Just like all other technologies, books are in danger of becoming extinct thanks to the Internet. Books are expensive, they are heavy, and while some people read them multiple times, for many they are purchased for a one-time use. They can be borrowed from the library for short periods of time. They can be stolen, physical and if one wanted, digitally.
Google Books has decided to totally disrupt this system. In 2002, Google began the process of scanning public domain books into its search engine. For a small fee, anyone could view these works. But the process has not gone smoothly for Google. Since day one, Google Book has faced multiple lawsuits from various entities. Judges have argued that Google does not have the right to take work that is public and begin charging a fee for it. Google has made various attempts to find copyright holders and pay royalties when necessary.
Google’s logic for creating Google Books is to give the world access to literature they might not otherwise be able to. This could be for a variety of reasons, whether it be money or because the book is out of print, or the copyright is lost. Personally, I disagree with all of this. While there should be a motivating factor to locate copyright holders for orphaned works, this is not the way to do it. Google claims they want to give every access to these literary works. If someone can’t spend $10 on a book, how could they afford a computer with Internet? In addition, I do not think Google has the right to charge for access to these works. Google plans to continue expanding its digital library. Dou you think Google has the right to do this? Do you think they have the right to charge for it?
Source:
http://www.kansascity.com/2011/04/13/2797087/future-of-google-digital-library.html
Does Google have the rights to do this? Certainly. Does Google have the rights to charge? Sure. Does Google have the means to charge? Absolutely not. Google is a user-based operating system. The source of the power of Google’s search engine (which is the source of the power of Google’s products) is the algorithms used by the engineers to collect data from search queries. If Google started to charge users for a service that was free and remains free elsewhere (libraries) then they will lose their users, thus pulling the plug on their entire operation. The fact that Google is a private company scares people int this sense but lets face it they are a company they want to stay in business. Does that fact that a private company like Facebook holds roughly 800 million people’s information make anyone just as anxious about personal documentation not really. But when you have a company that just wants to gather and organize books online, it turns into a frenzy. Google charging people for a service is similar to Facebook charging users for that services. They can try it but all that will do is push their users into he arms of their competitors, leading to their demise. Remember Google is not the only search company just the most prominent and domineering one, if this company wants to remain this way they have to maintain their user retention rates, a goal that is prominent at any company.
I have to agree with Bruce: for Google to charge a fee to distribute the books that belong to the public domain overextends their boundaries as a company. Works in the public domain, after all, are meant to be publicly available. Is there any indictation as to where those initial fees were allocated? Because if they were retained as a profit for Google, that seems very problematic. What royalties are they meant to be paying to objects in the public domain? That doesn’t make any sense. As for providing users with the availability of certain titles, I can commend Google’s attempt at sharing the literature. But otherwise, I’m struggling to see the premise for Google to charge for basically the “borrowing” of their library of titles.
I agree to Google’s initiative. I do not think that the issue should be focused on whether Google has the right to do it. Digitalizing books has to be done in some way or the other in the coming future. Somebody has to do it and it needs to be done in accordance to technological breakthroughs and changing life styles because of these innovations. It just seems that Google is positioned at the right time with sufficient amount of resources to put digitalizing the books to action. On the other hand, I agree with you on the matter that Google should not keep all the profits they gain from access charges. Google should give part of their profits to the authors of the original work. For example, if there is a work on the public domain, Google should not charge those that are already free to the public. Nevertheless, Google’s effort in using their private resources to digitize books should be acknowledged in some way or the other. I think we are situated in a moment and era where these transition initiative needs to be made. We may stumble over many unexpected problems on the way of digitalizing books, but it is a necessity that we cannot avoid facing.
There is a slight distinction – Google really isn’t charging for the books, per se. They’re looking to charge for access to a database.
Look at the structure system of law school databases like WestLaw, or even LexisNexis. Some of these articles are available for free, either through a no-cost subscription to a journal or by digging through the Internet or academic paper databases like SSNN. But universities and libraries pay for the privilege of organized, searchable compiled data.
I don’t think Google should be barred from charging for subscriptions to the GoogleBooks database – charging for access to individual public domain works is another issue (and one which I obviously would feel differently about).
Good point, however, a small problem remains. While some are capable of appreciating this distinction, I think that the average Google user is going to perceive this charge as “access to public domain works”. In the age of quasi instantaneous results, we want easy access and we want it to be free. Though the situation isn’t actually the same, a parallel exists here: when the New York Times began charging, many readers really did move on to the Huffington Post- It didn’t matter that some of the content remains free. Is the NYT a better publication? Probably, but the point I’m making here is that people are constantly looking for the easiest way to do things. Should they be responsible for themselves? Absolutely! But my fear is that there will be a shift to less credible/lower quality sources. How great will the effect academic research and personal edification be?
There is a real danger here and we need to think of the long term consequences of what Google are proposing.
Google ultimately is the enemy of ALL creative industries. It has effectively destroyed the photographic industry by creating a hedonistic “take take” culture amoung consumers and users, allowing an effective means for thieves to steal work, thus taking food from the mouths of creators. Now it is seeking to do the same to authors.
If creators are unable to licence their work, how are they supposed to make a living???? How are they supposed to survive? The argument for advertising revenues simply doesn’t stand up, you only have to look at what has happened to the newspaper industry in recent years, after it started putting content online for free.
I genuinely now fear for the future of our creative industries. Artists like Jane Austin, JK Rowling, Picasso, Henry Cartierre Bresson and so on, will become a thing of the past as the next generation will find it largely impossible to find the time to fund new projects due to the lack of revenue from what they do.
The danger further is that even if google do charge for access to work and pay a royalty, they have no connect to the time taken to create the work, the consequence being that like so many marketing people, they will just say “it didn’t cost us anything, so we’ll just undercut the price of ordinary sellers like Amazon to win market share. It will take money away from authors, but we don’t care because ultimately we are the big fish who didn’t pay anything for this stuff, and we will make back our sales in terms of quantity across the entire range.” In short, they profit, but the individual creator looses.
This will introduce a new concept, “cultural famine” as the volume of high quality professionally produced work falls off to nil. The only thing that will remain will be large amounts of substandard short amateur created content. But then, that will be the logical consequence of large organisations taking things that arn’t theirs to take, giving them away for free and then pocketing the advertising revenue for themselves.
The consequences of this sort of action are already been suffered by many at the grass roots of the creative industries. Check out what happened to stock photography for example, the libraries still exist (some of them) but many of the regular professional creators of a few years ago have gone to be replaced by huge volumes of extremely sub standard amateur created work. The situation could be even worse for authors give the time it takes to write a book. Authorship for the vast majority has never been a big money spinner. To do the job regularly requires a time commitment that simply would not be possible if someone has to work in another job for 5-6 days a week in order to survive. Urgent action to regulate and control google and its counterparts, otherwise many of the grass roots creative industries will cease to exist in a matter of a few years.
Only a smiling visitant here to share the love (:, btw outstanding pattern . “Audacity, more audacity and always audacity.” by Georges Jacques Danton.