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Google defeated in Belgian copyright case (How AP licensing scam will destroy Europe's blogosphere)
http://arstechnica.com/ ^ | February 13, 2007 | Ken Fisher

Posted on 06/17/2008 10:30:36 PM PDT by JerseyHighlander

Google defeated in Belgian copyright case; everyone but Google loses

By Ken Fisher | Published: February 13, 2007 - 11:48AM CT

The group of disgruntled newspapers in Belgium that sued Google for copyright infringement has emerged victorious after a decision was granted in their favor today in court. The judgment echoes a previous ruling from the Court of First Instance in Brussels that found Google in violation of copyright law when the company published extracts of articles from Belgian newspaper publishers.

Copiepresse, the Belgium copyright group representing the nearly 20 papers scandalized by Google News, now gets its wish: Google News may no longer link to the news resources in question nor cache any of their materials for use in Google News. Google was fined €25,000 for each day it violated the copyrights of the victorious party, which will amount to a €3.5 million payday. The fines were reduced from an earlier penalty of €1 million per day.

The drama began a year ago when Copiepresse's member companies complained bitterly about the free linkage being doled out to them via Google News. While most news sites jump at the chance to be included in Google News, these publications were aghast. A major reason for their unhappiness was the fact that Google News conflicted with their business model: the papers were in the habit of charging for content after it had been up for a set period of time, but Google News would show you cached copies. That wasn't the central issue, however.

The newspapers also vigorously argued that Google should not reproduce their content in any way without their explicit consent. They actually resented the fact that Google News might direct readers to their content, because they feared that a search engine might do what it is designed to do: get people what they want the first time. Copiepresse's member companies would prefer that you hit their home pages and wander around aimlessly instead. No, I'm not joking.

Google plans to challenge the ruling. "We believe that Google News is entirely legal," Google said in a prepared statement. "We only ever show the headlines and a few snippets of text and small thumbnail images. If people want to read the entire story they have to click through to the newspaper's Web site."

I'm feeling luck^h^h^h^h like you owe me a lot of money

This entire debacle was ultimately about advertising revenue, as so many of these disputes are. Copiepresse wanted in on the game, so to speak, and demanded a cut of Google's advertising revenue as pay for Google's inclusion of their materials in its master index and in Google News. Google balked, because to do so would mean the company could theoretically end up owing everyone who has ever published something online a cut of the pie.

Today's ruling requires Google to accept copyright infringement notifications from copyright holders via email, and Google will have 24 hours to deal with any claim of infringement before being fined €1,000 per day. It's not exactly what Copiepresse wanted (essentially a paid opt-in deal), but it puts the power firmly in the hands of copyright holders to determine what gets indexed. Of course, these same copyright holders had this power all the while in the form of a little something known as a robots.txt file, but they apparently refused to use it. Their collective argument against taking responsibility for how search engines indexed their content was that doing so made Google a de facto copyright rulemaker.

The case is significant for Europe because it could end up affecting search engine policy across the board. A European Commission spokesperson has said that the EC will consider revisiting copyright law as a result of the decision, according to IDG. It is hard to know which way the EC might lean, but if the EC sides with the spirit of this ruling, it could be bad news for search engines and for Internet users in general. The idea that any copyright holder should be paid for the inclusion of their materials—which they've published freely online—in a search index runs counter to established practice.

Google will be just fine, regardless. In most other regions of the world, publications are happy to be included in Google News. In fact, some even pay Search Engine Optimizers big money to "optimize" their search results. When copyright holders back out of search indexes, the only people that lose are the general public and the copyright holders themselves.

In the meantime, we expect Copiepresse to continue their quest against Yahoo and MSN. Maybe if they're lucky, no one will link to them ever again, and they can live in the obscurity that they apparently believe they should be paid to leave.



TOPICS: Extended News; Foreign Affairs; News/Current Events; United Kingdom
KEYWORDS: ap; associatedpress; belgium; eu; fairuse; google; googleap; googlecorrupt; googlefraud
In light of the AP attempted licensing scheme, it seems that there is standing European Union precedent in favor of the AP's position. It will not just be the voices of the United States threatened by the monopolistic predation of the AP over digital news communications, but the entire digital world community that will be hard pressed by this power grab. In light of this decision in Belgium, the situation in Europe is especially critical, legal precedent is already in place for the AP to manipulate, and the freedoms of the people are already severely curtailed.
1 posted on 06/17/2008 10:30:37 PM PDT by JerseyHighlander
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To: glock rocks

Ping to you....


2 posted on 06/17/2008 10:42:24 PM PDT by Brad’s Gramma (Typical Whitey Gramma just like Obamies!)
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To: Jim Robinson

Ping to you!


3 posted on 06/17/2008 10:53:03 PM PDT by Salvation (†With God all things are possible.†)
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To: JerseyHighlander
Copiepresse's member companies would prefer that you hit their home pages and wander around aimlessly instead. No, I'm not joking.

Copiepress? Never heard of them. It seems like media outlets have a death wish: they don't want to get found online, and they want to stick to dying forms of media (like newspapers).

4 posted on 06/18/2008 1:08:12 AM PDT by rabscuttle385
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To: JerseyHighlander

Completely remove them from Google’s search engine data base. No references whatsoever to any part of their organizations. Then see how they like that...


5 posted on 06/18/2008 1:33:00 AM PDT by DB
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To: DB

The MoronMedia is in the final stages of self destruction...they have a pistol to their heads and are threatening to use it...idiots!


6 posted on 06/18/2008 3:48:11 AM PDT by iopscusa (El Vaquero. (SC Lowcountry Cowboy))
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To: iopscusa
they have a pistol to their heads and are threatening to use it.


7 posted on 06/18/2008 3:58:35 AM PDT by csvset
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To: JerseyHighlander

How is there scheme legal or even enforcible?


8 posted on 06/18/2008 4:00:27 AM PDT by stevio (Crunchy Con - God, guns, guts, and organically grown crunchy nuts.)
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To: JerseyHighlander

The Associated Press is out of business. They’ve just not figured it out yet. Nothing anyone can do - no court, cartel or business - will stop technological progress.

Ask the RIAA.


9 posted on 06/18/2008 4:01:01 AM PDT by abb (Organized Journalism: Marxist-style collectivism applied to information sharing)
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To: JerseyHighlander
With the increasing use of the Internet over print media for news and information, this will only hasten the demise of the print media. If you cannot be directed by a search engine to the information you want in an AP site why bother looking there at all. What they are proposing is like creating a library with no card catalog and the books in random order on the shelves.
10 posted on 06/18/2008 6:58:11 AM PDT by The Great RJ ("Mir we bleiwen wat mir sin" or "We want to remain what we are." ..Luxembourg motto)
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To: The Great RJ

Great analysis!


11 posted on 06/18/2008 8:58:41 AM PDT by rawhide
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To: The Great RJ

I completely agree with you, imagine going to a museum where the works of art have no titles, no descriptive text, and the best possibility the museum curators have to organize the museum is their faded recollection of which time period the work of art is from, but since all new curators hired can’t read any of the old art history literature, the collections of art get more and more jumbled as time goes on as the collective memory of the curators fade, and fact, fiction and old wives tales about the art’s origins all mix to create folk legend as to why the ancients built a building to hold old pieces of canvas and carved stone.


12 posted on 06/18/2008 10:30:25 AM PDT by JerseyHighlander
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