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Google Books Hit with Another Class Action Suit
By Sarah Pierce
Google’s attempt to create a huge online library of scanned books through its Google Books Library Project hit another snafu this week.
Photographers and illustrators filed a class action lawsuit against Google Wednesday, claiming the search engine infringed on their copyrights by displaying images from scanned books without fairly compensating the visual artists. The lawsuit comes on the heels of a 2005 class action lawsuit, expected to be settled soon, in which authors and publishers sued Google for not fairly compensating them for books and excerpts posted online through the Library Project. (We told you about this class action lawsuit here.) Visual artists were denied their request to join the pending $125 million class action, so they decided to file their own.
The class action suit was filed by the American Society of Media Photographers (ASMP) and several other groups. “We are seeking justice and fair compensation for visual artists whose work appears in the 12 million books and other publications Google has illegally scanned to date,” ASMP General Counsel Victor Perlman said in a statement. “In doing so, we are giving voice to thousands of disenfranchised creators of visual artworks whose rights we hope to enforce through this class action.”
The lawsuit seeks at least $150,000 in statutory damages for each instance of copyright infringement by Google.
Updated April 9th, 2010
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