In a pre-published piece for The New Yorker, Jeffrey Toobin writes about the Google Library Project. This is a different project from the Google Book Search project which caused some controversy in the past. Google Book Search is a commercial project that Google launched in which it links search with “snippets’ of book content and, of course, advertisement. The Google Library Project is however supposed to be the incarnation of Google’s corporate motto that it wants to make the world knowledge accessible to all, free. This all sounds very philanthropic but we might want to have a good look at what is going on.

As can be imagined, publishers and authors have been up in arms about this project as these groups are afraid that Google is riding rough-shod over copy-right laws (and their business’ “raison d’etre”). And they are right to do so as in principle this is what Google is doing. Google has however found some powerful partners to do this with. Although some of these are not willing to go as far as violating copy-right law some others are.

This project is in fact not a novelty and the problems encountered are all well known. Libraries around the world have been looking into digitizing projects for more then a decade and projects such as Project Gutenberg have been around for quite a while as well. The problem these two have encountered is money. To undertake projects this size a huge budget is necessary, which is something that publicly funded organizations, in the case of libraries, or organizations which hinge on public support such as the Project Gutenberg do not have.

There are also other initiatives such as the Open Content Alliance, a Microsoft sponsored outfit, but these are trying to play be the rules and will most probably loose out to Google in the long run as Google is prepared to inject millions into to this, in making deals with the publishers and authors and investing in technology and manpower. By making these trade deals and by investing in digitizing technology R&D, in short; cutting out the competition, Google will in effect emerge as the monopolist in this field. A possibly highly profitable field. It remains to be seen whether they will honor their pledge of not infesting the Google Library Project with advertisement and other harassements, as unlike for instance libraries they do not seem to adhere to a “Socrates oath” of providing information virtually free and without bias (remember google.cn).

Somehow in looking at this issue, I get the feeling that the majority of people do not see the difference between ‘open content’ and ‘open access’. The Google Library Project is truly a good idea, a noble one even, if they truly will provide unhindered and unbiased access to the digitized content of their books database. However I remain sceptical as I doubt whether they will really be able to capture the world knowledge for one and secondly, looking at Google’s track-record, whether they will really provide open access to it. We need to remember; Google is a company, a very good advertising company.

The European Commission (Directorate General for Enterprise and Industry) has published a research study prepared by Rishab Ghosh and his team at UNU-MERIT.

Study on the economic impact of open source software on innovation and the competitiveness of the Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) sector in the EU

The study looks at direct as well as indirect impact and finds that FLOSS (Free/Libre/Open Source Software) could help Europe reach its goal of becoming the most competitive knowledge economy by 2010.
The findings include:

• FLOSS applications are top rung products in terms of market share in several markets.
• The existing base of quality FLOSS applications with reasonable quality control and distribution would cost firms almost Euro 12 billion to reproduce internally. This code base has been doubling every 18 to 24 months over the past eight years.
• The notional value of Europe’s investment in FLOSS software today is Euro 22 billion (36 billion in the US) representing 20.5% of total software investment (20% in the US)
• While the US has an edge in large FLOSS-related businesses, Europe is the leading region in terms of globally active FLOSS software developers, and leads in terms of global project leaders, followed closely by North America. Asia and Latin America face disadvantages at least partly due to language barriers, but may have an increasing share of developers active in local communities.
• By providing a skills development environment valued by employers and retaining a greater share of value addition locally, FLOSS can encourage the creation of SMEs and jobs.
• Defined broadly, FLOSSrelated services could reach a 32% share of all IT services by 2010, and the FLOSS-related share of the economy could reach 4% of European GDP by 2010.
• Though FLOSS provides ample opportunities for Europe, it is threatened by increasing moves in some policy circles to support regulation that seeks to protect old business models of creative industries, making it harder to develop new ways of doing business.
• Firms have invested an estimated Euro 1.2 billion in developing FLOSS software. Such firms represent in total at least 565 000 jobs and Euro 263 billion in annual revenue.

Download a pdf copy of the report from here. You can find current press coverage here.

[Update by Karsten Gerloff:]
When these results were first presented at a Brussels workshop at the end of September 2006, they caused quite a stir. A letter to the European Commission by lobbyist Hugo Lueders of the “Initiative for Software Choice” argued that any move by the European Commission to open the market to stronger competition by Free Software would “disrupt the entire software ecosystem”. Other than that, the reception was rather positive.

While said ecosystem remains very much undisrupted in places such as Extremadura or Andalucia, despite stronger pro-Free Software policies than the EU could dream of, the “Initiative for Software Choice” appears to be an exercise in astroturfing. Apparently, becoming a member does not take anything more than pledging allegiance to the group’s mission and statement of principles; no fees in sight, so this commitment comes rather cheap. I would also appreciate if someone could give me some background on a software company called “Jackrabbit Microwave“; if no information is forthcoming, I’ll have to assume that the group is not above accepting non-existing entities into its ranks.

MORE UPDATE:

CompTIA, the association of proprietary software makers which manages ISC, has apparently been successful in pressuring the European Commission to state that it is not favouring Free Software over proprietary programs. Richard Thurston over at ZDNet has put together a short, informative timeline.

Please note that noone has alleged that the EC favours Free Software. It has merely commissioned a study about the effects of Free Software in the European market, and this study arrived at a number of conclusions, most of them favourable towards Free Software. The EC has not distanced itself from that study, but rather pointed out that it is “technology neutral”, not favouring one software model over the other.

Rishab Ghosh, lead author of the study, has posted a detailed comment on the matter in response to the ZDNet story.