NP: Major book/author news....

[Mark Kohut]

Google Settles Lawsuits brought by the Authors Guild on a class-action basis and five large publishers as representatives of Association of American Publishers against Google have been settled, pending approval by the US District Court. The release notes that "the agreement acknowledges the rights and interests of copyright owners, provides an efficient means for them to control how their intellectual property is accessed online and enables them to receive compensation for online access to their works."

Yes, compensation. Google will pay a total of $125 million, "to establish the Book Rights Registry, to resolve existing claims by authors and publishers and to cover legal fees." US copyright holders can register with the Book Rights Registry, a newly-established not-for-profit organization, and receive "a cash payment if their works have already been digitized." 

Mostly, all parties are hopeful that the settlement will open the way to revenue-generating schemes that have been impeded up until now by the litigation. The parties forsee purchasing of online access to complete texts by individual readers as well as paid institutional subscriptions for colleges, universities and other organizations. The Registry will distribute the appropriate payments, as well as "locate rightsholders, collect and maintain accurate rightsholder information, and provide a way for rightsholders to request inclusion in or exclusion from the project."

AAP chairman Richard Sarnoff says in the announcement: "This historic settlement is a win for everyone. From our perspective, the agreement creates an innovative framework for the use of copyrighted material in a rapidly digitizing world, serves readers by enabling broader access to a huge trove of hard-to-find books, and benefits the publishing community by establishing an attractive commercial model that offers both control and choice to the rightsholder."

Google co-founder Sergey Brin adds, "Today, together with the authors, publishers, and libraries, we have been able to make a great leap in this endeavor. While this agreement is a real win-win for all of us, the real victors are all the readers. The tremendous wealth of knowledge that lies within the books of the world will now be at their fingertips."

Rightsholders should visit this link once it is active for more information: http://books.google.com/booksrightsholders. Look for more on our site later today.
Guild announcement
AAP statement