Our problem is that the guys and girls at Google don’t really get books. They want to believe that books are just primitive webpages, simply more information to be organized for the benefit of everyone....But websites are built for the web. Books were not written for Google Library. Forcing publishers and authors to opt-out, instead of opt-in, is not fair. It’s coercive....Librarians, unfortunately, don’t understand the rights of the creators and producers of books. Most librarians do not understand the work and expense, the expertise and talent, involved in creating the publications they buy. And quite a few believe that information should be free --unless it is only available through them. Besides that, Google has an unhealthy fascination for librarians: they are (rightly) terrified by the fact that students go to Google instead of to them, but they can’t take their eyes off it. Google is taking advantage of librarians by making them partners in a process that undermines the sources of information and knowledge that their institutions and communities depend on. As a result, authors and publishers can easily be made to look obstructive and mean-spirited....It’s a good thing the Google lawsuit isn’t going to be decided by a public referendum, because we authors would lose hands down. I’ve taken to asking people whether, if it were possible, they would be happy if they knew Google was going to scan, store, and index copies of all their personal photographs and diaries, photos of the interior of their house and their closets, all without permission? (And use that content to make money.) Our challenge is to show people just what it takes to create and publish a book and that intellectual creation merits every bit as much protection as physical property. And we need to talk about this is simple terms. When Google says it will take and hold and use content that does not belong to them, without asking permission, they are coming awfully close to breaking their own rule, “Don’t be evil.”
Comment. Three quick replies. (1) For a defense of Google Library's opt-out policy, see my article in this week's SOAN. (2) The analogy to personal photos and diaries is very bad. We don't make them hoping to bring them to the largest possible audience. We don't hope to make money from them. We don't welcome free advertising for their contents. But book authors do all of these things. (3) Publishers who don't want to look "obstructive and mean-spirited" should stop using the false and grasping comparison of intellectual property to physical property. Physical property doesn't enter the public domain after a fixed term of years, and non-owners have no fair-use rights over it. Intellectual property is only quasi-property that every country on Earth treats very differently from physical property.
Posted by
Peter Suber at 10/05/2005 01:16:00 PM.
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.
