WEDNESDAY 13 APRIL 2016 LONDON SHOW DAILY
Authors Guild refocuses
But the work of the Authors Guild has now shifted,
and over the last year it has refocused its efforts on
matters more pressing to its members than whether
readers can view out-of-print books.
Among the digital issues on the Guild’s agenda is a
“fair contract” initiative that seeks to engage publishers on
revising book contracts for the digital age. This includes shorter
licence terms, and a higher standard royalty for ebooks.
The Guild is also looking to the legislature: in a letter to
Congressional leaders last summer, Guild officials proposed
replacing the current “Notice and Takedown” regime authorised
by the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) with a
“Notice and Stay Down” provision. In essence, requiring ISPs
to filter their networks for “all infringing copies” or risk losing
their “safe harbour” immunity from claims of infringement.
And, finally, the Guild is lobbying antitrust regulators at the
US Department of Justice to investigate Amazon. Working
with Authors United, the group organised by author Douglas
Preston, the Guild argues that Amazon’s dominance and its
“heavy-handed” behaviour is affecting “the free flow of
ideas in our society”. All of those proposals face opposition
from various quarters. But in 2016, the key battles have
shifted, from the courts to the legislature. ■
On 4th April, the US Supreme Court was expected to
announce whether it would hear the Authors Guild’s
final appeal in its long-running legal challenge to
Google’s library book scanning programme–only that
didn’t happen. Mysteriously, the case was absent from the
Court’s order list, meaning the Guild will have to wait a little
longer to learn the case’s fate. But even if the Court surprises
observers and decides to hear the appeal–an outcome most
observers say is not likely–the Guild is moving on to new battles.
First filed in 2005, two years before Amazon launched the
Kindle and the modern ebook market–the Google Books case was
a by-product of fear–fear that authors and publishers felt over
digital piracy, and fear about the intentions of Google. A decade
ago, Google’s scan plan captivated the publishers at the London
Book Fair. The reaction now: disbelief that the case is still not over.
In its Supreme Court briefs, attorneys for the Authors Guild
stress that the lower courts’ holdings represent “an unprecedented
judicial expansion of the fair-use doctrine that threatens copyright
protection in the digital age”. But that argument has failed to gain
traction in the courts; indeed, Judge Denny Chin’s 2013 decision
in the case reads like an endorsement of Google’s scanning (he
called the project “an invaluable research tool” in which “society
benefits”). And, Chin’s ruling was upheld on appeal.
The art and craft of beautiful books
9781910904329
Jun 16 / HB / £ 16.99
9781910904589
Sept 16 / HB / £ 12.99
9781849943826
Mar 17 / PB / £ 14.99
9781910232859
Sept 16 / HB / £ 12.99
9781849943109
Apr 16 / HB / £ 9.99
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