German publisher retracts copyright case against Google

A German publisher has retracted its demand for a temporary court order against Google. Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft (WBG), an academic publisher, had complained to Google after the search engine digitised and offered WBG’s titles on Google Book Search . Google removed the titles, following WBG’s complaint.

But the publisher wanted to ensure German copyrighted titles would not be scanned in future without prior permission from publishers and took Google to court over this issue. The court, however, advised that this decision was a matter for the US courts. The Hamburg court also advised the publisher that Google’s previous action to remove WBG titles from Google Book Search ruled out a verdict of copyright infringement . Following the court’s assessment, the publisher decided to retract its case.

German trade association the Borsenverein, which was supporting WBG in the court action, stated that, even though Google removing WBG’s titles from the web was a “positive sign”, it found the situation “altogether unsatisfactory” and would continue to keep an eye on Google .

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