Judge Rejects Google Books Settlement: Make It Opt-In

Federal Judge Denny Chin ruled against the proposed settlement between Google and written content creators, saying that the proposed $125 million agreement (in discussion since 2009) is over-broad, and takes too many liberties on the part of orphan works and other potentially disputable items. The agreement would have put millions of books, in and out of print, online, but Chin suggested that the nature of the agreement (opt-out rather than opt-in) was too permissive of Google's "scan first, get permission later" approach, and that it essentially rewarded them for illegal behavior. Seems to me that rewarding illegal behavior is pretty common these days, but we'll assume that Chin meant well here. His fear of overstepping his judicial bounds is to be commended, but is he setting back the industry as well?

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