Stanford University has expressed its disappointment with the latest ruling in the Google Books Agreement case. The university is analysing the decision and will consult with other libraries participating in Google's digitisation project.
US Circuit Judge Denny Chin had said the deal between Google and publishers 'goes too far.' But Stanford does not have to halt its project of digitising the books in the university's libraries - over 2 million have been scanned since 2004.
Google reached a $125 million settlement with authors and publishers after the company was sued for copyright infringement in 2005, shortly after starting to make digital copies of every published book. The recent decision by Judge Chin in Manhattan said the deal would give Google 'a significant advantage over competitors, rewarding it for engaging in wholesale copying of copyrighted works without permission.'
Stanford has not been part of the lawsuit but supported the settlement. It argued that digitising its books would preserve fragile volumes, make them easily accessible and allow researchers to efficiently scan and mine them for information that would otherwise require reading entire works. Google has scanned about 2 million books owned by Stanford, and more than 24 other major libraries are involved in the project.
Michael Keller, the university's librarian, said Chin's decision leaves unanswered several issues, including how to create a universal library; how long books should be protected by copyright; and how to deal with access to orphan works - books that are still under copyright protection but are not necessarily marketable and have no identifiable copyright holder.
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