"Six Reasons Google Books Failed."

Robert Darnton digests Judge Denny Chin’s opinion rejecting the settlement of the copyright claim against Google:

First, Google abandoned its original plan to digitize books in order to provide online searching.... Instead, Google chose to make its opponents its partners...

[Second]... a dubious opt-out clause....

Third, in setting terms for the digitization of orphan books—copyrighted works whose rights holders are not known—the settlement eliminated the possibility of competition.....

Fourth, rights held by authors and publishers located outside the United States...

Fifth, the settlement was an attempt to resolve a class action suit, but the plaintiffs did not adequately represent the class to which they belonged....

Sixth, in the course of administering its sales, both of individual books and of access to its data base by means of institutional subscriptions, Google might abuse readers’ privacy by accumulating information about their behavior....