This case will affect writers more than any other for a long time.

For the uninitiated, Google has been scanning books into a giant database since 2004. Currently, there are seven millions books scanned into Google's big database. Of those, a million have had their copyright expire, putting them in the public domain. Another million are currently in print with active copyrights, and Google gained permission from publishers to scan the books. The remaining five million are out of print, but have active copyrights. In many cases, the copyright holder is very difficult to find.

To be sure, Google has spent an enormous amount of time and energy, not to mention money, on this effort and would like to eventually sell access to all these works and more. That desire didn't sit well with authors and publishers, who sued Google. Through negotiations Google reached an agreement.

In the deal, Google will be able to sell individual digital books, as well as access to its database. (Libraries will receive free access via a single terminal per location.) In return, Google will give 63% of its revenue to a books rights registry that will distribute the money to publishers and authors. Google will also provide $34.5 million to help build the registry and provide $45 million to a fund that will pay copyright holders at least $60 for each scanned title. (Source: San Jose Mercury News)

Authors have until September 4 to opt out of the deal and retain their right to sue Google. But, by opting out, they will also lose the right to have their books included in the registry, which may be the only game in town. Google will be able to digitize pretty much anything and show up to 20% of it for free. Currently, it links you to places where you can buy the rest of the book. (Speaking as a wannabe author, this sounds like a pretty good deal to me.)

The problem comes because Google is the only game in town. It may eventually decide to make all of your book free or none of it. It may also decided to drop your book entirely (similar to the Amazon "glitch" that resulted in gay-themed books falling out of its rankings system a while back). It may raise the cost of accessing the books to an enormous amount.

Or it may use its power in nefarious ways we can't yet imagine. (Uhhh, yeah. We don't like the way you wrote this part, so we took the liberty of rewriting it for you in a more non-offensive way. But it's okay. You can opt out. Of course, no one will actually see your book after that, but...)

A hearing will either endorse or reject the agreement on October 7. In the meantime, the Justice Department is starting to ask questions about anti-trust issues.

Personally, I'm split on this. On the one hand, Google is the only entity that had this vision to begin with and has poured an enormous amount of resources into it. On the other hand, I'm not comfortable with Google having that much power over my work, and the work of pretty much everyone else.

This case will have more impact on writers than any other for a long time.