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Originally Posted by Kali Yuga
It is screamingly obvious they've violated a huge number of copyrights.
That's why the settlement agreements keep ketting shot down, because they invert the very structure of copyright law, without any legal authority to do so.
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You can keep saying it's obvious (screaming or otherwise), but from a legal perspective, it is anything but. There's actually very good and very interesting arguments on both sides. You might not agree with what Google has done, but it's not clearly illegal. That's why a lot of people (myself included) were looking forward to the case prior to the first settlement.
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Originally Posted by Kali Yuga
The US has no laws that deal with orphaned or out-of-print works. As such, Google has absolutely no right whatsoever to distribute those works. Further, this is not something the courts should sort out, it should be up to Congress. Legislature writes the laws, the courts should only decide whether or not those laws are constitutionally sound.
Orphan works do need to be fixed, and the final structure could look very similar to what Google is in fact proposing. But none of the parties to the settlement or lawsuit have the legal authority to do so, nor is there any indication whatsoever that Google plans to limit their scanning project to orphaned works. They are sucking up entire libraries and hoping no one stops them.
They do not have the legal right to distribute the books they've scanned. Thus, opt-out is not a "good option," it's an illegal option as it violates those copyrights.
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For orphaned works under the revised settlement agreement, any unclaimed funds are to be allocated proportionally to the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom and Australia, and that these funds will be disbursed to literacy-based charities and the reading public.
If the works truly are orphaned, is it wrong if no one lodges a complaint? Is it restricted if there's no law dealing with it, or implicitly permitted? In any event, Google and the Authors Guild thought they could craft a legally binding settlement agreement that encompassed orphaned works, and that a court would approve. Regardless of that outcome, its nice that this may actually spur more development of an orphan book discussion in the U.S.
I would also point out that the Department of Justice has itself acknowledged that a settlement agreement with a properly defined and adequately represented class of copyrightholders might be appropriate. So they also didn't see it as screamingly obvious as you that Google may be perpetrating the greatest copyright fraud in the history of the U.S.
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Originally Posted by Kali Yuga
I can quote a section of a copyrighted law when writing a review of the content. However, my purposes for writing the review can be 100% commercial in nature and still be classified as fair use.
Google's motives are not relevant. They can swear up and down that they are not evil, and they only want to improve access or preserve the works, and can be 100% honest on these counts. It's still copyright infringement on a truly massive scale.
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I totally agree, it could be copyright infringement on a massive scale. Or it might not be; I don't think either of us can really say definitively.