Mass Digitization History
An overview of key milestones in UC’s mass digitization program, as well as the conclusion of the Authors Guild lawsuits against HathiTrust and Google.
Timeline of UC Mass Digitization
2005
- UC becomes founding member of Open Content Alliance
- Authors Guild files class lawsuit against Google for copyright infringement
2006
- UC joins Google Library Project
- NRLF begins sending volumes to Google to scan
- OCA launches scanning center at NRLF
- OCA launches scanning center at SRLF
2008
- Microsoft ceases funding book scanning via Internet Archive & OCA
- Internet Archive’s scanning center at NRLF is de-commissioned and relocated to facility in San Francisco
- UC is founding member of HathiTrust
- Parties in Authors Guild Google Lawsuit agree to global class action settlement
- UC Davis begins scanning volumes via Internet Archive
- UC San Diego begins sending volumes to Google to scan
- UC San Santa Cruz begins sending volumes to Google to scan
2009
- Due to funding constraints, the Internet Archive scanning facility at SRLF is closed and UC’s collaboration with OCA and Internet Archive ends
2010
- UCLA begins sending volumes to Google to scan
- UC’s Internet Archive scanned volumes start being contributed to HathiTrust
- UC’s 3,000,000th book is digitized
2011
- Authors Guild Google Class action settlement is thrown out by federal judge Denny Chin
- Authors Guild files lawsuit against HathiTrust
- UC Reprints service begins
2012
- UC San Francisco begins sending volumes to Google to scan
- HathiTrust repository exceeds 10,000,000 volumes
2013
- UC Libraries partner with DPLA via HathiTrust
- UC Davis begins sending volumes to Google to scan
- SRLF begins sending volumes to Google to scan
- CDL launches Zephir, HathiTrust’s Metadata Management System
- Judge Denny Chin rules Google Library Project a fair use
2014
- US Court of Appeals for 2nd Circuit rules in favor of HathiTrust (authored by Judge Parker)
- NRLF sends 3 millionth book to be scanned by Google
- UC Berkeley begins sending volumes to Google to scan
- Authors Guild appeals court ruling in Google lawsuit
2015
- Remaining issues in Authors Guild vs. HathiTrust are resolved and lawsuit ends
2016
- UC Riverside begins sending volumes to Google to scan
- Google lawsuit concludes when U.S. Supreme Court refuses to hear Authors Guild appeal
- UC Irvine begins sending volumes to Google to scan
- UCLA rejoins Google Project
- HathiTrust exceeds 14,000,000 volumes
2017
- UC San Diego rejoins project
- Non-book digitization pilot project begins
2018
- In October, HathiTrust celebrated it’s 10th year
2019
- On January 1, the U.S. public domain expands for the first time in 20 years
- HathiTrust exceeds 17,000,000 volumes
- UC Santa Barbara begins sending volumes to Google to scan
2020
- On January 1, the U.S. public domain expands again
- In March, UC campus libraries close physical access due to the Covid19 virus and UC book scanning via Google is put on hold.
- In April, UC students, faculty, and staff gain limited access to digital scans of in-copyright UC holdings via HathiTrust’s Emergency Temporary Access Service (ETAS).
The Authors Guild Lawsuits
The history of mass digitization at UC is deeply entwined with the litigation between Google and the Authors Guild. Over the course of nearly eleven years, Google had to argue the case for digitizing the collections of research libraries. HathiTrust spent three years fighting a similar lawsuit by the Authors Guild.
On April 18, 2016 the U.S. Supreme Court declined to hear the Authors Guilds’ appeal of a lawsuit against Google, bringing to a close eleven years of litigation against Google for digitizing the collections of research libraries. By refusing to hear the appeal, the Supreme Court affirmed the Circuit Court’s ruling that Google’s digitization of library collections, the creation of search functionality, display of snippets, and provision of copies to its partner libraries are all non-infringing fair uses. In 2011, the Authors Guild had brought a similar lawsuit against HathiTrust that ended in 2014 with a ruling also upholding the digitization of library collections as a fair use.
The resolution of these cases was a resounding victory for fair use, libraries, scholars, researchers, and the public alike.
Authors Guild Lawsuits Resources
- HathiTrust page about Lawsuit
- Google Books Settlement Web Archive on Archive-It
- CDL Welcomes Conclusion of Authors Guild v. Google
Related Rulings
- Authors Guild v HathiTrust
- October 10, 2012: US District Court grants summary judgement for HathiTrust (authored by Judge Baer)
- June 10, 2014: US Court of Appeals for Second Circuit rules in favor of HathiTrust (authored by Judge Parker)
- Authors Guild v Google
- November 14, 2013: District Court Opinion Granting Summary Judgment of Fair Use (authored by Judge Chin)
- October 16, 2015: US Court of Appeals for Second Circuit affirms ruling of District Court (authored by Judge Leval)