Push Button Paradise

Take this ZDnet article, and I'll quote a bit of it, replacing "books" with "web sites":

But there's a big catch: Many of those web sites are protected by copyrights, and Google is requiring copyright holders to opt out of the scanning process if they don't want their web sites to be searchable.

That's raised plenty of hackles among publishers, who argue that they--not Google--should control who can see and search the web sites. And last week, five leading publishers filed suit against Google to stop the program.

"It's a commercial use" of the web sites and therefore a copyright violation, said Ralph Oman, a lawyer and former Register of Copyrights for the U.S. Copyright office. "This is masquerading as an educational use (which wouldn't be an obvious violation), but from Google's point of view this is a money-making exercise."

But not every copyright expert is so sure Google is on thin ice. Truth is, there's no consensus in the legal community on this one-of-a-kind case. The fight comes down to a simple question: Is the search king setting itself up to be a copyright violator of epic proportions, or is it a champion of learning trying to make even the most obscure web sites readily accessible in a Web search?

Like I wrote before, this could be a lead-up to a big disappointment. But either way this case will end up being more important than many now realize. -m

posted at: 23:48 | under: 2005-10 | 2 comment(s)