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As Google settles copyright issues with its Google Books service, their competitors continue to object. Are the complaints mere distractions from the benefits Google Books Search presents? Dusty books in library shelves will once again be read, with help from Google. The Google Books Library Project has been scanning books from libraries for the past five years, creating a new avenue for information access. As Google settles copyright issues with the Authors Guild, the Association of American Publishers, and others, the company continues to face opposition from its competitors. Currently Google Book Search allows you to search text, and to view snippets from copyrighted books. Once the settlement is reached, more books will then be available for preview, reading, and purchase. As of today, Google has scanned over ten million books, half of these books being out-of-print or commercially unavailable. The Kindle, Amazon’s eBook reader, offers less than a million titles. Only one million items in Google Books Search have been settled for full preview. Once the settlement is approved, Google Books might be more useful than other eBooks providers in terms of information and access. If the settlement is approved, books that are purchased through Google’s service will be accessible on any computer with internet access. This feature makes data more accessible, and cheaper than the Amazon Kindle. The Kindle costs three hundred dollars, but most people already have a computer. In addition to personal access, the Google Books settlement will offer institutional subscriptions for universities. Students of participating schools will have faster access to more books, all without visiting the library. This would mean greater access to knowledge, but not without strong opposition from its competitors. The three other technology titans are not pleased. Yahoo!, Amazon, and Microsoft have allied themselves with other organizations to form the Open Book Alliance. Gary Reback, the lawyer whose efforts led to the Microsoft antitrust case in the late 90s, is the co-chair of this organization. In July 2009, Reback admitted during an interview with Michael Arrington of Techcrunch, that he is “troubled” by Google’s “unfair advantage.” Is Google Books, once settled, creating a monopoly? The strength of arguments against Google Books varies. The Open Book Alliance claims that the Google Books settlement is anticompetitive. However, this settlement is non-exclusive, so a business competitor could create a similar agreement with publishers. There is a financial barrier to providing an expansive eBook service. The cost of the Google Books settlement with the publishers is about 125 million dollars, not including the costs of their legal battle. Still this is not a financial obstacle for a company like Microsoft. In October 2007, Microsoft paid $694 M to the European Commission for antitrust law violations. In respect to their reported $51.12 B revenue in 2007, the fine was miniscule. The innovation of the Google Books service is a bright one, especially in the global digital age. Nonetheless, Google’s competition will continue to fight the settlement. They forget that technical change is bound to happen, regardless of legislation. * 694 million dollar fee  |
Comments
What the OBA doesn't get is that ebooks are such an innovation that it changes the product denomination completely. People aren't buying books, or even words - they're buying data. The commodity for sale is the device that presents teh data. It used to be books. Now its an LED high-resolution screen.
As a firm, one can charge for goods or services. Hoarding data which is virtually free to make(I'm typing some right now) and charging too much for access is not a service, it's a moral sin. And a Kindle that does less than a 0 notebook PC is not good, either.