Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2009-11-26-Speech-4-067"
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"en.20091126.4.4-067"2
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"Madam President, I would like to thank you for your statement, the Committee on Legal Affairs for its question, and Mrs Niebler for her comments and the Commissioner for his answer. These are extremely important matters for the Committee on the Internal Market and Consumer Protection as well. The process of digitising books opens up great new opportunities, but it must – and I emphasise this – must serve the interests of publishing and readers, that is to say, European businesses and consumers.
The previous version of the agreement with Google threatened the monopolisation of the entire literary output by one private firm, a threat which has not yet been completely eliminated. It was Google that scanned millions of copyright titles from all over the world. To date, it has made use of these scans illegally, only applying the US principle of fair use without asking the authors or publishers for their agreement.
The new agreement continues to flout a basic principle of the Berne Convention, which says that copyright holders have to be asked for permission before their works are used, and not simply be given the option to opt out, all of which would put the responsibility, effort and costs on the author’s shoulders. The agreement applies to books from all over the world published in English in countries which are covered by the Convention.
When it scanned the books, Google drew on the categories of out-of-print and orphan works. Both of these categories are very loosely defined. It is quite often possible to find the authors of orphan works if you put your mind to it. Out-of-print books are often works which the authors or publishers have deliberately taken out of print. Does this not entail the danger that Google may be depriving publishers of the freedom to establish their own publishing policy, and authors of potential earnings?
On the issue of consumers: the publishing industry may be undermined in the long term by the Google Project if the copyright holders are not paid the royalties due to them. To allow them to remain competitive, publishers will stop producing valuable, expert-reviewed, costly books. For consumers, this will effectively mean high-quality publications being replaced by cheap, unverified, unimaginative publishing, additionally accompanied by ubiquitous advertising.
I therefore expect the European Commission to devise a policy which will allow the development of further digitisation, but without impacting negatively on creativity and on the interests of the market and of readers in Europe."@en1
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