A well-known scholar and his publisher have demanded that Google withdraw his books from the digital archive that the Internet-search company is compiling from the holdings of five university and research libraries. "The basic problem is copyright violation," said Jacob Neusner, a research professor of theology at Bard College, who has written [or edited] more than 900 books...In an interview on Thursday, Mr. Neusner said that he had asked Google to remove his works from its Google Library project, but Google had insisted that he fill out a separate form for each of his books. That was wrong, said Mr. Neusner, because under copyright law it is Google's responsibility to seek permission to use a copyrighted work. So the Rowman & Littlefield Publishing Group, which has issued many of his books, took up the banner and has insisted that all of its works be removed from Google Library as well. Jed Lyons, president of Rowman & Littlefield, said that his company had not requested a royalty from Google for using the works. Nor will he. "We think it's unfair and arrogant and disrespectful of publishers' and authors' rights, and we don't want to do business with an organization that thumbs its nose at publishers and authors," he said. But Google, he said, is seeking to change his mind about withdrawing the works. "They're trying to convince us it's a mistake."
(PS: It's Jacob Neusner's loss. We know from the Authors Guild lawsuit that he's not the only author who would rather dig in his heels than find readers and buyers. If any of our searches would have pointed to his work, then it's also our loss.)
Posted by
Peter Suber at 10/07/2005 11:39:00 AM.
The open access movement:
Putting peer-reviewed scientific and scholarly literature
on the internet. Making it available free of charge and
free of most copyright and licensing restrictions.
Removing the barriers to serious research.
I recommend the OA tracking project (OATP) as the best way to stay on top of new OA developments. You can read the OATP feed on a blog-like web page or subscribe to it by RSS, email, or Twitter. You can also help build the feed by tagging new developments you encounter.
