Google Book Search Deal: Does it Violate International Laws

An interesting blog article on this topic at eWeek.com opens with following comment:

"The Google Book Search deal violates international laws and treaties and could force the United States to pay penalties to countries under rules overseen by the World Trade Organization, claims the Open Book Alliance. The OBA, which includes Amazon.com, Microsoft and Yahoo, turns to experts in intellectual property and copyright law to argue its case. A Google spokesperson says while the company has not fully reviewed the OBA's document, it is confident the settlement between Google, authors and publishers is compliant with US and international copyright laws."

As publishers we follow such information with interest and would be interested to have comments from our subscribers on this topic.