When Google Attacks

Renowned artist Asaf Hanuka produced a creative and thought provoking piece of art to accompany a thoughtful article in California Lawyer magazine on Google’s increasingly disturbing behavior.

(credit: Asaf Hanuka)

Hanuka chose to depict an epic battle between a voracious Google monster and heroic authors attempting to fight of its rampage.  With an appetite for 1,000 pages an hour we think he just about nailed it.

In the accompanying article Tom McNichol describes the spectacular chain of events that have brought consumer advocates, privacy watchdogs and the U.S. government together in opposition to the growing Google monster.

OBA’s own Gary Reback receives a prominent place in the article noting:

“At least with [the old] Microsoft, you knew where you stood because they were candid about their goals,” Reback reflects. “They thought it was their God-given right to do what they wanted to do, and you could engage the adversary on that basis. But with Google, they really seem to believe that they’re good guys, and that’s how they present themselves.”

McNichol also explores the exceptional audacity and growth of the settlement’s objectives:

To critics, the settlement effectively locked in the ground rules for the emerging digital books market, to Google’s considerable advantage. What initially appeared to be a class action settlement involving a set of aggrieved rights holders became a privately negotiated compulsory license designed to monetize millions of out-of-print works.

The article should be required reading for anyone interested in a succinct overview of the issue. And, as for Hanuka’s Google monster, we plan to frame a copy for our desk to remind us of just what we’re up against.