Seems as time goes by, more people are coming to grips with what’s in the Google Book Search Settlement. Everyone knows the basics of the agreeement – Google pays $125 million total to publishers, of which, $35 million will be spent to create the Book Rights Registry. The registry will be an online database of books and information about their ownership. It’ll also provide the ability to process royalty payments from online content sales and facilitate sending the payments to the proper parties. It’ll be run by author’s and publisher representatives and will be independent, in that, it won’t be used only by Google. Any service provider will be able to use the service. Sounds great, right?
Well, some folks are reading the tea leaves a bit and are now wondering aloud what it all really means. Others have already come to their conclusions and are filing objections to the settlement with the AAP and the Author’s Guild. While Google professes to “do no evil”, their willingness to agree to paying out such a large sum isn’t an indication of guilt and regret. There’s always a silver lining, and you can be sure Google will make the most of it.