This morning’s Observer column.

If you have any free brain cells next Tuesday, spare a thought for Denny Chin. He is a judge on the US district court for the southern district of New York. And he has the job of deciding a case which has profound implications for our culture.

At its centre is a decision about how we will access printed books in the future. And, as you might guess, Google is at the heart of it…

The published version of the column omitted the reference to Professor James Grimmelmann’s terrific commentary on the case. If you’re interested, you can get the pdf from here.