The case brought by the Author’s Guild and others against Google for copyright infringement relative to the Google Books and Library Project has been dismissed by the Court following the grant of summary judgment for Google. The case sought damages on behalf of authors arising out of Google’s scanning of more than twenty million books, the delivery of digital copies to participating libraries, the creation of an electronic database of books, and the making of text available for online searching through the use of “snippets.” Most of the books were protected by U.S. Copyright Law, and Google did not obtain permission from the copyright holders.
The Court (Circuit Judge Chin of the the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York [Manhattan]) granted Google’s Motion for Summary Judgment (and denied the Author’s Guild’s Motion for Partial Summary Judgment). Assuming that the Author’s Guild had established a prima facie case of copyright infringement against Google under 17 U.S.C. section 106, the Court found that Google’s effort provided significant public benefits and, upon consideration of the four Fair Use factors set forth in 17 U.S.C. section 107, ruled that Google’s actions were Fair Use.
The entire opinion, which contains a very good analysis of the Fair Use defense, can be found through http://www.pacer.gov/, and likely will be posted by others soon. The case name and number are Authors Guild v. Google, 1:05-cv-08136. More news articles are available on the Internet for your information.
We shall see whether the ruling is affirmed on appeal.
Matthew I. Berger Law Group 