Judge agrees to postpone Google Books hearing

The Authors Guild, the Association of American Publishers (AAP), and Google will get more time to modify their proposed agreement to settle lawsuits the two organizations filed against the search company over its book search service. Judge Denny Chin on Thursday granted a request made earlier this week by the Authors Guild and the AAP to postpone the "final fairness" hearing on their proposed settlement agreement with Google. The Authors Guild, the AAP, and Google are revising the agreement so that it can get the DOJ's stamp of approval, but they said they wouldn't have the revised proposal ready by Oct. 7, the original date of the "final fairness" hearing. However, in granting the postponement request, Judge Chin said that the parties still need to be in court on Oct. 7 for a status hearing, during which they'll work out a schedule for how to proceed.