Somehow I forgot to blog Danny Sullivan's interview with Sally Morris on the ALPSP's objection to Google Library's opt-out policy. It appeared in SearchDay for August 30. Sally Morris is the Chief Executive of the ALPSP. (Thanks to Gary Price.) Excerpt:
The ALPSP put out a statement (PDF format) last week with this key highlight that caught my eye: "Google Print for Libraries is a very different matter. We firmly believe that, in cases where the works digitised are still in copyright, the law does not permit making a complete digital copy for such [indexing] purposes." I asked Morris: "Google...has indexed nearly 1,000 pages from the ALPSP web site. My assumption is that the ALPSP never overtly asked for these pages, all of which are copyrighted, to be digitized and included in Google. Despite this, I've never heard your organization complain about such indexing....In short, why is opt-out OK when it comes to web content but not OK when it comes to [other] published works?"
Morris replied: "[Y]ou're right, in principle Google should seek opt-in permission before indexing freely available web pages, too...However, I think the issue is much more acute where the content is not made freely available by its copyright owner - which is, of course, the case for all the in-copyright content Google are planning to digitise from libraries."
I wasn't convinced on the "freely available" front and sent this follow-up: "Why is publishing a book not making content freely available? If I go into a library, I've got plenty of content for free. That's exactly why Google has gone into the libraries....I don't know of any library being sued for allowing people to borrow books, which arguably goes directly to the potential earnings a publisher could make....In contrast, Google is not making the full text of books available as a library does. If anything, libraries are far greater infringers than Google and have been so longer. Why aren't libraries being targeted?"
Morris replied: "A published book is sold - to the individual or to the library. Lending it out does not contravene copyright. To my mind, making a digital copy of the whole thing does. We are not saying that increasing visibility via Google Print is a bad thing - I think those of our members who participate in the Google Print for Publishers program (or who otherwise allow Google to index their closed content) are generally pleased with the increased hits, though I'm less clear whether they are in fact seeing increased sales. All we're saying is that the method of achieving it seems to us clearly to break copyright laws - and we'd like to work with Google to find an acceptable way of getting publishers' opt-in."
[Sullivan again:] And I guess all I'm saying is that those publishers, if they try to push this angle with Google via a lawsuit, had better be prepared for explaining why they've never complained about having their web sites indexed by Google for years without permission. Moreover, woe to the publisher or member of a publishing group that is ever found during legal disclosure to have complained about not being indexed better on Google. You can't enjoy years of free traffic from a source, then suddenly decide that copyright law is now different just because the words appear in print, rather than on the web. One interesting solution will be to see if Google simply goes out and buys a copy of every book it wants to offer in its virtual library.
Posted by
Peter Suber at 10/06/2005 07:32:00 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.
