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Richard Sarnoff, chairman of the Association of American Publishers and president of the digital media investments group at Bertelsmann, tells the New York Times that the deal with Google whereby rights holders receive 63% of revenue is not a "game changer” for authors, but could be significant to their publishers.
"They will get paid for the use of their book, but whether they will get paid so much that they can start living large — I think that’s just a fantasy," Sarnoff said. "I think there will be a few authors who do see significant dollars out of this, but there will be a vast number of authors who see insignificant dollars out of this." But, he added, "a few hundred dollars for an individual author can equate to a considerable sum for a publisher with rights to 10,000 books".
So far, publishers that have permitted Google to offer searchable digital versions of their new in-print books have seen a small payoff. Macmillan, the company that owns publishing houses including Farrar, Straus & Giroux and St Martin’s Press and represents authors including Jonathan Franzen and Janet Evanovich, offers 11,000 titles for search on Google. In 2007, Macmillan estimated that Google helped sell about 16,400 copies.