Google-Hachette Rumblings

More voices are speaking out on the Google-Hachette deal.  And few seem particularly enthused.

The French author’s association, La Société des Gens de Lettres de France (SGDLF), came out this morning urging its membership to be thorough in their contract dealings with the search giant.

While recognizing that this deal could offer some benefits, the SGDLF highlighted the deal’s potential to weaken the French cultural ministry’s digitization project, announced last year—largely in response to Google’s unlawful scanning efforts.

Sam Edenborough, literary agent of the London-based Intercontinental Literacy Agency, stated that he would “cautiously welcome” the deal in the UK.  Novelist and GBS critic Nick Harkaway is also cautioning the UK publishers:  ”Having run into trouble with the Settlement, they have realized there are other ways of getting what they want.”

Mark Le Fanu, general secretary of the Society of Authors since 1982, is advising authors to pay special attention to details concerning revenue share and if rights can be reacquired “when their work is no longer being sold effectively.”

Google has scanned more than 100,000 French works that are still protected by copyright.