Google has managed to come to an agreement with publishers and authors in the country

Jun 11, 2012 11:30 GMT  ·  By

Google has settled a lawsuit initiated by a French publisher association and an author association pertaining to Google books and, in particular, Google's practice of scanning copyrighted books for its online repository. The main issue was over orphaned books, which are no longer in print but are still covered by copyright.

The company has reached an agreement with the two groups that have withdrawn the lawsuit. The agreement enables Google to continue to scan books, but doesn't seem a particularly positive one for the company.

"From now, publishers will promote and commercialize electronic versions of their out-of-print books scanned by Google," Philippe Colombet, Google Books' strategic partner development manager in France, wrote.

"In this win-win solution, publishers and authors retain control over the commercial use of their books – while at the same time, opening a practical path to bring to a wide audience our decade-long efforts to digitize books," he explained.

Publishers will be able to sell digital copies of their out of print books that have been scanned by Google.

It's unclear whether this means that Google will be able to store copies of those books and make their content discoverable via search, as it does now, but that's likely the case.

Also unclear is whether Google will be allowed to sell copies of those scans via its own online store. Google's eBookstore is not available in France yet, but rumors about its debut surfaced a couple of months ago. With the partnership in place, things are beginning to look better.

"Our project with the authors is equally exciting. We will support their initiative to build a comprehensive database of published writers, a process that will help identify copyright holders and help them receive payment for their works," Colombet explained.

Google will contribute financially to the creation of a database of who owns the rights to which books, making it easier for the right people to get paid when Google or someone else sells a copy of a book. This is particularly important for orphaned books.