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Google will pay $125 million in a settlement with the Authors GUild and AAP (the american publishers’ association), which still must be approved by a federal judge before it takes effect. $34.5 million will be used to set up an independent Book Rights Registry. Authors whose books have been scanned in Google’s book project might get tiny a share of the money “at least $60, depending on how many rightsholders file claims”, as the Authors’ Guild tells on their website.

The settlement will also establish a mechanism of Google selling books to users (individuals and libraries) and sharing the revenues with rights holders.

Paulo Coelho got quite some press exposure after his speech at the Frankfurt Book Fair last week — which he startet with a reference to the heretic Giordano Bruno. Quite purposefully, I think, as he goes along picturing himself as the “pirate Coelho” who is giving his books away for free, on the Internet and (good forbid) via peer-to-peer networks.

But Coelho went even further — he invited his readers to shoot films based on his novel The Witch of Portobello. The results of this competition can be found on his blog. Also, Coelho staged a virtual exhibition for readers sending him their photos of reading Coelho which he used as a backdrop for the Frankfurt Book Fair. There is the author connecting with his readership using the Internet.

So is he the new bad kid on the block or the (re-)inventor of the book in a world 2.0?

This is ‘The Author’s Rights Awareness Campaign’, and our message to the public is: ‘Texts don’t grow on trees. – It is all about authors’ rights. Respect the authors’ position. Get to know their economical situation – also and particularly in the digital era. Become their partners.’ Equally, our message to authors could be: ‘Texts don’t grow on trees. – It is all about your rights: Use your rights for bargaining. Make people your partners in text.’ Eventually it is your, the authors’ choice how you want to use your rights.

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Edward Shanken interviewed by Peter Troxler, Photo by Anne Helmond

The discussion about what stimulates innovation in the creative industries quickly touches on the topic of intellectual property rights. So far, it is commonly argued that the only solution to stimulate innovation is the legal protection of intellectual property through copyright, trade marks and similar mechanisms.

However, there is a growing number of repositories of user-generated content: YouTube, Flickr Wikipedia. They use open content models; and Creative Commons Licensing has become a popular extension to traditional copyright terms.

During PicNic I had the chance to speak to a few people about these questions, people who are all active in New Media. Using the example of Creative Commons Licensing, I discussed the potential of open content and its possible pitfalls.

With academics Rachel O‘Reilly and Edward Shanken, new media consultant Esa Blomberg, Music Futurist Gerd Leonhard, and the practitiones Hessel van Oorschot (TribeOfNoise), Gijs van de Heuvel (Nederland P), Marcus Miletich (Engerwitzdorf) and Seb Chan (Powerhouse Museum).

Denial comes in many forms, and most recently from academics from TU Berlin. A certain Prof. Erdmann claims to have discovered, that using wind energy would increase the costs of electricity in Germany by more than 0,7 Cent per kWh. Obviously it’s all to do with how you define your system boundaries; and Erdmann does that in favour of the big energy consumers and the highly centralized electricity production industry. He (or the TU Berlin press department) are so busy denying the benefits of wind energy that, in their press release, they fail to spell the weblink to the study properly (http://www.ensys.tu-erlin.de/menue/research/publications/), which I’m happy to correct here: http://www.ensys.tu-berlin.de/menue/research/publications/.

A new organisation, the Featured Artists’ Coalition was launched yesterday (Sunday 5 October 2008) at the music industry’s In The City in Manchester to campaign for the protection of performers’ and musicians’ rights. Formed by some of the best-known names in music — Billy Bragg, Craig David, Iron Maiden, Radiohead, Robbie Williams, Wet Wet Wet to name a few — the Coalition will give artists the voice they need to argue for greater control over their music.

The campaign is all about artists remaining in control of their creative works, rather than giving it away for (almost) nothing to producers, labels and other middle men.

Details on the website of the Featured Artists Coalition, www.featuredartistscoalition.com