Google Books hearing officially delayed

The judge overseeing Google Books settlement has agreed to the plaintiffs' request for a delay of the final hearing scheduled to approve the controversial settlement, which is being reworked by the parties.

Judge Denny Chin of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York had been scheduled to oversee a October 7 hearing about whether to approve a 2008 settlement between Google and several groups representing authors and publishers. However, the settlement, which gives Google sweeping rights to digitize out-of-print but copyright protected books, has drawn staunch opposition from many corners of the literary world as well as the U.S. Department of Justice.

As a result, the settlement is in the process of being reworked, and Judge Chin agreed to give the parties more time to rework the settlement following a request from the plaintiffs filed earlier this week. "Under all the circumstances, it makes no sense to conduct a hearing on the fairness and reasonableness of the current settlement agreement, as it does not appear that the current settlement will be the operative one," Chin wrote in a letter sent to both parties.

Instead, the parties will hold a status conference on the 7th to figure out what to do next. Chin noted that this case has been in the works for over four years, when groups representing authors and publishers sued Google in 2005 for digitizing books without explicit permission.

[OctoChops]

I still don't know what to think of this. I'm happy but confused.

[dowell100]

Google has no right to to digitize out-of-print but copyright protected books.

The Book Rights Registry is just a Google puppet They want to pay $125 million to fund it and they will own it no matter what anyone says.

According to the US Department of Justice: "The settlement should be modified so that it complies with U.S. copyright and antitrust laws, and to satisfy the requirements of Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 23, which sets parameters for approving class-action lawsuit settlements."

Google is trying for a massive theft of intellectual property, and they should be stopped. Their Utopian view of digitizing the world''s books is just a smokescreen. They just want more text to use as lures for more ads. They are trying to get a free ride off the intellectual property of others.

[Police_States_of_America]

google is indexing data that it plans to use in business deals. quit whining.

[zclayton3]

If a book is out of print then there is no monetary interest in it by the publisher the author the heirs of the estate or anyone but the person who wants to read that content. entities with no monetary interest should not be allowed to hold up the process. copyright is B$ without an interest in monetizing it.

[Besh32]

We have a situation here. As I said earlier, the books published since 1970s and up to 1960s are printed on acid paper and they are quickly deteriorating. The only way to protect them is filming or scanning. The more we argue about money and rights the more of them will just disappear.
http://www.betanews.com/article/Justice-Dept-What-right-does-Google-have-to-ebook-exclusivity/1253554550

[hutwarmer]

Google should just bail on this and say "*crew you" to everyone. Then everyone can get back to their pathetic little lives where they whine about how unfair the world is while sitting back doing nothing. Many of these out of print books will eventually fade away and nobody will care anyway.