TeleRead: Bring the E-Books Home
News & views on e-books, libraries, publishing and related topics
Authors and Steinbeck heirs want delay in Google book settlement
Monday, April 27th, 2009By Paul Biba
The New York Times is reporting that the heirs of John Steinbeck—as well as other heirs and still-living authors, along with musician Arlo Guthrie—are officially asking for a delay in the implementation of the Google book settlement.
The group of authors seeking the delay has not come out against the settlement. They argue that given the complexity of the agreement and its long-range implications, the May 5 deadline should be extended by four months to allow authors to make informed decisions about how to proceed.
Editor’s note, 1:48 p.m.: Glad to see the Times in effect catching up with an April 25 post from our newest contributor, Mike Perry, one of the authors asking for a delay. - D.R.
Why the Google settlement is anti-author—and why writers deserve four more months for opt-outs and objections
Saturday, April 25th, 2009By Mike Perry, editor of Inkling Books
Welcome to TeleRead’s newest contributor, Michael W. Perry, editor of Inkling Books—an author who has officially objected to the proposed Google settlement! Among other works, Mike has written Untangling Tolkien. Please note these are Mike’s opinions and not necessarily TeleRead’s. – D.R.
Quick, tell me who Michael Boni is. You don’t know? How about Joanne Zack Zack? Still drawing a blank? Then surely you must know Joshua Snyder? No?
That’s odd, because all three work for the Pennsylvania law firm of Boni & Zack (yes, I know, it sounds like a movie), and they’ve been your lawyers in the not-quite-settled copyright dispute that Google has been fighting for several years with the Authors Guild and Association of American Publishers. If you own a copyright in a book or a portion of a book published on or before January 5, 2009, then Boni & Zack was your law firm.
Don’t want Boni & Zack? Tough luck
“But I didn’t ask them to represent me and I’ve never signed anything?” Tough! You don’t realize just how broad the reach of lawsuits such as this one can be.
Google’s FAQ so chirpily asks, in a bolded heading:
“Who is included in this Settlement?”
As a member of what’s called the “Author’s Sub-Class,” you’ve had Boni & Zack as your representatives. What the firm has settled on in this settlement will, if nothing happens to hinder it, seriously affect any copyright you might hold in any book published up to January 5, 2009. The impact is particularly hard if that book, however recent, has dropped out of print.
$30 million legal bill ahead?
“But I didn’t pay them a penny?” you assert, thinking that’s a telling argument. No, you didn’t. If fact Google has agreed to pay your lawyers up to $30 million if this settlement goes though. You can find that remarkable little nugget in the FAQ’s answer to, “How much will Class Counsel be paid?”
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Deadly Skyline Towers collapse: Partly inspired 'The Solomon Scandals' novel
Book overview | Buy in E or P
The real collapse"Same dark zeal Hammett held for Frisco or Chandler had for Los Angeles."
Recommended by Washington City Paper and Epublishers Weekly
