A Paris court issued a ruling banning Google from scanning French-published books because they were in violation of the country’s copyright laws. It said that Google’s expansion into digital books is a breach of France’s copyright laws. In addition to this, the court fined the Internet search leader with €10,000 per day until it stops showing literary previews, especially of books published on French soil. This hefty fine is equivalent to almost $14,300 a day.

Aside from this, Google was also fined an additional €300,000 in damages and interest payable to French publisher La Martiniere, which brought the case to the Paris courts in behalf of a group of publishers from France.

Google, for their part, said they would appeal the ruling. This decision in France is another obstacle to the goal Google has set out to achieve before 2015: to scan all of the world’s books into a digital library that can be accessed by anyone with an Internet connection. A US legal settlement that can grant Google the digital rights to millions of books is in jeopardy because US regulators have foreseen and warned a federal judge in New York that the act can ruin competition in the growing market for electronic books. According to them, the agreement may also compromise copyrights.

The courts of France, and also that of Germany, have raised objection to this granting of digital rights to Google saying that this will overstep and violate copyrights of publishers in other countries. Google is trying to appeal its case amidst the clamor of its critics. The revised settlement submitted by the company is still under court review.

The French court ruling served as a big obstacle for Google and its ambition of getting into other markets beyond Internet search. Many critics speculate that Google is getting too powerful for the market’s good and that it will soon be eating up its competition and completely dominate the whole Internet market. Despite this, Google’s shares still gained $3.86, up to $597.80, in last December 18’s trading.

A music video streaming site launched Dec. 8, 2009 received high benedictions from record labels. Called Vevo, the site marks yet another effort by labels to monetize their increasingly devalued products.

Foraying where MTV has gone, Vevo contains over 30,000 studio-produced music videos from Vivendi Universal Music Group, Sony Music Entertainment and EMI Music, plus content from Last.fm and various other CBS radio stations. The site is a joint venture of these recording companies with Google.

Google has pulled out professionally produced music videos from YouTube, its popular streaming site, and made Vevo its repository. In addition, Google—currently the world’s most successful advertising company—is infusing Vevo with YouTube’s technological know-how. If successful, Vevo could do for the digital era what MTV did for the 1980s.

McDonald’s Corp, AT&T Inc, Colgate-Palmolive Co, and MasterCard Inc, among 20 other companies, have struck advertising deals with Vevo. In exchange for an audience with its highly lucrative demographic, the site has pegged its ad price anywhere between $25 and $40 for every thousand page views.

Backed in part by the Abu Dhabi Media Company, Vevo somewhat replicates a business model pioneered by Hulu. The latter has become very profitable as a one-stop site to watch films and TV shows, drawing the likes of Disney.

For their part, YouTube has inked deals to legitimately use content from several film studios and television networks, e.g. Sony Pictures, MGM Studios, Lionsgate and CBS. Additionally, the site has plunged into partnerships with all four major record labels, including sole Vevo holdout Warner Music Group.

Warner Music Group CEO Edgar Bronfman was visibly absent at the Vevo launch party on Tuesday. The affair was nonetheless studded with all three music industry moguls, together with their talents.

“Vevo is a huge platform, and you know what’s best of all? It’s our platform,” said Universal Music Group CEO Doug Morris at the party.

Google CEO Eric Schmidt took center stage that night, alongside Vevo CEO Rio Caraeff. They hobnobbed with such musical greats as Lady GaGa, Shania Twain, 50 Cent and Sheryl Crow. Guests were serenaded by performances from Mariah Carey and John Mayer, among others.