Google Book Scanning and Copyrights

Here's an update from news.com on Google's ambitious plans to scan as many books as possible to make the text available through Google search. The article points out some noteworthy facets of copyright law so it makes for some good reading. Here's the meat of the controversy:

The controversial part of the Print Program, which has prompted two lawsuits so far, is the Print Library Project. Under the Library Project, the search giant is scanning, digitizing and making searchable parts or all of the collections from Stanford University, Harvard University, Oxford University, the University of Michigan and The New York Public Library.

Google says it will scan copyright protected books from libraries unless the publisher or copyright holder expressly opts out. If the book is copyright protected, there is minimal text, only a few sentences, or "snippets," surrounding the keywords searched. There are no ads on Google Library Project pages.

If the work is in the public domain, the entire page will be shown and people will be able to read the whole book. However, they will not be able to print or download the book, Google says.