More on Google

[Joseph Esposito <espositoj@gmail.com>]

I just stumbled across the following in a FAQ on the Stanford Web site:

"Will books scanned at Stanford be available to the general public? In
what format?

"Materials that are clearly in the public domain (mostly materials with
publication dates of 1922 or earlier) will be available to the general
public through Google. All users should be able to view the full text of
public domain materials online. This will be part of "Google Print"; see
http://print.google.com/ for more about the services offered.

"Google is exploring options for displaying snippets of copyrighted
materials online in ways that adhere closely to appropriate copyright
protections. Access to digitized content served by Stanford will be
restricted to members of the Stanford community."

JE:  Note that last sentence.  One interpretation of it (and only one:
this is not the most informative FAQ I have ever seen) is that some
copyrighted books in the Stanford Library will be mounted on a Stanford
server for access by the Stanford community.  That means that the sale of
one hardcopy yields community-wide access.  I am curious to know if
members of this list believe that this is allowable under copyright law,
or if a copyright-holder's permission is required for community-wide
dissemination.

-- 
Joe Esposito