class action lawsuits against google

Appeals Court reverses class action by U.S. authors against Google eBooks on

The American Association Author Authors Guild and several individual authors for the time being but may raise any class action lawsuit against Google Books. This was decided by an appellate court to be released and a permit from the Federal District Court of Southern New York from May 2012. The case (Authors Guild et al vs.. Google, 05 Civ. 8136) now moves back to the district court. The judge Denny Chin should first decide whether Google can rely on "fair use".



With class actions, the shared interests of many plaintiffs will be clarified in a joint process. Individual actions often omitted for cost reasons. Google had argued many authors benefited from the fact that excerpts of their works can be found on Google Books. The plaintiffs alleged an injury and could not be considered representative of all authors. Therefore, a class action is inadmissible.

This argument "might have some force", were the judges of the Court of Appeals (2nd Circuit). First, the district court must determine, however, whether Google's scanning of works under "Fair Use" (about: Appropriate use) falls. It checks in a four-step test whether an unauthorized use of material protected is still permitted. It depends on the purpose of the use of - commercially, non-commercially or for education - as well as on the type of work that used excerpts in comparison to the overall work, and finally the impact on the potential market for the work.

From the perspective of Google Books Authors Guild has eliminated a commercial venture for fair use. Google sees the inherently different. The result of the fair-use test could vary depending on work. Even it could fail, which would greatly reduce the number of applicants (and thus the potential indemnity), a class action.

In another method, in terms of Google Books, the Authors Guild had sued five universities that could scan their libraries from Google. Another judge of the same court recognized this at the fair-use defense and dismissed the action brought by the Authors Guild from (Authors Guild et al vs.. HathiTrust, 11 CV 6351). The appeal is pending.

In the parallel case of the photographer (American Society of Media Photographers vs.. Google, 10 Civ. 2977) Chin had also authorized a class action lawsuit. In contrast, Google has not been appointed, the process runs in the first instance. With the publishers last year, Google has agreed to settle.