We may have announced the time to rejoice over Google Book’s settlement a wee bit too soon. As Miguel Helft wrote for the NY Times on Thursday, “As currently written, the controversial settlement between Google and groups representing publishers and authors is officially dead.” But before you start ringing the bells of mourning, it seems a federal judge gave the parties time to negotiate a new deal! Yay! And one that would address some of the many objections filed by various groups.
The Authors Guild and the Association of American University Presses sued Google in 2005. They felt that Google’s plan to scan books from major libraries and make them available online constituted copyright infringement. After two years of negotiations, the parties announced the settlement in October 2008.
Judge Denny Chin (of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, if you must know) granted a motion to delay an October 7th hearing on the settlement. The motion was filed earlier this week by the Authors Guild and the Association of American Publishers, the plaintiffs in the case, and was unopposed by Google, the defendant.
In his order, Judge Chin indicated that he took seriously the long list of objections that various parties have raised about the agreement.
“The current settlement agreement raises significant issues, as demonstrated not only by the number of objections, but also by the fact that the objectors include countries, states, nonprofit organizations, and prominent authors and law professors,” Judge Chin wrote. “Clearly, fair concerns have been raised.”
Instead of the scheduled fairness hearing, Judge Chin asked the parties to convene in court on October 7th for a status conference to “determine how to proceed with the case as expeditiously as possible, as this case has now been pending for more than four years,” he wrote.
So, readers of digital books, keep your fingers crossed for this to be resolved with internet speed!
Tags: Digital Books, Google, Internet Speed