“The settlement would alter the landscape of copyright law, for millions and millions of rights holders of out-of-print books,” Peters said. “It would flip copyright on its head by allowing Google to engage in extensive new uses without the consent of the copyright owner–in my view, making a mockery of Article One of the Constitution, that anticipates that authors shall be granted exclusive rights.”

The settlement, as Peters sees it, will allow Google (GOOG) to profit from the work of others without prior consent. “It could affect the exclusive rights of millions of copyright owners, in the United States and abroad, with respect to their abilities to control new products and new markets, for years and years to come,” she said. “In essence, the proposed settlement would give Google a license to infringe first and ask questions later, under the imprimatur of the court.”

One of the more blistering attacks on the deal to date, especially given its source: The nation’s top copyright official. But Google nevertheless dismissed it as unfounded: “We think the settlement is legal, and we think it is structured well within the guidelines of what you can do in a class action settlement,” David Drummond, Google’s chief legal officer, said during the hearing. “It certainly is not usurping Congress’s authority to do whatever it wants.”

A typically arrogant response from Google, though the company does appear to be conceding a bit of ground in the face of widening opposition to the deal. Responding to Peters’s criticism and claims that the deal will essentially grant Google a de facto monopoly over out-of-print books, Drummond said the company plans to make those works available to any book retailer.

“For the out-of-print books being made available through the Google Books settlement, we will let any book retailer sell access to those books,” Drummond told the committee. “Google will host the digital books online, and retailers such as Amazon, Barnes & Noble or your local bookstore will be able to sell access to users on any internet-connected device they choose.”

Sadly for Google, that conciliatory gesture did not go over well with critics of the deal. “The Internet has never been about intermediation,” Paul Misener, Amazon’s vice president of public policy, said of the company’s offer. “We are happy to work with rights holders without anyone else’s help.”

The Internet Archive’s Peter Brantley was even more disdainful. “I fail to see what’s really new here,” he told the Los Angeles Times. “It’s like Macy’s telling Sears, ‘You can sell Macy’s clothing.’ There’s no fundamental change of the conditions under which Macy’s acquires those clothes. Google remains in control.”

Not bad for a product that’s been around just 15 months. And, remember, these are pre-Beatles: Rock Band sales. When Viacom’s MTV Games ships that title on 9/9/09 (Get it? “Number nine, number nine, number nine.”), the franchise will be well on its way toward the $2 billion barrier, though it make take quite a bit longer to reach it. The public’s appetite for music games like Rock Band and rival Guitar Hero is said to be cooling, with sales expected to be flat in 2009. “[These games are] certainly losing steam,” Pacific Crest Securities analyst Evan Wilson told the Los Angeles Times recently. “This year will establish the direction that this genre will go. Maybe it continues to take off. Maybe it tops out at 15 percent of the software market. Or it could just turn out to be a fad. I think the latter two scenarios are most likely.”

The settlement marks the end of a legal debacle that began back in 2006, after an investigation by the Apple board uncovered some troubling options grants at the company. It also means that Jobs, who was likely to have been called to testify in Heinen’s SEC trial, won’t be. “This is it for backdating of stock options and Apple,” Peter Henning, a law professor at Wayne State University, told the Los Angeles Times. “Steve Jobs dodged a bullet.”