![]() ![]() ![]() Amount and Substantiality of Portion Used.Given that the books are also published and publicly available, he finds that the second test “favor(s) a finding of fair use.” ![]() Nature of the Copyrighted Works: In considering this test, Judge Chin takes into account the fact that “the vast majority” (as much as 93%) “of the books in Google Books are non-fiction,” and therefore entitled to less protection against a fair use claim than creative, fictional works would be.Purpose and Character: Here Judge Chin refers back to his argument that “Google’s use of the copyrighted works is highly transformative,” in that it “transforms expressive text into a comprehensive word index” he emphasizes that “the use of book text to facilitate search through the display of snippets is transformative.” In this case, he argues, “words in books are being used in a way they have not been used before.” He acknowledges that commercial use of copyrighted material generally weighs against a fair-use finding in this context, but points out that a) “Google does not sell the scans it has made” b) “it does not sell the snippets that it displays” and c) “it does not run ads on the About the Book pages that contain snippets.” In short, Google “does not engage in the direct commercialization of copyrighted works.” Judge Chin concludes that the first fair use factor “strongly favors a finding of fair use.”.In his analysis of the fair use argument, Judge Chin begins by strongly defending the characterization of Google’s digitization project as a “transformative” use (a heavy factor in favor of fair use), and then applies each of the four tests for fair use to Google’s actions: Benefits authors and publishers “by helping readers and researchers identify books” and by providing “links to sellers of the book.”.“ Helps to preserve books and give them new life,” particularly by making old and out-of-print books available to the general public.(Google Books “provides print-disabled individuals with the potential to search for books and read them” and “facilitates the identification and access of materials for remote and underfunded libraries.”) (“Google Books permits humanities scholars to analyze massive amounts of data-the literary record created by a collection of tens of millions of books.”) Makes text-mining possible on a massive scale.(“Google Books provides a new and efficient way for readers and researchers to find books… has become an essential research tool.”) He cites as factual truths that the Google Books project: All quotes in the section below are taken from Judge Chin’s written decision. Among the facts he lays out are, significantly, a list of five benefits that he feels Google Books offers to society. In his decision, he reviews the facts and procedural history of the case. ![]() (In 2012 Google did reach a separate settlement with the Association of American Publishers, which had sued Google specifically over its use of books published by McGraw-Hill, Pearson Education, the Penguin Group, John Wiley & Sons, and Simon & Schuster.) However, an appellate court’s rejection this past summer of Judge Chin’s granting of class status to the plaintiffs contained significant hints that the lawsuit was not going to end well for them-in that decision, the Second Circuit hinted strongly that they found Google’s fair-use defense compelling.Īnd in the end, Judge Chin agreed. This decision comes as less than a total surprise to many observers, even though the future of Google Books seemed uncertain following Judge Chin’s rejection of a proposed settlement in early 2011. In a decision that may have deep and wide-ranging implications for the publishing industry and for future applications of the fair use doctrine, Judge Denny Chin has dismissed the Authors Guild’s eight-year-old lawsuit against Google over its Google Books project. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |