Paris – Google (NASD: GOOG) has struck an agreement with French publisher
Hachette Livre, ending a dispute over the rights to scan out-of-print titles
for inclusion in its digital library project, The New York Times reported.
Unlike the lawsuit settlement hammered out between Google and U.S. publishers
last year, Hachette’s agreement with Google permits the publisher to control
which books Google may scan.
Any books scanned by Google will be made available
for sale as e-books by Google, or by Hachette to third-party retailers — as well
as to France’s own national book-scanning project.
French courts have sided
with publishers claiming Google’s book-scanning project violates their copyrights,
and other litigation is still pending.
But Google hopes the deal with Hachette will
"serve as a framework for other French publishers and maybe other
publishers around the world," Dan Clancy, director of Google Books, told
The Times.
Related Links:
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/18/business/global/18book.html
