Google Me!

The lawsuit filed by publishers against Google over its plans to scan millions of books is both shortsighted and legally flawed. The suit emulates one by the Authors' Guild, claiming copyright infringement. Despite the plaintiffs' claims, one must note what Google's plan is not: Google doesn't propose to scan books and then make them available for free. It intends to scan them in order to make them searchable over the Internet and available for purchase -- after paying a royalty to copyright holders. It's hard to see how authors or publishers can lose. Millions of obscure(d) books get a second life, while publishers retain the ability to make money.

The plaintiffs argue that Google's actions infringe copyright because it is essentially copying books when it scans them without paying copyright holders. Yet scanning itself creates no revenue for Google and doesn't deprive copyright holders of income. It is only when a reader purchases a book that Google derives revenue, and in that situation it has announced plans to pay the copyright holder a royalty. Thus, its scanning ought to be protected by the "fair use" doctrine.

Publishers contend that Google is depriving them of opportunities to create their own searchable index -- and of a revenue stream from their own property. They sound just like the music industry, which abdicated one of the greatest opportunities in tech history to the Napsters. Lawsuits can't stop innovation by bottling it up in court. Consumers want content; authors live to provide it to them. When corporate interests get in the way, the only people who are hurt are the public and the creators of that content. Authors may think they're protecting their rights; but they're protecting the rights of publishers to make another dime off their backs. Authors might even welcome such exploitation if publishers really had plans to make a dime (and pay them their 12% royalty). But history teaches us that you can't teach an old dinosaur new tricks.

Sure, Google hopes to reap a profit by its ostensible good deeds. Even on the Internet, there is no free lunch. But rather than fight to preserve a right they haven't exercised and may not own, publishers and authors should thank Google for waking them from their slumbers.

So go ahead, make my day: Google me.

Mr. Stracher is a writer and publisher of the New York Law School Law Review.