[B]ooks at especially high risk include those that sell to the student (particularly college student) market as secondary reading. A student could easily grab the relevant chapter or two out of a book without paying for it. Students certainly have the time and most likely the inclination to do so, and, with the help of some willing colleagues, could print out the entire texts of books in the program. —Authors GuildAuthor’s Guild Question Amazon’s Full-text Search FeatureThe Imprtance Of)
I found the above via Slashdot, on The Importance Of’s overview of the Amazon search controversy.
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I think it will be very difficult to put the genie back in the bottle. I'm assuming Amazon feels this act will increase sales -- but it's true that Amazon sells far more than books. So if Amazon gets loyal customers who browse books online instead of purchasing them, perhaps they will learn so much about their users that they will be able to place ads for products that they sell. Amazon may be poised to give Google a run for its money in terms of creating the Memex.
One point I saw referenced on Burningbird's blog seems important--that for those using the search as it was intended, the signal-to-noise ratio is going to be pretty low. I wonder if that, coupled with the fair use issues, will be the death of this before it's much more than hatched.
Yes, I have serious concerns, too. Although it was neat to do an egosurf of Amazon and see my literary criticism cited here and there (and I even found a new book in my field that I want to buy), I was dismayed to see that if I clicked on a page, I could easily click "next" to go to the next page...enabling me to sample a whole chapter. It would be a cakewalk for anyone to grab a book free. This is beyond publicity and sales -- there are electronic rights issues at work here and it seems to me that making this material available online goes beyond fair use. I'm sure Amazon's new search feature won't last long. I hope so, anyway. I'm an advocate for online text but I also advocate for the printed word, too...I don't think of them as mutually exclusive.
Oh my goodness! You mean we wouldn't have to pay for a book we have no real interest in, and will only use a single chapter out of? How unfair! (rolls eyes)