zett - 9:16 am on Dec 22, 2009 (gmt 0)

Eurofascist

Whoa. I think you need to calm down a bit, hutcheson. I would be very very careful with that F word. Most folks (including me) get really upset when being called a fascist. Dangerous grounds here.

But let me calm down as well and have a rational look at the situation.

First, U.S. folks should realize that their ARE different countries with different laws. What may be perfectly legal in the U.S. (e.g. copying of entire websites to show snippets and to monetize as the copying organization sees fit) may not be legal elsewhere.

Second, non-U.S. folks should investigate the legal tools that the U.S. provides. If you register a formal copyright on your works, which is easy to do and costs just $35 (which really is not much in Euroland), then you probably WANT folks to steal your property. Because if they do, you can go after them with the full power of the U.S. copyright law. And this can get really really expensive - up to $150,000 fines PER CASE. Ten songs, ten cases. Fifteen books, fifteen cases. Twenty photos, twenty cases. And this regardless of the actual damage being done. I find this really attractive. Good stuff.

Third, for those cases where a work has an expired copyright in the U.S. but a non-expired copyright elsewhere, U.S. corporations who re-publish that stuff should put money aside for those cases where they get sued in that foreign country. Of course, they could cease doing business there and just ignore it, but I guess that doing business abroad is too attractive to ignore. Sooo, it's really a binary decision: EITHER do business abroad and stick to the laws of the respective country OR do not business abroad and do not stick to the laws of the respective countries.

In this case, I see that Google wants to do both both - they want to do business abroad AND not stick to (certain aspects of) the law of France. Which is simply not OK. They'll have to decide what they want to do. (And bringing up the cr*p about "organizing the world's information" does not cut it. It's irrelevant.)

As a side note, I am personally glad that Europe is much more critical than the U.S.; that really is the cultural divide. There was a point in my life where I wanted to live in the U.S., but not any more. I'm happy being old-fashioned and critical, slow and not as money-driven as (some of) the U.S. folks. I enjoy my freedom of speech which is essentially protected by various E.U. and country laws.