Open Book Alliance to Fight the Google Books Settlement

Just as Google is making another claim for openness by releasing over a million public domain books in the open ePub e-book format, the company is bracing for some heavy battles defending the settlement it signed with publishers and authors to sell out-of-print books through Google Books. The unlikely alliance revealed last week, which calls itself the Open Book Alliance, has launched a new website to make its goals a little clearer.

“[The settlement of the] class action lawsuit [...] creates an unprecedented monopoly and price fixing cartel,” the site reads. “[A] digital library controlled by a single company and small group of publishers would inevitably lead to higher prices and subpar service for consumers, libraries, scholars, and students.”

“Unlike the proposed settlement, there are proper, fair ways to make the promised digital future for books a reality. Today, we are launching the Open Book Alliance to insist that any mass book digitization and distribution effort be open and competitive,” Peter Brantley of the Internet Archive and antitrust lawyer Gary Reback who led the new alliance added.

The alliance brings together a motley group of businesses, organizations and individuals all united in their opposition of the settlement, which is still awaiting court approval. Internet giants and competitors in many fields Microsoft, Yahoo and Amazon are part of the group, alongside organizations like the American Society of Journalists and Authors and the Council of Literary Magazines and Presses. The Open Book Alliance is led by the Internet Archive, the organization responsible for archiving the World Wide Web as well as books, software, movies and audio recordings.

The Google Books settlement, in which Google would pay $125 million to several publishers and authors groups for the right to scan and sell any book that may still be under copyright but for which the copyright holder can't be found, is undergoing an investigation from the Department of Justice and is still awaiting a court's decision with a September 4 deadline for submissions to the court, either for or against the deal.