Appeals court rules that Google's book-scanning project is fair use

Google's book scanning project constitutes fair use under U.S. copyright law, an appeals court confirmed Friday, ending a ten-year legal fight by the Authors Guild and other writers' groups to have it stopped.

Google began working with libraries in 2004 to digitize their book collections, including works still protected under copyright, and makes snippets of the digital copies accessible through its Google Books search engine.

Authors filed suit against Google in 2005, complaining that this breached their copyright, and also their right to license their works for search in digital form. Google defended its actions, saying that they constituted "fair use," one of the allowed exceptions to U.S. copyright law.

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