Tag archive: Google Books

Announced on the Official Google Blog earlier today, Google will be simplifying how the privacy policy is structured across more than 60 different Google products on March 1, 2012. Users will definitely benefit from the simplicity of a single document regarding privacy instead of sixty policies, but may not like the company direction stated within the blog post. As outlined in the revised privacy policy and terms of service, any user action on… Read More

Google has come under fire at times for scanning books and then making them available online, but Google’s latest project will most likely not cause any lawsuits. Google has just made the Dead Seas Scrolls available to view online for the first time ever. Google worked with The Israel Museum in Jerusalem to bring the over 2,000 year old documents to life online. Unlike scanning books Google couldn’t really handle the ancient manuscripts due to… Read More

Apple and Google are feuding on new turf. Google Books users  on the iPhone and iPad can no longer buy books from within the app. Phandroid reports that the search giant emailed iPhone and iPad users of its Google Books app, informing them that they can no longer purchase and download new eBooks due to Apple's in-app billing policies, which require publishers to give the Cupertino company 30 percent of every item (such as a book)… Read More

Last month, author JK Rowling announced the launch of Pottermore.com, a website devoted to the expansive world of Harry Potter. But the most significant revelations from Rowling wasn't the website — it  was that her  Harry Potter series would, for the first time, be release in e-book format. And today, we've found out how exactly that will happen First, Rowling has decided to shun the publishing industry by self-publishing the… Read More

We all like free stuff. Especially when there's lots of it. One free book is great, but how about 250,000 of them? That's the number Google will soon be making available thanks to a newly formed partnership with the British Library. All of the out-of-copyright books will be digitized by Google — which will also handle all associated costs — and placed on the Google Books UK website. The project covers a period spanning… Read More

Some projects are just too big, even for Google. The company has announced it is halting its plan to digitally archive the world's newspapers in order to spend resources on what Google believes are more important endeavors. The intent was “to make old newspapers more accessible and searchable online”, with the same line of thought for Google Books and the world's libraries. The plan was to scan, index and host newspaper's… Read More

Federal judge Denny Chin has rejected a proposed settlement between Internet titan Google and the publishing industry that would have granted Google a monopoly for digitizing so-called “orphan works,” or books which are still in copyright but for which no author or rights-holder contact information is readily available. Under the controversial settlement plan—known as the Amended Settlement Agreement or ASA— Google… Read More

Internet giant Google has run into increasing amounts of friction with the European Union, with the European Union launching a formal antitrust investigation almost a year ago. The EU's scrutiny has focused not only on the company's Google Books and Google Street View projects, but has also spilled over into the company's core online advertising business and even looking into whether the company demotes competitors in search… Read More

A collaboration between Google and Harvard University has brought us Ngram Viewer, a service that analyzes how often certain terms have appeared in millions of books over a specific time range. Since Ngram Viewer uses Google Books as a search database, you’re getting somewhat limited results – approximately five million books, or about four percent ever published. Still, the archive features a sampling of different languages, including Chinese,… Read More

As we reported last week, Google is launching its own e-book store. Previously known as “Editions” Google eBookstore launches today. Google claims it has the largest book library of any seller, with more than 3 million titles available, most of which are free. Several hundred thousand titles, including many current bestsellers, are for sale for about $10 – $15. Like Amazon's Kindle e-book store's Whispersync,… Read More

Google 's e-book store will open before the end of 2010 in the U.S., reports the WSJ. Called Google Editions, the store was supposed to open last summer, but has seen delays as the search giant tried to improve the buying experience or the product and finish book deals with a number of publishers. “Because of the complexity of this project, we didn't want to come out with something that wasn't thorough,” said Scott… Read More

Speaking at a Book Industry Study Group panel in New York, the Wall Street Journal reports Google Book Search's manger for strategic partner development Chris Palma indicated Google intends to start selling digital books under the name “Google Editions” beginning in June or July of this year. Although Google has been working on launching its own ebook service for more than a year, the move will finally put it into direct… Read More

Google's ambitious digital library project—wherein it is scanning the contents of millions of books in order to make them available via the Internet—looks like it may be facing yet another legal challenge. Today, the American Society of Media Photographers and other industry groups representing visual artists announced they have filed a class action lawsuit against Google over the project, claiming it infringes on copyrights… Read More

Internet giant Google has dreams of making millions of books available digitally through its scan-and-post Google Books project, but the plan has has been subjected to significant objections from publishers and other interested parties, who pointed out that Google would effectively have a monopoly over digital versions of many titles, and would effectively be misappropriating works where copyright holders are unknown or unreachable and… Read More

Last November, Internet giant Google offered a new version of its Google Books settlement agreement, which (if approved) would enable the company to create an enormous digital library and bookstore—including copyrighted works for which Google has not secured permissions. The court set a January 28 deadline for parties to file objections the preliminary settlement, and critics have lined up to slam Google's plans, with many claiming… Read More