Google Play and Lawyers Win?

Seven years is a long time in this digital age and much has happened since Google first attempted to land grab all the content, adopt the orphans and hoodwink the industry. Seven years of litigation, seven years of fat legal expenses and seven years which on reflection were sometimes sad as positions were taken and sometimes it appeared the industry was hell bent on a programme of civil war. It was somewhat inevitable it would be settled ‘out of court’ and behind those now richer lawyers’ doors and yesterday the Association of American Publishers (AAP) and Google announced a settlement agreement and the dismissal of their lawsuit.

The Authors Guild fights on and no doubt we may hear of a similar settlement in the future.

We don’t know the details of what has been agreed other than the high level statements which say much, but as ever are open to much interpretation. What is clear is that although the simpler and less contentious case of the publishers is resolved, the core issue of orphans remains unresolved and somewhat on the table. The settlement would appear to remain an ‘opt out’ not an ‘opt in’ model which is a clear win for Google and it is somewhat unclear what the terms are.

The question remains; who owns what and whether digital rights of books digitised by Google under its programme are actually all owned by the publishers, or assumed to be owned and aligned to the print rendition?

There is no mention of the rights registry, so the one positive the old settlement would have delivered appears to have disappeared with the will to continue the fight.

Following the agency debacle, this would appear to be the second attempt to derail Amazon that has expensively gone wrong. It would lead some to question the cost of litigation incurred and what has been achieved in return?

Related articles:

AAP Press Release

The Chronicle of Higher Education (with interesting quotes from James Grimmelmann)

FT: Google ebook win little treat to Amazon

Indies You’ve Been Googled!

The marriage of Google Books and Indie Bookstores tied the knot between, the bride who brought her wealth of stores and customers and the groom who brought his technology and ebooks. Was it an even relationship founded on common understanding and shared belief in each other, or merely a hastily arranged mis-marriage born more of convenience than love and probably never consummated?

This week Google started divorce proceedings based on the indies not delivering sales.

Unrequited love, often drive the groom to seek pastures new and in this case Google has declared that it will start to sell e-books solely through its recently launched Google Play beginning January 31, 2013. Will it makes the envisaged sales it believes it can do better on its own or will it find the market will has moved on further and Google is not the ebook force it once envisaged?

The bride will no doubt be unindicted by new suitors hungry to convert the dowry on offer. However, will these wanabees fair any better, offer a true relationship or once again follow in the footsteps of Google when their expectations are not met. It is easy to see a line of ‘white label’ suitors who all will offer books and technology. How will any of these differ from what went before? It is often said that if one rushes on the rebound from one broken relationship to another, with the next one being to someone very similar to the first.

When we wrote the Brave New World report in 2006 we saw the opportunity for booksellers to embrace and deliver the digital opportunity. Then it was possible to see strong partnerships that could have matured, but today the landscape is very different and although the pie has grown significantly the opportunity to cut a sizable slice of it has diminished for many. We did discuss the opportunity for bookstore to build their own platform and take control of their own destiny but it was felt that marriage was more rewarding than remaining single. In hindsight we wish we would have been more forceful and argued the case stronger as a booksellers digital repository tied to stores and consumers would have had strong market appeal and perhaps would have attracted a more equal suitor or offered a stronger relationship.

The opportunity is not lost, nor should anyone dismiss the wealth on offer, but it takes strong leadership and vision now to move the indies digitally forward. The UK and US do not have the security of the Centraal Boekhuis relationship but can learn much from it. The stores themselves need to recognise that white ‘label stores’ only offer a commission not a marriage or partnership. It’s somewhat ironic that the two parties, libraries and bookstores, that are now playing the dating game, are potentially still the strongest bodies if they can the pull all the pieces together.

Google Make a Wise Move On eBooks

I remember fondly walking into the offices of ebook technologies in San Diego some three years ago. We say San Diego, but in reality they are in La Jolla, which is the gem, hidden away on the south west coast. The term office was loose, as it more resembled a technology lab with every size, make and model of ereaders wired to perform across every desk and often with their core exposed like dead men in a mortuary.

Why were we there? Simple, these guys and their President Garth Conboy, not only knew everything there was to know about ereaders from yesterday but also what was likely to happen tomorrow. They had grown up through the first ebook era of Softbook, Gemstar etc and had even acquired some of the technology. We needed advice and insights and saw no one their equal.

Today Google has made them their first acquisition of 2011 and have acquired ebook technologies, a small but very effective company, focused on the ebook and ebook readers hardware and software distribution. They also have acquired some interesting intellectual property and a team that is capable of interesting innovation.

The acquisition may be ‘chump change’ for Google, but by doing it, it has signalled its ebook ambitions and intent to not just provide scanning, search, discovery and sales but to be abreast and maybe even get involved in the technology itself. In adopting an "Open" position on ebooks Google needs to remain one step ahead of a growing army of pretenders,technology strategies and also evolving standards as well as the thorny issue of DRM. In Garth they also have acquired someone who knows epub standards as well as anyone and has been influencial in its development.

Well done Garth and the team!

Should Digital Public Works Be Exclusive?

According to The New York Times, the European Commission look likely to respond to the pressure to limit the amount of time private companies can exercise exclusive use of digitized materials from the public domain.

Having already digitised millions of works, Google remains the biggest benefactor of the current situation. Google and others can restrict access to the works and yet also benefit themselves through the works remaining commercial exclusive to them. The move to reduce the exclusive period from the current 15 years to 7 would enable the public to benefit better from what is ‘public domain’ works. The advocates of the current move wish to see increased access for not-for-profit organizations such as Europeana, which is an online digital service supporting European arts and culture funded by the EU.

As more national treasures and public domain works get digitised it makes sense to get these into the public domain and not restrict them to one digital owner. Google and others may have paid huge sums to digitise the works but they came from libraries who had paid for the original books out of public funds. Some would suggest that what is public should remain public and philanthropy in this case should come before profit.