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Google loses copyright case in Belgium

AOIFE WHITE

Associated Press

Latest comment posted at 11:19 PM EDT 14/02/07

Newspapers have demanded that the Web search service remove their stories ...Read the full article

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  1. gary blades from Halifax, Canada writes: Google uses the same business model as Microsoft whereby the work and ideas of others are used and copied for the benefit of these giant corporations.
  2. Edwin Longueville from Cavan, Canada writes: If the US government uses bullying as a tactic in international relations, then why would US corporations not use the same tactic? Hoorah for a little country to stand up against the mightly club wielding Goliath
  3. C. H. Oakley from Canada writes: Maintaining a cache of publicly available material, along with some links, should not be considered infringement. This is a terrible decision and anyone who agrees with it is an idiot.
  4. Gord Murray from Canada writes: Internet Superway easement through jurisdictions via technology and numbers strikes again!

    Settlement demand again? Reasonably restricted? Standard rates?
    Sounds like the U.S. 'Sunrise' decision might have someone calendar.
  5. j j from Toronto, Canada writes: Dang, I was reading "Insiders Edition" material on news.google because even though I have pocket change for a subscription I thought the idea of me being an "Insider" was just too goofy; hell I'm a scientist, it's bay street types who like to think of themselves as Insiders Operators and suchlike, but as of January I stopped seeing any new material there... guess you finally plugged that leak.
  6. RJ Roy from Canada writes: It does seem a bit odd to me, but it depends mostly on if they mean the proper usage of "cache". If they just meant that Google cached the URL, which is unlocked normally but only accessable through a subscription (a horrible, horrible way to do it, by the way), that's their fault more then anything. If they meant a downloaded copy of the page, that's another thing. I wonder if they'll go after people who manually downloaded the news articles while they were free next.
  7. Michael Vanner from Toronto, Canada writes: JJ nice poke at the Globe and it's "Insider" content. One of the world's most respected publications, The Economist gives access to all of it's internet site to print subscribers. Not The Globe and Mail, it wants to ding you twice for the same thing.
    I think the Google cached content allowing me to bypass "user" fee's on sites is a great thing. Especially sites where the content is posted by unpaid contributors, which seems to be a trend in the sciences, especially technology.
  8. Mike F from Ottawa, Canada writes: Something is not right here. Google, like all web search engines, uses web crawlers going from link to link to find content, it then indexes it for key word searches. If the link Google finds is openly accessible, then its in the public domain. When anyone downloads the content then they are making copies (from a copyright perspective). If the newspapers move that content to a paid service for archived content and don't change the link or block its access, then I don't see what they are crying about. I personally think its a dumb business model anyway, news articles have a rapidly decreasing value in the public's eye; which is why old newpapers never sell very well. The newspapers don't seem to realize the web referrals they are getting from Google. Maybe google shoud put their websites on a "don't crawl" list and remove their content, then the newspapers would be so much better off ;-)
  9. Clark Kent from Canada writes: These new websites will see a drop in readership and a correspending drop in ad revenues. Congratulations.
  10. Brett Tremblay from Canada writes: It appears that the issue isn't a link to or a copy of freely available material, but that Google continues to cache what was once free and distribute it freely even if it has since become paid content. When the story broke a few months ago I was worried that this mess was bad for internet news but now I realise that the only thing wrong is Google's unwillingness to keep abreast of the policies of the sites it accesses. And, RJ Roy, publishers (even Canadian ones like FP Infomart and our beloved GAM) routinely go after people who download once freely accessible content and then disseminate it -- to the tune of hundreds of thousands of dollars each year. For a case in point, subscribe to the daily e-mail from Advisor.ca. It lists the headlines of the news articles and once connected to them as well but now they can't show you any of the ones that are for paying customers. A while back, they even pulled headlines to paid content but they've since put them back and let the readers decide on their own if they want to access it.
  11. Bart B. Van Bockstaele from Toronto, Canada writes: This is from a September 18th, 2006 article in Le Soir, one of the French language newspapers in Belgium: "Le moteur de recherche Google, véritable géant américain, ne doit pas en revenir : un tribunal belge le condamne pour non-respect des droits d'auteur. Et si les autres pays d'Europe suivaient..." "Et l'astreinte astronomique ? Copiepresse demandait 2 millions, motivant l'importance de la somme par le chiffre d'affaires de Google, « de près de 13 millions de dollars par jour »." This whole issue has nothing to do with copyright. It has everything to do with those Belgian newspapers trying to take advantage of the wave of anti Americanism in Europe to get a cut of the revenue of "that horrible American company". Being a Belgian myself - and a programmer since 28 years- it is my opinion, that it is not Google's fault that the Belgians don't know how (or don't want) to properly design web pages. Protection against webcrawlers and spiders is many years old but they don't use it. They want to profit from the traffic that Google brings them for free, since Google does not charge them, but they don't want Google to make any profits at all, even if doesn't directly profit from any of its Copiepresse content, but only very indirectly. But even though this judgement seems a success for those newspapers, it is no more than a Pyrrhic victory. They had asked for 2 million euro's per day retroactively, they are getting 25,000 euro's per day. It remains to be seen if they'll even get that. On top of that, we are only talking about google.be. Everything is just as it was on google.com. Except for the totally uninformed, it won't make any difference whatsoever.
  12. Vincent Clement from Windsor, Canada writes: Gary Blades: Yes, how dare Google point traffic to these Belgian newspaper websites. But then again, we are talking about Europe, where anything American is seen as bad, despite the obvious benefits. Hey France, how is your version of Google coming along?
  13. gordon foster from Canada writes: 'Google' the search engine once pointed traffic to websites, but these days 'Google' the internet monopoly-seeker sells advertising and purchases rivals. The Belgian newspapers have a good point and made a good case. Here's hoping other 'little guys' will be encouraged to follow suit.
  14. Terry H from Moncton, Canada writes: Disgusting. Sure they could be ordered to not post any more stories from those dolts at the Belgium papers, but a fine of that magnitude is downright silly. I would think that these sorry sources for news should be glad to have Google post a link to them. Some things are backwards in the "copyright" world.
  15. Slippery Slope from Canada writes: Let's see what happens when Google drops every reference to those newspapers in their search engine. People looking won't be able to find them and will have to type them the names in manually. They're going to lose revenue.
  16. Ernest T Bass from United States writes: Maybe Google should remove any hits from their search engine relating to Belgium and from Google Earth. :)
  17. Dog's Best Friend from Canada writes: RJ Roy. You are absolutely right that it depends on your interpretation of the word "cache". However, in this case and most others the word cache is spelled cash.
  18. Veritas Veritas from Canada writes: Typical small-minded mentality trying to choke the flow of information. Google's bots wouldn't have been able to access the content unless it had been freely available on the Net. What grinds me, as a Canadian, is the small-minded LIEbrawl types, many in large metro areas or Ontario, who support the knowledge-throttling actions of groups like the Belgian newspapers.

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