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Below is the advice the Authors Guild offers about the settlement<br>
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<font size=2>For a quick guide to the settlement, see the following.
<br><br>
Freely forward and post this message. For more information, contact
staff@authorsguild.org or 212.563.5904.<br><br>
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<b>Should I Opt Out? Should I Fear Google? What about the Money?<br>
<i>Answers about the Google Book Settlement<br><br>
</i>There's not much time left for authors to opt out. What should
I do?<br><br>
</b>Short answer: nothing.<br><br>
Longer answer: Opting out of the settlement is for authors who want to
preserve their right to sue Google themselves. We don't think there
are any such authors.<br><br>
<b>Then, do I need to sign up somewhere?<br><br>
</b>You don't <i>have</i> to-your rights are fully protected either
way. But yes, we do recommend that you claim your books. It's
easy to do that on line, at
<a href="http://www.googlebooksettlement.com. " eudora="autourl">
www.googlebooksettlement.com. </a> Then when money starts coming in that
belongs to you, the Book Rights Registry will know where to find
you.<br><br>
<b>What money?<br><br>
</b>If Google scanned your book from any library, you may be entitled to
a small payment just for that: at least $60 per book, and up to $300,
depending on how many people claim their books. (The deadline is
next January 5 and, again, you sign up at
www.googlebooksettlement.com.)<br><br>
There will also be money from advertising. When Google displays ads
next to any page from a book of yours, you are entitled to a share of the
money.<br><br>
And then there will be money from institutional licenses and from sales
to consumers who find books through Google search and want to read more
than a small sample.<br><br>
In addition, there will be per-page printing fees from users of free
access terminals in public and academic libraries throughout the
country.<br><br>
All this applies to millions of books that have been out of print.
Books still in print (published up to January 5th of this year) can be
included if that's what both the author and publisher want.<br><br>
<b>But what if I don't want Google displaying my book at all?<br><br>
</b>You are fully protected. The settlement gives rights holders
full control over how their books appear in the program. You can
tell Google to display nothing at all. You can display only
snippets. You can let users see a fixed percentage of the
book. You can let users buy the ability to read the whole
book.<br><br>
And you can change your mind at any time.<br><br>
<b>Assuming I do want to let readers buy access to my book, who decides
the price?<br><br>
</b>You do. The rights holder.<br><br>
Google has developed an algorithm to help find optimal prices for
different books. Those prices will be used when rights holders
don't want to decide on their own, or when rights holders can't be
found.<br><br>
But the rights holder can always take over and specify a price.<br><br>
<b>Am I the rights holder -- or is the publisher -- if my book is out of
print?<br><br>
</b>When your book goes out of print, rights should revert to you, but
generally you have to take action to make sure that happens: send a
written request to your publisher. This settlement makes it more
important than ever that authors do that.<br><br>
If rights haven't reverted, you and your publisher share control (and
share the revenue). But you always retain veto power.<br><br>
<b>What is Google's role in the new Book Rights Registry?<br><br>
</b>None. As part of the settlement, Google has to put up the
start-up money to get the Registry up and running. (We expect them
also to help with some tech support.) But the Registry will be
controlled by a board of authors' and publishers' representatives; Google
does not get a voice.<br><br>
<b>What about the "orphan works"? Doesn't Google get a
monopoly over those?<br><br>
</b>There is a big difference between "out-of-print" works and
"orphan" works. It is inevitable that some rightsholders
will not claim their out-of-print books, but we believe that over time
most will. Unlike true orphan works -- where the rightsholder is
unfindable, such as photographs published without attribution -- books
have lots of identifying information that the Registry can and will use
to find their rightsholders.<br><br>
In this way the settlement will rescue these books from the purgatory
they are in now. And as that happens -- as money begins to be
collected on behalf of rights holders -- we're quite sure that the rights
holders will come forward. Our own experience with the
<a href="http://app.bronto.com/public/?q=ulink&fn=Link&ssid=896&id=ecfp09a4vsoojf0omaokq045yxxiy&id2=gh5fcamb18p0dsor4dwnpwfhshhw3">
Authors Registry</a> has shown tremendous success in finding rights
holders of out-of-print books. We expect the Book Rights Registry
to do even better, and to create what the industry has needed for so
long, a comprehensive database of copyright owners.<br><br>
So we think the settlement, especially the establishment of the Book
Rights Registry, is a big part of the <i>solution</i> to the orphan works
problem. (Here's
<a href="http://app.bronto.com/public/?q=ulink&fn=Link&ssid=896&id=ecfp09a4vsoojf0omaokq045yxxiy&id2=3n0aiiymi3pant67e13lg96l665mk">
more on the subject</a> from Roy Blount Jr.)<br><br>
<b>Can Google "repurpose" my text to make something new? Can
they add hyperlinks to other sites?<br><br>
</b>No. The settlement includes strong protections for
"Integrity of the Text." The words of a book may not be
altered in any way. Google cannot add hyperlinks (except to help
the reader navigate within the book: for example, from the table of
contents to the referenced page).<br><br>
<b>Should I be worried about my book being marred by intrusive
advertising?<br><br>
</b>There are strict limits on what Google may and may not do in the way
of advertising -- for example, no pop-ups or pop-unders, and nothing that
blocks any portion of a book at any time. Furthermore, the rights
holder always has the right to bar advertising from any of his or her
books.<br><br>
What if Google ever decided to make a book disappear -- under pressure
from a foreign government, or to block porn, or for any other
reason?<br><br>
If that happened, Google would be required immediately to notify the
Registry and turn over a complete digital version of the book. The
Registry, and libraries, may then make it available (assuming the rights
holder agrees).<br><br>
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<br><br>
</font>At 9/3/2009 02:57 PM Thursday, Thalia Rubio wrote:<br>
<blockquote type=cite class=cite cite="">Hi all,<br><br>
Does anyone have an opinion about the Google Book Settlement (deadline
September<br>
4). I can take answers offline, if it's easier.<br><br>
Thanks -<br><br>
Thalia<br><br>
Thalia Rubio, M.Ed.<br>
Lecturer, Program in Writing & Humanistic Studies<br>
Massachusetts Institute of Technology<br>
77 Massachusetts Avenue, 12-111<br>
Cambridge, MA 02139<br>
Email: trubio@mit.edu<br>
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