John Steinbeck to lessen Google wrath...

The Google book controversy rages on. Following the long dispute with the Author's Guild, writers have until January 28th to opt in or out of the scheme, which is currently digitising millions of books world wide. Led by Ursula Le Guin, of 'Earthsea novels' fame, several authors have expressed their digust with the deal, including Nick Harkaway and Kim Stanley Robinson; Le Guin herself called it a 'deal with the devil'. However, the tide has shifted in recent days, as the Steinbeck family has announced their decision to 'opt in'. Gail Steinbeck, the famous author's daughter-in-law, stated that while she was still against Google's 'imperious act of copyright infringement', it was time to evaluate the situation and minimise the losses. Le Guin is still continuing with her petition, to this date signed by almost 300 authors.

Guild v Google...

A US judge has announced the date for the settlement in a major literary legal dispute today. February 18th next year, will see the culmination of the Authors Guild action against Google books in 2005 for a breach of copyright. By scanning texts from the United States and Britain, Google had been creating a digital archive of books, which it hoped to sell on its website; yet the previews for such items included small section of text available for free. The system was admonished by the president of the Authors Guild who stated, 'Authors, not Google, have the exclusive rights to...authorise such reproduction, distribution and display of their works.' But Google fought back, claiming their new project, 'directly benefits authors and publishers by increasing awareness and sales of the books.' A settlement had been agreed last year, with Google agreeing to pay $125 million, to create an independent 'Books Rights Registry' with a proportion of revenue going straight to the author; yet a revised settlement has now been called for, and the case should be resolved next year.