Amazon attacks Google books deal

 

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By Barry Collins

Posted on 16 Jun 2009 at 07:57

Amazon boss Jeff Bezos has launched an outspoken attack against Google's plans to exclusively digitise millions of books.

Under a deal struck last year between Google, the US Authors Guild and the Association of American Publishers, the search giant will have the exclusive right to digitise so-called "orphan works". These are books that are still covered by US copyright law, but whose owners have not been traced.

The deal has caused a great deal of consternation on both sides of the Atlantic, and the Amazon boss shares such concerns.

"We have strong opinions about that issue which I'm not going to share," Bezos told an interviewer at the Wired Business Conference, according to CNet.com. "But, clearly, that settlement in our opinion needs to be revisited and it is being revisited."

The Amazon boss claimed Google was being rewarded for riding roughshod over copyright law. "There are many forces of work looking at that and saying it doesn't seem right that you should do something, kind of get a prize for violating a large series of copyrights," Bezos said.

Amazon has plans of its own to offer every book ever printed on its range of Kindle eBook readers, and the Google deal clearly interferes with such lofty ambitions.

However, the deal faces two major regulatory hurdles before Google gets its hands on the books. The US Department of Justice is conducting an investigation into the orphan works deal, as is the European Commission.

The orphan works aren't the only area of contention between Google and Amazon when it comes to eBooks. Earlier this month, Google announced plans to sell eBooks online, pitching it into direct competition with Amazon.

Unlike Amazon, which sells eBooks exclusively for the Kindle, Google will allow consumers to read its eBooks on any device, be it a PC, mobile phone or dedicated eBook reader.