Google to grow into a tiger, eat our culture
Lawrence Lessig’s rundown of the Google Book Search Settlement is perhaps the best articulation of the ‘against’ position I’ve seen. He urges us not to look at Google as a kitten, but rather a tiger cub that can’t help but grow into a vicious man-eater.
In particular, Lessig talks about how the Settlement changes the print-based ‘ecology’ of ‘free access’, which guarantees access to published information, to an ecology of confusion and complexity that will actually inhibit access, despite Google’s intentions. He draws an analogy to film documentaries, where each snippet in the film may have separate negotiated rights and agreements attached to it, making it exceptionally difficult to legitimately clear all the rights, and consequently, not worth the effort to do so. More fuel for the pro-piracy camp, in fact.
Lessig’s ultimate point is that the balance has been shifting too far towards commercial interests. Where once we had publicly supported and legally recognised institutions (libraries) that guaranteed access to cultural works, we are moving towards “permission culture” with a “tendency” towards access, but not a “guarantee” of access. This is partly a consequence of moving towards digital publishing environments, which makes it all the more pertinent to refine our legal and public institutions around access, rather than leaving it up to Google and the Author’s Guild.
Interesting stuff and well worth watching if you’re not up to speed on the issues surrounding this monumental change to publishing and copyright.
