Ten long dispute – Google may scan millions of books – finally – Süddeutsche.de

• The US Supreme Court refuses to discuss Google Books -. So shall the decision of the courts
• Google may therefore digitize books without permission, because the principle of “fair Use “corresponds.

From John Kuhn , New Orleans

2004 Google began to digitize millions of books from US libraries. Google Books was one of the first major projects of the Group and drew one of the first principle Suits according to:. 2005 drew the author Association “Authors Guild” against the company in court

Now, the case is after more than ten years clarified: The scans are legal, Google Books remains. The US Supreme Court decided on Monday not to consider the decision of the lower courts on possible constitutional issues. Thus the judgment of the Federal Court in the autumn of last year remains valid, which had confirmed the legality of digitization.

The decision strengthens in the US, the principle of “fair use”, the use of works by third parties without their permission allows. The condition is that the conventional exploitation of a work is not threatened, the use serves a public interest and from the “quote” a new work is created ( “transformation”)

Judge:. Books can not be “together Googling “

” fair use “is interpreted broadly generous than the German quotation rights and has contributed to the flowering of Meme- and remix culture, give the photos Internet users known a new context or modify it. The lawsuit involved the question of whether to Google Books, the principle of “fair use” is given and the group publishers and authors do not have to ask permission before he digitized works via text recognition.

in order not to jeopardize the “original recovery” according to the rules, shows Google in its search results to only parts of the plants. Therefore, the courts followed not the argument of “Authors Guild” that someone a book “” together googling “can and therefore waives the purchase.

In addition, the company displays no ads next to content that monetizes the digitized texts so only insofar as the Google search engine has another function (and stored and analyzed the searches there are).

search as a new book function

Tricky is the question the “transformation” to answer: Google adds the books no word added or commented on its content, the company digitized texts the judge in the previous instances nonetheless interpreted this as “fair use” because in the digital age the books with the searchability by words. , expressions or quotations new features have been added quasi.

“the purpose of copying is highly transformative, the public visibility of the text is limited and what is shown is not a sufficient market replacement for the protected aspects of the original” it’s a bit awkward in the grounds of the appeal court of last fall that negotiated the objections of authors Association. One of the three judges was Pierre Leval, who is known to give the fair-use principle in copyright repeatedly to advantage.

The American publishers to Google in 2012 had already agreed in a settlement. Since Google shows only up to 20 percent of a text and sells digital versions of books in part on its Play Store.