Google fears remain

Google’s scanning of works from five major libraries has led publishers to question its right to digitise material that is still in copyright.
The company says that where such still-copyright works are scanned from a library, users will be able to view only the bibliographic information and a few short sentences of text around their chosen search terms.
A spokesman said it prefers to work directly with publishers to bring copyrighted books online through content excerpt pages and links to book retailers, and is initially focusing on out-of-copyright books. But "to make Google more useful to users, Google is scanning all types of books from libraries including those in the public domain, out-of-print titles and those still under copyright." The spokesman also said that publishers may opt out, and content from their books scanned in libraries will not be displayed to Google users.
But Bloomsbury c.e.o. Nigel Newton said: "This does not reassure me in the least because 100% of the text of the books is being scanned. Although the current proposal is to limit to small amounts what is viewed, this is the thin end of the wedge and you can be absolutely sure that in five to 10 years’ time we will be in a completely different place, with larger amounts of text being made available."
Lawyer Michael Evans, of Faegre & Benson, says large-scale systematic scanning would appear to be an infringement of copyright, but reproducing insubstantial parts of works is not.
Meanwhile, Google has set up a homepage for Google Print, www.print.google.com.> Briefs > n.b.news