Prudence S. Adler
ARL Associate Executive Director

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

WASHINGTON, D.C. – The American Library Association (ALA), the Association of College and Research Libraries (ACRL) and the Association of Research Libraries (ARL) today submitted a supplemental filing with the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York overseeing the proposed Google Book Search settlement to address developments that have occurred since the groups submitted their filing on May 4.

While the library associations’ position has not changed since their initial filing, the groups believe that recent activity, such as an amended agreement reached between Google and the University of Michigan, the University of Texas-Austin and the University of Wisconsin-Madison, Google’s recent public statement regarding privacy, and the library associations’ communication with the Antitrust Division of the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) should be brought to the court’s attention.  In their supplemental filing, the library associations call upon the court to address concerns with pricing review, to direct Google to provide more detail on privacy issues, and to broaden representation on the Books Rights Registry.

Both of the filings emphasize that vigorous oversight by the court is needed to ensure the proposed settlement reached among Google, the Authors Guild and the Association of American Publishers does not erode core library values, such as equity of access to information, patron privacy and intellectual freedom.

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SUPPLEMENTAL LIBRARY ASSOCIATION COMMENTS ON THE PROPOSED SETTLEMENT

Representatives from Google and the library community will participate in a panel discussion moderated by Nancy Kranich, chair of the Committee on Legislation’s Copyright Subcommittee, to discuss the recent settlement and essentially what’s in it for libraries.

Panel participants include:

• Dan Clancy, Google
• Crosby Kemper III, CEO, Kansas City Public Library system
• Nancy Kranich, Chair, ALA Committee on Legislation Copyright Subcommittee
• Lee Van Orsdel, Dean of University Libraries, Grand Valley State University
• Kevin Smith, Scholarly Communications Officer, Duke University
• Patricia Steele, Dean of University Libraries, Indiana University

The program will include an overview of the proposed settlement recently reached among Google, the Association of American Publishers and the Authors Guild and the comments filed on behalf of the ALA, the Association of Academic and Research Libraries and the Association of Research Libraries with the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York for the judge to consider in his ruling on the proposed settlement. The panelists will offer brief remarks and then take questions from the audience.

Additional information about the proposed Google Book Search settlement agreement, including the recent amended agreement between Google and the University of Michigan, is available at http://wo.ala.org/gbs/.

CONTACTS:
Jenni Terry, press officer, ALA Washington Office; (202) 628-8410; jterry@alawash.org
Prudence S. Adler, associate executive director, ARL; (202) 296-2296; prue@arl.org

WASHINGTON, DC – The American Library Association (ALA), the Association of College and Research Libraries (ACRL) and the Association of Research Libraries (ARL) today filed comments with the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York for the judge to consider in his ruling on the proposed Google Book Search Settlement.  The associations asked the judge to exercise vigorous oversight of the interpretation and implementation of the settlement to ensure the broadest possible benefit from the services the settlement enables.

Representing over 139,000 libraries and 350,000 librarians, the associations filed the brief as members of the plaintiff class because they are both authors and publishers of books.  The associations asserted that although the settlement has the potential to provide public access to millions of books, many of the features of the settlement, including the absence of competition for the new services, could compromise fundamental library values including equity of access to information, patron privacy and intellectual freedom.  The court can mitigate these possible negative effects by regulating the conduct of Google and the Book Rights Registry the settlement establishes.

“While this settlement agreement could provide unprecedented access to a digital library of millions of books, we are concerned that the cost of an institutional subscription may skyrocket, as academic journal subscriptions have over the past two decades,” Erika Linke, president of ACRL, said.

Under the settlement, Google, the Association of American Publishers and the Authors Guild resolved their legal dispute over the scanning of millions of books provided by research libraries.  The library associations are not asking the judge to reject the settlement.  Instead, they are requesting the judge to carefully monitor the parties’ behavior once the settlement takes effect.

Jim Rettig, president of ALA, said the proposed settlement, “offers no assurances that the privacy of what the public accessed will be protected, which is in stark contrast to the long-standing patron privacy rights libraries champion on behalf of the public.”

Although the filing deadline for comments to the judge was recently extended by four months, the associations moved forward with filing by the original deadline to help inform the public as it considers this important and complex matter.

“The filing before the court by the library associations demonstrates that the associations will be vigilant in highlighting the interests of the public in this settlement.  We have asked the court to exercise vigorous oversight to ensure that the powerful groups that control content do not leave individual researchers, libraries, other cultural organizations and the public without an effective voice,” Tom Leonard, president of ARL, said.

The library associations filing can be viewed on the ALA or ARL Web sites.

ALA, ACRL, ARL Google Book Settlement Brief

Mr. Castro gave a brief overview of Google’s Book Search Project and proposed settlement agreement. Panelists then offered remarks. Dr. Clancy presented a little background information about how the settlement came about. He reiterated that Google still feels that it was OK for it to be able to scan and index copyrighted books. He said that Google didn’t start the Book Search project to pick a fight on fair use, but rather wanted to increase access to books. Clancy said he and others at Google realized that users wanted to see lots more than just the 3 “snippets” provided when queries are made on the Google Book Search database today. He said that basic search and discovery are good (and have always been central to Google’s mission), but users really want a world where they can find stuff very easily. “If kids can’t find it,” Clancy said, “they think it’s not there.” Under the terms of the settlement, he said that Google can provide better access, and that authors and publishers can be fairly compensated.

Mr. Adler said that it is important to understand the underlying context of the settlement. He said that early in the Book Search project, Google came to publishers to make individual agreements to scan and index their books. He said that the publishing industry is not naive–he claimed the community was open to exploring how and when to make books available online. But, Adler said publishers got upset when Google crossed over into making separate agreements to scan the entire collections of libraries. Under the library program, Google scanned everything in the library’s collection, switching from and opt-in “is this OK before we do it?” system to an opt-out “tell us if you don’t want to be a part of this” system. This switch in philosophy and practice is what brought about the original copyright infringement lawsuit against Google. In terms of the settlement agreement, Adler feels that authors have benefited, and that parts of the settlement benefit the public generally. He also championed how the settlement addresses issues of accessibility for disabled persons.

Dr. Inouye presented comments reflecting a coordinated position of the American Library Association, the Association of Research Libraries, and the Association of College and Research Libraries. Inouye said the associations will be submitting comments to the court as members of both the author and publisher subclasses, since the associations both write and publish books. He said the the associations have been agonizing over the proposed settlement. On the one hand, said Inouye, the settlement provides unprecedented access to information. Inouye predicted that the post-settlement Book Search tool is likely to become valuable resource for library users and the public. On the other hand, he cautioned that some provisions of the settlement may compromise fundamental library values, such as privacy and intellectual freedom. Inouye said that a key concern will be the pricing of the institutional subscription that will be offered for purchase by university and public libraries. While the settlement documents indicate that the pricing of the institutional subscription will be determined by analyzing comparable products and services, Inouye questioned how this will work on the ground, since there are no real similar products to compare it to right now. He also mentioned that since the settlement is a dispute between Google, the Association of American Publishers and the Authors Guild, there was no mechanism for input from libraries and the public. Inouye said that there is little to nothing in the settlement agreement that describes protections for personally identifiable information for users participating in the consumer purchase feature, although he assumed that for the institutional subscription information would be aggregated and not tracked per individual user. He went on to say that  inadequate privacy protections could also produce a chilling effect on intellectual freedom, as users are less likely to explore particular lines of inquiry if they feel uncomfortable with uncertain information gathering techniques employed by Google or the Book Rights Registry. As a contrast to the paltry user privacy protections in the settlement, Inouye noted the extensive sections outlining cumbersome security provisions inserted to make sure rightholders content is secure. He said that while the associations do not outright oppose the approval of the settlement, they will urge the court to exercise strong oversight in the application of the settlement provisions moving forward.

Mr. Brantley stated that the Internet Archive has filed a motion with the court to intervene as a party defendant. He said that unlike the library associations, the Internet Archive was not conflicted in its opposition to the proposed settlement. Brantley disclosed that he had helped negotiate the original contract between Google and the University of California when UC had joined the Library Project a few years ago. But, he suggested that the proposed agreement would give Google license to in essence privatize our nation’s libraries, and that the settlement could spawn a new and unsettling form of media consolidation. Reading from a prepared statement titled “A Future for Books?” attributed to Brewster Kahle, Brantley said that the Archive’s primary opposition to the settlement was due to the inclusion of books that are considered orphan works–in this case books whose copyright holders are not known. He said that the settlement would create a class that by definition “includes millions of people who will never come forward…[and] Google and Google alone gets an explicit, perpetual license to scan and sell access to these in-copyright but out-of-print orphans.” Brantley suggested that legislation–not a private settlement–is the best way to address orphan works. He said that since the orphans have no one to speak for them, the Archive wants to remove them from the settlement altogether.

The panel was videorecorded. We’ll post a link from ITIF once we get it.

Grimmelmann said that the settlement is meant to be comprehensive, since the scale of the scanning project itself makes negotiating with individual authors prohibitive. He talked about orphan works “hanging over the head of U.S. Copyright law,” and said that the settlement breaks the logjam on the orphan works problem. As we know, the settlement would enable Google to sell access to the full text of books, not only continue to scan and index books. Grimmelmann said this will make Google the “world’s largest bookseller.” Google will collect the money, store it, and distribute it to authors (and to orphaned authors if and when they show up).

By requiring authors to opt-out of the settlement class (to which they are automatically included), Grimmelmann said that Google/authors/publishers have created an “elegant solution,” and one that is “about the best we can hope for” for authors and publishers we can’t find.

However, James said that Google may become a bottleneck through which all books will flow, since they’ll be the only game in town for serious, online access to many of these works. He warns that there are no provisions for the privacy of readers. “Google can track what you read,” said Grimmelmann. “How much Marx, how much Marx Brothers.” He also said there’s no provisions for consumer rights concerns, since the settlement may be seen as a conversation between private parties. Grimmelmann generally questioned the effect the settlement may have on current copyright law.

Grimmelmann returned to the issue of orphaned authors, and challenged whether the settlement needed to use the class action device. He said that the typical class action is a settlement for wrongs done in the past, providing remedy for those affected by things like faulty drugs or products that don’t do what they claim to do. Under the Google Book settlement, everyone who owns a copyright has become one of the plaintiffs. “Did we agree to this?” asks Grimmelmann. Orphan works owners will not benefit because they can’t be found to claim their money, and can’t be found to object. In essence, the settlement class consists of group of people who do not realize that they are a part of it. At the same time, said Grimmelmann, a small group of class owners have been using orphan works as a bargaining chip in their favor.

James said that Google has a head start on digitizing and making books available, and any other competitor would need to get permission from every member of the class to do the same thing. Google and Google alone can sell access to this huge backlog. He cautioned that the settlement fine print will cause damage for society and for the way we access books. Grimmelmann was skeptical of the use of the settlement to decide such matters. “We have legislation, we have agencies that take expert testimony,” he said. “The courtroom is not the place to decide the interests of a million-member class of people…this is not the way things ought to be done in a democracy,” said Grimmelmann.

Grimmelmann said he still thinks the settlement is a net positive for society. “Good things can come from corrupt practices.” But, he said that society need not settlement for something merely better than the status quo. Just because we haven’t come up with something better by ourselves, he said, we don’t need to accept the the settlement simply because it’s better than nothing…it should be good.

Vaidhyanathan gave an overview of the history of the Google Book Search project since its beginnings only a few years ago. From his own experience of receiving minimal compensation from participating as an author in Google Book Search, Siva questioned the economic utility to authors of the project in general. The service “will allow long forgotten books to be discovered at the rate of 10 cents per year,” he said.

Siva said that fair use should continue to be a foundation principle for copyright law. While many predicted that Google would have prevailed in its fair use assertion had the infringement lawsuit gone to trial, Siva disagreed. He said there were lots of ways Google could have lost, seeing a wide gap in the potential outcomes a liberal circuit court versus the non-experimental nature of the U.S. Supreme Court, had the case progressed that far. Instead, he wished that institutions would have taken up the massive digitization project from the beginning. If libraries would’ve engaged with this, they’d have law on their side, he proffered.

Vaidhyanathan suggested that Google has lofty goals in the Book Search project, and wants to “gather the lexicon of the human experience.” He said that Google may wish to delve into semantic analysis of as many of these books as possible. He said they want to create a better understanding of how human language works so they can improve their search function. Having so much text at their disposal is part of their profit making plan down the line, he said. If Google Book Search was just about creating an index, Siva offered, Google would’ve done it through their non-profit channel.

Siva observed that Google seems to be imposing new norms on the world without the mess of legislative scrutiny. He went on to say that relying on the courts is not a healthy way to create policy. Google had the cash now, he said, and they are betting on expediency at the expense of the longer term good.

He questioned whether libraries are getting the raw end of the deal with regard to the settlement. “Are libraries contributing to corporate welfare,” he asked, “and getting back inferior quality copies?” Will public libraries have “book vending machines”? Vaidhyanathan was disappointed if this is indeed the future for public libraries, since libraries have represented for a long time a place to go and not be seduced by commercial temptations.

Siva echoed Grimmelmann’s worry about reader and consumer privacy considerations, saying that Google is the great “personal information vacuum.” He also suggested that we should know more about the principles and guidelines that place one book above another in response to a search query within Book Search.  While we have a basic understanding of how Google ranks webpages, books are a different story. A book published in 1930 lacks hyperlinks, so Google’s Page Rank may not work so well. Siva called for more transparency in Google’s use of metadata around the book ranking process. “We’re entering a situation where we have diverse voices, but the gate keeping function is where the winners and losers are chosen, and that’s where we need to be careful,” he said.

Although this is a private settlement, the result has very real implications for public policy and the way libraries of all types will operate.  The mission of libraries is to provide the broadest public access to the use of information, and the library community has a long history of advocating for laws and policies that protect the rights of library users. Because of the complexity of the agreement, its potential long-term impact on libraries, thus user interests, and the enormity of the book collection involved, many librarians have raised questions about the settlement’s impact.

Issues raised at the meeting that members believe are of key concern to libraries include:

-Access. What will the settlement mean for protecting the public’s ability to access and use digital resources from the nation’s libraries? Since the Book Rights Registry established as a condition of the settlement will represent the interests of the authors and publishers, who will represent the interests of libraries and the public? What are the financial implications of participation? Could the settlement create a monopoly that threatens the mission of libraries by raising the prices to an unreasonable level that limits public access?

-Privacy. What will reader privacy look like in a Google subscription-based world? Will the years of hard-fought effort to protect library users’ confidentiality be compromised as a for-profit company has new capabilities to monitor and track user reading habits under this settlement?

-Intellectual freedom. Are there academic freedom issues to consider? What are the implications of Google’s ability to remove works at its discretion? Will there be notification of their removal? What are the issues regarding possible access and use restrictions on the Research Corpus?

-Equitable treatment. Since not all libraries are addressed in the settlement, what impact will it have on the diverse landscape of libraries? In light of tight economic times, will this negatively affect libraries with lean budgets? Will it expand the digital divide?

-Terms of use. Under the terms of the agreement, will library users continue to enjoy the same rights to information under copyright and other laws? Will the settlement impact the legal discussions and interpretations of library exceptions that allow for library lending, limited copying and preservation?

Next, the executive boards and other leadership bodies of the library associations will consider a number of options available to them to have their voices heard in this debate. To stay posted on the latest developments of the associations’ next steps, see www.ala.org/washoff; www.arl.org; and www.ala.org/acrl.

Download this document as a PDF

As mentioned in an earlier post, panelists included Dan Clancy, Engineering Director for the Google Book Search Project, Paul Courant, Dean of Libraries at the University of Michigan, Karen Coyle, Digital Librarian and Consultant, and Laura Quilter, Librarian and Attorney at Law.

Dan kicked off the panel by giving a brief overview of the main points of the settlement. He stressed that the agreement is a compromise, and settles the class action lawsuit between Google, the Association of American Publishers, and the Authors Guild. The explained that the settlement class includes anyone with copyright interest in a book before published before January 5, 2009.

Dan said that the settlement does not affect books in the public domain, and does not include journals, magazines, newspapers, and images if the rightsholder of the image in a book is different than the rightsholder of the book itself. The settlement also applies only to rightsholders in the United States.

Mr. Clancy explained that the settlement allows Google to continue to scan, index, and otherwise use non-display versions of books. This corresponds with the default status today for in print books. Currently, Google’s scan index the contents of books, allowing users to search the full text of works, but only displaying up to 3 snippets of text per work (a snippet is considered a “non-display” use).

Under the proposed settlement, the default status for out of print (also called “not commercially available”) will be that access models are turned on–rightsholders of out of print book can opt out if they wish, but the default will be to include their materials under the settlement provisions. Rightsholders of in print books need to opt in (this is how it’s always been).

Dan explained four models of access under the proposed Google Book settlement. First, there will be the online consumer purchase, where individuals can create an account with Google to purchase perpetual access to the full text of an individual in copyright, out of print book. He called this service the “digital locker.” Second, he said that all users will be able to preview up to 20% of a book (more or less, although there are some stipulations to this–see “A Guide for the Perplexed for more detail…). He said that Google will also provide links to where users can find the physical book in the library, or purchase the physical book online (such as from Amazon). Third, Dan explained briefly the concept of the “institutional subscription database” (ISD), which will include essentially the entire database of in copyright, out of print books. Universities will be able to purchase access to the full or subset portions of the ISD, depending upon the number of FTE equivalent students there, and those users will be able to access the ISD remotely. These types of users will be able to view the full text of the materials in the ISD, print 20 pages with a single command, and copy/paste 4 pages in single command. There was talk that the ISD should be able to be integrated into the ILS system within a university, making it easier for students to access, and potentially connect it with other Google services used by students and faculty. Fourth, Dan laid out the intial provisions for the “public access service” (PAS). He said that for those libraries that choose not to subscribe to the ISD (public or university), Google will provide one terminal per building which allows for full access to the contents of the ISD. Although users will be charged a per page printing fee, Dan said that Google will pay for the printing costs for 5 years or up to $3 million.

Mr. Clancy touched upon the various levels which libraries may participate under the Google Book settlement. Fully participating libraries will receive what’s called a “Library Digital Copy” (LDC), which comes with certain restrictions and provides for certain authorizations of use. For example, under the fully participating library agreement, Google can return a digital copy of a book scan to the participating library (such as University of Michigan). The library will be absolved of copyright infringement liability, but must follow particular security provisions. These libraries may also receive book scans from other participating libraries under certain conditions (see the agreement summary for more details).

Dan said that Google will set up a process to handle public domain books. He admitted that there are scaling problems in determining whether a book is in the public domain.

Paul Courant said he represents a large academic library (University of Michigan), and feels that it is the duty of his institution to take social responsibility for some pieces of the world’s cultural collection that otherwise might go away. He questioned, “if we hadn’t had the settlement, where would we be now?”Paul referenced the recent article by Bob Darnton, in which Darnton said that if universities and libraries and other organizations would have just stuck together and organized better, we could have had a large scale digitization project without private help. Courant said that this is what everyone would’ve liked, but obviously not what has happened.

Paul said that if we never had the settlement, we would’ve just had snippets and indexing, and not ability to actually read the books. He said that if we never had the settlement, libraries may have tried to negotiate, publisher by publisher, the right to display works. However, he assumed that under this case, the negotiations wouldn’t have gone well, and would’ve probably required libraries to pay money to the publishers for these display rights.

Before Google began its book scanning project, Paul said that this utopian vision of a large, noncommercial digitization initiative had the likeliness of success of 1 in 100,000. However, with Google at the front in the book digitization business now, Paul admitted that the same vision is probably now 1 in 1 million. Courant claimed that the settlement agreement potentially weakens fair use for libraries, since the settlement in effect creates a market for old works, and where there is a market courts are less amenable to fair uses. He said that even though the settlement claims that fair uses are not affected, on the ground, it really is.

Courant said there are many gains for libraries. First, he said that the settlement solves the negotiation problem highlighted above. He said that while class action settlements are generally not very good at solving large coordination problems, it’s what we got and better than libraries negotiating with publishers on a case by case basis. Second, Paul said, for some academic libraries, the settlement provides for a huge increase in the accessible collection. For example, Michigan gets to use materials from Stanford’s collection. For public libraries, he said, the nerdy kid who wants to read 40 year old monographs gets to do it. Third, Courant said that while Google scans are not at archival/preservation standards, there are more usable in more and more cases.

The biggest question Courant wanted to know is “what’s the pricing going to be?” He said that if the pricing of the ISD is going to be like journal pricing, then it’s not going to work for most libraries. But, Paul said he thinks the price is going to be reasonable, if only for the fact that this class of books are out of print for a reason! He said most books go out of print the year they go into print. Courant said that there is a difference between the way libraries subscribe to scientific journals and the way libraries may subscribe to the ISD. The current scientific literature journals have a monopoly on recent stuff, and libraries (at least academic libraries) will continue to feel compelled to subscribe. Courant said libraries like the University of Michigan library has their hands tied here–they’ll subscribe because faculty, researchers, and students demand it. But with the price of the ISD, he claims that if the price is too high, consumers just won’t buy it.

Finally, Courant said that we’re no worse off than we were with the physical books–we just have a richer finding tool. He said that users can still get the physical book from the library or put it on interloan. He claimed that selling things at high prices has not been what Google has traditionally done, so doesn’t think they’ll start now with the price of the ISD. He concluded that there is an ongoing sense of mission at the library that we want the world to read our stuff, but right now we don’t have any other good ways to showing it to you. The Google Book settlement provisions may help with this.

Karen Coyle began by stating that she was not involved in the settlement negotiations, and said that those involved in the agreement bound by nondisclosure agreement (Clancy said this is normally required by the court of members of class action settlements). Karen said she was posing questions from the point of view of libraries that are not signing an agreement as either a participating or cooperating library.

Coyle clarified that the settlement agreement is a contract between Google and the AAP, and that public libraries are bound by nothing in the settlement. She outlined many of the values that are central to libraries in their efforts to serve library users. Coyle posed several fundamental questions libraries and librarians need to ask about the settlement provisions, including:

• Does this product serve users?
• Do library users want to read these books online?
• What are the collection implications for libraries going to look like 3-5 years down the road?
• What is the quality of the scans going to be? (she said there may be some room for librarians/archivists to help educate Google on this)
• What are the privacy implications for users of the product?
• Will Google serve ads within the product?
• Will the settlement properly address accessibility concerns, specifically ADA?
• What are the implications for First Amendment rights and and intellectual freedom, especially since Google and the publishers have the ability to censor or remove controversial books?
• What are the ways Google and the publishers will maintain transparency down the road, especially at public institutions?
• Since the product is maintained by a private entity, is the product sustainable? Libraries have been around for thousands of years and have been experts at preservation. Can the book scans be placed into escrow in case Google goes out of business?
• What are the associated costs to public libraries for the public access service?
• Do the public access terminals represent a product placement for the members of the settlement (Google and publishers)?
• Would Google drop this product if it is not profitable to them?
• Will the settlement agreement inhibit libraries from innovating or participating in creating new technologies an services with their own data?

See more questions from Karen and her remarks.

Laura Quilter, like others, said she felt “wistful” that there would have been a good chance that Google would’ve won the copyright infringement lawsuit brought against it by the AAP and the Authors Guild. She felt there was a strong case for fair use, and that the settlement represents a compromise on behalf of Google with respect to a “permissions culture.” She said that librarians have been trying to push back on this permissions culture.

Quilter questioned how the settlement is going to shape the market. While she agreed with Courant that we’re definitely a step ahead from where we would have been without a settlement, we must continue to explore where does that trail leads. She said that while librarians are among Google’s biggest fans, we need to retain our representation and autonomy without the need to rely on a private entity such as Google.

Laura said that the terms of the settlement are significantly different from the old scanning agreements that Google had with universities. In fact, she said, the old deal might actually have provided more rights to libraries than the new agreement. Under the new agreement, there is no ability for customized deals with libraries beyond the specific participation levels set out by Google and the publishers in the settlement details.

Quilter also raised several questions about the settlement, including the implications on Section 108 rights for libraries or archives to make reproductions of materials for their users. She also questioned the various ways library services may be encumbered by the settlement, including certain bans on interlibrary loan lending, restrictions on using the scanned materials in university courses, and restrictions on off site access to the books database. Quilter, like others, challenged the public access service provision for public libraries, which sets aside a single workstation for access to the ISD. She said that this access is inadequate for all but the smallest libraries.

Another issue brought up by Laura is that school libraries are left out entirely from the agreement. She also said that there may be some intellectual freedom issues–Google is not subject to information transparency regulations required of public libraries by some state statutes. Quilter again raised the issue of user privacy in relation to the provisions of the settlement, including the ability of Google to record what books users read, which pages get read, how long users spend on an individual page, and more. She contrasted this to the strong privacy protections that public libraries assure their users (Clancy said Google had not thought about this, but was not really interested in this type of data collection).

If Google may remove books for editorial reasons, Quilter advocated for stronger guarantees about what this will actually mean in practice. She also questioned the DRM on the books in the database, and said that users would be able to do what they want with the materials that they purchase. For example, the scans of the books cannot be ported to mobile devices like the Kindle.

Laura agreed with Coyle that if perpetual access is indeed promised with the consumer purchase, we need to make sure this is guaranteed by placing copies of the book scans in escrow, potentially in the care of the library community. Finally, Quilter questioned whether libraries can leverage their market power in order to make changes to the proposed settlement.

We’ll post more from the Q&A in a later post.

Panelists will include Dan Clancy, Engineering Director for the Google Book Search Project, Karen Coyle, Digital Librarian and Consultant, Paul Courant, Dean of Libraries at the University of Michigan, and Laura Quilter, Librarian and Attorney at Law. The session will be moderated by Nancy Kranich, chair of the COL Copyright Subcommittee. Following brief opening remarks by each panelist, there be an opportunity for dialogue and questions from the audience.

If you’re not able to join us at Midwinter Conference and want to ask a question, please contribute your ideas in the comments section to this post! The questions will be aggregated and presented to the panelists by the session moderator.