From the San Francisco Chronicle
Google book project far from settled
By James Temple
As the deadline draws near for authors and publishers to opt out of a proposed legal settlement allowing Google Inc. to forge ahead with plans to scan millions of books, more opponents of the landmark deal are stepping forward, and the local literary world is growing more perplexed.
The agreement, reached in October after two years of negotiations, would resolve lawsuits filed by writers, the Authors Guild and members of the Association of American Publishers against Google for digitizing libraries of out-of-print books and making them searchable online. The deal would allow the Mountain View company to move forward with its ambitious project while establishing a system to sort out and compensate the appropriate rights holders....
Some legal experts believe the growing confusion will create more opposition to the deal, which could factor into the settlement hearing and potentially limit the scope of the books program. But Pamela Samuelson, co-director of the UC Berkeley Center for Law and Technology [and professor of information], said it's more likely to lead to a sort of collective paralysis that prevents affected parties from taking any action....