Supreme Court Rejects Authors' Challenge Against Google's Online Library
The Authors Guild, together with some independent writers, filed a case that reached the U.S. Supreme Court, alleging that Google's act of scanning countless numbers of books in order to integrate them into an online library is a clear violation of copyright law. However, the highest court declined to hear the plaintiffs' challenge on Monday, giving Google a huge sigh of relief of what might have been a very expensive repercussion.
The subject of the suit is Google Books, in which the authors complained that its publication, together with their scanned works has utterly deprived them of profit. The first ruling for the litigation came out back in 2013, where a lower court favored Alphabet Inc., the parent company of Google. In October of last year, a 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New York affirmed the lower court's decision, according to Reuters. The appellate court, by virtue of a unanimous by three member judges, said that the case indeed tested the boundaries of fair use but ultimately decided that the act of Google in making them available online were actually within the bounds of the law.
The authors sued the giant internet company back in 2005 after the project was unveiled. During the lower court hearings, Google based its argument on the simple reason that the project would actually help the authors increase the sales of their books since readers will find their work online. The fact that they are being made available over the internet means they get the exposure they didn't previously get.
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Google reportedly created digital copies of about 20 million books, but not everyone was against it. Some publishers gave Google the permission to copy their books and have them appear in their online database.
With Google Books, users are able to search the content of books through the display of excerpts, but they cannot read the majority of it.
