Wed 7 October 2009 at 5.30 pm

The Google Settlement - OPuS event

The implications for publishers and authors

Wednesday 7 October: 6.30 drinks, 7.30 event

Taking Place: Oxford Brookes University - Main Lecture Theatre

Speakers

Benjamin King

Head of policy and communications at the Publishers Association

Diane Spivey

Rights and contracts director at Little Brown in London.

On 28 October 2008 the AAP and the US Authors Guild signed an agreement with Google over their Library Project, which is part of the Google Book Search programme. The settlement resolves the lawsuit that publishers and authors in the US launched in 2005 against Google for digitising and showing extracts of in-copyright books without rightsholders’ permission. Although the settlement only directly affects users’ experience of Google Book Search in the US, over the past twelve months the implications of the Settlement for publishers and other rightsholders based in the UK and Europe have become more evident daily, and (for some) more worrying. The date of this event coincides with that of the Fairness Hearing at which the judge will decide whether the Settlement is to be upheld. Many parties have already expressed concerns and it is to be hoped that some immediate comments on the ruling will be possible.