Remember "Don't be evil"? ------------------------------------------------------------------------
"By settling a lawsuit with book authors and publishers this week, Google <http://www.pcworld.com/tags/Google+Inc..html> is looking out for itself and has avoided fighting for and possibly establishing a positive legal precedent for copyright fair use on the Internet... "As an academic and a fair use advocate, I was somewhat disappointed the case got settled. I had been hoping to see it as a test of the boundaries of fair use, as a chance for the court to describe more specifically the scope of fair use here," said Wendy Seltzer, a fellow at Harvard University's Berkman Center for Internet and Society <http://www.pcworld.com/tags/Berkman+Centre+for+Internet+%26+Society.html>... "Google has quite effectively solidified with this settlement its position as a leading search company and effectively excluded lots of others from following in its footsteps. A court judgement in favor of fair use would have let anyone else go in and make similar fair uses," Seltzer said. "This settlement sets a pretty high fee on making those uses." In other words, Google saw the opportunity to settle in these terms as a key move for its business strategy, one valuable enough to sacrifice a greater good for Internet companies everywhere. http://www.pcworld.com/businesscenter/article/153085/in_google_book_settlement_business_trumps_ideals.html
