Google announced today that is unveiling "Google No E" as a replacement for the company's Google Print program, which had been met with much resistance from publishers. With Google No E, Google will scan and make available every book ever published, with all instances of the letter E omitted.
"We had some negative reactions from publishers to our GooglePrint program," said spokeswoman Donna Manfreid. "So we decided to get past those pesky copyright issues by allowing users to search the full-text of every book ever published and view actual, scanned pages, but without the E's. We think this will go a long way toward our mission while ameliorating the concerns of publishers."
When asked to comment, president of the American Association of Publishers Pat Schroeder said, "It's a step in the right direction, but we're going to monitor the situation closely to make sure no errant E's slip through. If Google makes any excerpts available with the E's included, then book sales will plummet and we'll have to call our lawyers."
Cool. Good one.
Posted by: Bill | November 18, 2005 at 09:19 PM