Google has now made one big step forward in its initiative to have out-of-print books online. Tuesday, Judge John Sprizzo approved a lawsuit settlement between Google and numerous authors and publishers to the tune of $125 million. This money will be placed in a fund to go to copyright holders and will allow Google the rights to placing out-of-print material online.

This lawsuit has been going on now for a few years and Google is undoubtedly glad to see an end to it. This could see Google becoming one of the biggest out of print book retailers around. Any revenue received by Google from its print services will be split 37 / 63 between Google and its publishers " the publishers getting the lions share.

Once fully operational, Google print will make it easy for users world wide to access a vast amount of difficult to find information " as Sergey Brin noted, "It's a real win-win for all of us, the real victors are the readers."

More information on the settlement can be found over at Google.

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