What Would You Do With $20 Million Dollars???

This is quite a juicy tidbit to ponder . . . the Claims Notice Program in the Google Author Settlement (I have it on good AUTHORity) is costing $20 Million Dollars. Funny, I got no notice at all. Well, thanks to the Steinbeck family I did become aware in a very roundabout way . . . but still, it makes me wonder. What the hell was that $20 Million dollars spent on?

I'm guessing that is a question for Rust Consulting http://www.rustconsulting.com/

God, I hate Rust Consulting. I used to have to deal with these jackasses every day. They never answer the phone, and if you make it through their automated answering service to someone's personal voicemail, you can expect to get a response in a week if you are lucky.

Sometimes I used to think it was the fickle Minnesota weather that kept my inquiries from being addressed in a businesslike fashion -- you see, if anything, I am always willing to give people the benefit of the doubt. But no, Rust Consulting simply doesn't give a shit.

So, of course, when I realized they were handling the Google Author Settlement Notice program, I knew I was entirely on my own. There would be no one like me on the other end of the phone to answer my questions, and guide me through the process.

Which takes me back to my original question -- what is the $20 Million dollars being spent on.

Well, it so happens Rust has merged with Kinsella Media, and Kinsella Media gave this explanation in the New York Times.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/04/books/04google.html?_r=3&ref=arts

"But as it turns out, authors and publishers are hard to track down. More than members of most settlement classes, said Kathy Kinsella of Kinsella Media in Washington, which is directing the ad campaign, these are a particularly diffuse group. “We looked at how many books were published in various areas,” she said, “and we knew from the plaintiffs and Google that 30 percent were published in the U.S., 30 percent in industrialized countries. The rest of the world is the rest.”
“We had some choices,” she added. “We thought it made sense that in order to meet the due-process standard that we were as broad-based as possible.” So, using United Nations data, her company created a list of countries and territories. Some nations, including Iraq, Afghanistan and Iran, were excluded because they do not agree to international copyright terms. In others, like Cuba, North Korea and Myanmar, her company is prohibited from buying ads because of United States trade embargos, Ms. Kinsella said."

Interesting. So all those International ads made sending me direct notice impossible? I really don't see that writers are any harder to track down than anyone else. In fact we should be darn easy to track down, because we wait for those royalty checks and statements to hit our mailboxes in a regular fashion.

And this explains the cost of the program -- "So while there is a large direct-mail effort, a dedicated Web site about the settlement in 36 languages (googlebooksettlement.com/r/home) and an online strategy of the kind you would expect from Google, the bulk of the legal notice spending — about $7 million of a total of $8 million — is going to newspapers, magazines, even poetry journals, with at least one ad in each country. These efforts make this among the largest print legal-notice campaigns in history." it doesn't account for the other $12 million dollars.

You see, David Stellings of Lieff Cabraser Heimann & Bernstein told me he had just had lunch with Ms. Kinsella, and she said the notice program cost $20 Million dollars.

So Kathy Kinsella, perhaps you want to star in your own Mastercard ad.

Trip to Myanmar to check out the possibility of placing a Google Author Settlement Notice in the local papers - $8,934.

Rental of New York penthouse to facilitate interview with the New York Times. - $125,342.

Lunch at a fancy New York restaurant with potential clients who regularly notice class members of settlements - $648.

Kickback from the Google Author Settlement Notice program and bragging about the windfall to potential clients and anyone else who will listen - priceless.

Yeah, I guess I could see where it could ad up.