A French book publisher sues Google

Heidi Gautschi, Google: On en Parlera: French Publisher Sues Google Book Search, August 18, 2006. Excerpt:

La Martinière Groupe, an international French publisher, filed a suit in early June against both Google, Inc. and Google France on behalf of three of its publishing houses, Le Seuil (France), Delachaux et Niestlé (Switzerland), and Abrams (The United States). La Martinière claims Google has disregarded intellectual property rights and has produced counterfeits of its books on the Book Search site.

Speaking on behalf of La Martinière Groupe, Tessa Destais, adviser to the company's president, explained the motivation behind the suit, saying, "French and EU legislation does not allow a third party to use a copyrighted product. Google Book Search has also misrepresented La Martinière books by making a sentence available here and there and taken out of context. It's not very fair to the books, the authors, or the publisher." For La Martinière, Google's most serious offense is that the company "has put our business strategy in danger and violated our business freedom."

Google, of course, sees things differently. Philippe Etienne, in charge of communications for Google Book Search France, finds the situation "unfortunate and unnecessary....Publishers who wish to be excluded are excluded."...

Comment. I don't know French or EU copyright law. But I'd be very surprised if displaying a short snippet, in a book review or search engine, counted as unlawful "misrepresentation" of a book. I'd also be surprised if "putting a business strategy in danger" were prohibited by copyright law. Shifting from law to fact, I'd be just as surprised if participation in the Google Library project harmed, rather than helped, La Martinière's sales.