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Google makes about $16 billion in revenues each year. Today, the Authors Guild, the Association of American Publishers (AAP), and Google announced a settlement allowing certain activities around scanned books found via Google Book Search. The price for Google to settle this? $125 million, or 0.7% of one year’s revenues.

Smart move, and a win-win for everyone involved. Google will continue to dominate search results and easily win back the small amount it paid to publishers for their participation. Authors might get new revenues from their books. And scholars will have better access to more information.

Of course, the issue of more information will bring about new services and approaches for handling discovery, filtering, and customization. And the beat goes on.

October 30 UPDATE: Harvard says “No, thanks” to the settlement.

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