Tuesday, October 28, 2008

Google Reaches Deal With Authors, Publishers

Mountain View-based Google said Tuesday that the firm has inked a deal with authors and publishers to settle a class action lawsuit filed against Google by the Author's Guide and the Association of American Publishers. According to Google, the settlement settles a lawsuit that has been ongoing for two years, as well as a separate lawsuit by five large publishers, over Google's inclusion of those firms' books in its Google Books search. Google will pay $125M to settle the lawsuits, and will establish a Books Rights Registry which will resolve existing claims with allow authors and publishers. Google was sued by the publishers and authors after it began including copyrighted material from publishers in its book search results, without explicit permission from those publishers or authors. Among terms of the settlement, which still needs to be approved by the court, is the ability to make in-copyright but out-of-print books available for searching, previewing, and buying online; authors and publishers of those books will be compensated. The deal also allows users to pay for books which are copyrighted for viewing online.