If you're wondering what Patricia Schroeder is doing...
From AP/Yahoo:
Under the Google Print Library Project, millions of copyrighted books from five major libraries — including the University of Michigan and the New York Public Library — will be indexed on the Internet unless the copyright holder notifies the company by Nov. 1 about which volumes should be excluded. A few sentences from each book would be viewable, but could not be printed or downloaded.
Google has called the project an invaluable chance for books to receive increased exposure. The library project is an offshoot of the Google Print program, for which publishers voluntarily submit copyrighted material.
But in papers filed Wednesday in the U.S. District Court in Manhattan, the [Association of American Publishers] sought a ruling that would support an injunction against illegal scanning and cited the "continuing, irreparable and imminent harm publishers are suffering ... due to Google's willful (copyright) infringement to further its own commercial purposes."
The suit named five publishers as plaintiffs: McGraw-Hill, Pearson Education, Penguin Group USA, Simon & Schuster and John Wiley & Sons. The suit seeks recovery of legal costs, but no additional damages....
Patricia Schroeder, president and CEO of the Association of American Publishers, said Wednesday that the publishers' lawsuit followed months of negotiations with Google.
"We spent so much time on this I think half of our board ended up having trouble with their families because of canceling vacations," she said.
Publishers worry that Google is scanning entire books, even though just a limited amount of material will be displayed online. The library project's Nov. 1 deadline, Google's so-called "opt out" provision, was established over the summer in response to such concerns.
But Schroeder said Wednesday that the company still wrongly placed the burden on copyright holders. By contrast, publishers don't object to the larger Google Print program because nothing would be used without explicit permission....
Schroeder...cited two reasons for still objecting to Google's program.
"First of all, it sets a dangerous precedent. If you allow Google to do it, you allow anybody to do it. It's going to be an impossible task for copyright owners to defend themselves," she said.
"Secondly, the whole principal of copyright law is that you get to decide if it's good for you. Why should Google get to decide?
Allow me to slam the AP momentarily regarding the last paragraph. There has been constant misuse of the terms "principal" and "principle" lately - usually by saying "principle" when you mean "principal" (is a "principle engineer" one with a high standard of ethics?). In this case, the AP writer (and the editor and/or fact checker and/or whatever) talked about the "principal" of copyright law. Argh.
But on to why Pat Schroeder's name is remembered:
Only a generation ago, Ed Muskie blew his 1972 presidential hopes by shedding a tear about a critical news report on his wife. Less than a decade ago, Colorado Congresswoman Pat Schroeder got endless grief for crying when she quit her presidential run in 1987.
Yet today, both Bill Clinton and Bob Dole seem so comfortable blubbering in public -- dare one say ``on cue?'' -- that the Wall Street Journal dubbed [the 1996] campaign the ``weepiest on record,'' with only iron-man Ross Perot eschewing the snivels.
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