Re: French deal may break deadlock between Google and publishers

[Sandy Thatcher <sandy.thatcher@alumni.princeton.edu>]

And what would Hachette do with copies that they could not use 
commercially? What would be the benefit to them?

Sandy Thatcher


At 8:32 PM -0500 11/30/10, Mary Murrell wrote:
>I haven't seen the agreement, but the press coverage (in the New
>York Times and the Bookseller) indicated that Google would give
>copies to Hachette (for non-commercial uses) and to the
>Bibliotheque Nationale de France.
>
>It's not clear where the books will come from -- US libraries?
>Hachette itself? -- or how many Google has *already* scanned.
>
>I also thought that publishers (US ones, at least) already had
>the option of submitting a list of ISBNs to Google that would
>then be excluded from their scanning, but perhaps I was mistaken.
>
>Mary Murrell
>
>
>>  If I'm reading this announcement correctly, what this arrangement
>>  does is what the Amended Google Settlement also does, as thus
>>  summarized from an official document about the AS:
>>
>>>As Google first announced in September 2009, any book retailer
>>>-- Amazon, Barnes & Noble, local bookstores, or other retailers
>>>-- will be able to sell consumers online access to the
>>>out-of-print books covered by the settlement, including
>>>unclaimed books. Rightsholders will still receive 63% of the
>>>revenue, while retailers will keep the majority of the remaining
>>>37%. This provision has been explicitly written into the revised
>>>agreement as a Google obligation.
>>
>>  I do not believe that this means Google will give its digital
>>  files to Hachette for Hachette to use in any way it pleases.
>>  That would indeed be a step beyond anything Google has agreed
>>  to do in the past.
>>
>>  When Penn State Press approached Michigan about granting more
>>  use rights for the library's Google book files of Press books
>>  if Michigan would give the Press a copy of the files for its
>>  use, Michigan agreed but Google nixed the deal. Google has been
>>  very protective of its files, and I can't imagine that it
>>  really has backed away from that position.
>>
>>  Does anyone on this list know what the arrangement with
>>  Hachette indeed entails in this respect?
>>
>>  Sandy Thatcher