Dear Commons Community,

The NY Times editorial pages today take another look at the recent ruling by Judge Denny Chin that struck down Google’s deal to digitize “all” of the world’s books.   This ruling was commented upon last week in this blog and referred specifically to a column by Gail Collins calling for a “public” digital library to replace the Google or privately-held library.  Today’s piece supports Gail Collins  and also pushes the position that a private entity should not control such a significant portion of our cultural heritage:

“Judge Chin argued that the agreement would grant Google a virtual legal monopoly over the online book search. That is too high a price to pay.”

I agree fully with this point of view.  Maybe it is because I do not like monopolies of any sort but also that our books are an incredibly important part and testament of who we are as a people and should not be controlled by a for-profit entity.

Tony