In an ominous development with direct implications for the blogosphere, the French news agency Agence France-Presse has sued Google Inc. for alleged copyright infringement, seeking damages for the latter's displaying of "story leads, headlines and graphics" without permission:

In its U.S. suit, the news service is seeking at least $17.5 million in damages and an injunction against Google to immediately stop the display of the news service's stories on Google News.

At stake is the way certain news-collection Web sites and search engines can display news content, said lawyer Scott Spooner, who specializes in trademark and copyright law.

Certain Web logs, or blogs, could be forced to change how they display news stories published by another entity, he said. However, the effect on Web sites depends on how much content they display.

"It is impossible to cite some bright line use that this is fair use and this crosses the line," Mr. Spooner said.

AFP says Google News is impeding the market value for its news content because the site is posting the most significant portions of the news stories -- the headlines, leads and photographs -- without paying for it.

"If you go on Google News, it's like a newspaper," Mr. Kaufman said. "There are news stories and pictures. Google News is not a search engine. Google News is a news aggregator."

Agence France-Presse, which has bureaus worldwide, including in Washington, charges its customers for access to its news stories and photographs. The news service contends that Google News does not have the right to display the service's headlines, story leads or photographs.

"When Defendant produces and displays AFP's photographs, headlines and story leads it removes AFP's copyright management information found at the original source," the complaint states.

AFP also asserts that Google has ignored requests to "cease and desist from infringing its copyrights in its works."

The news service has not decided whether it will seek actual damages -- the amount of money it thinks it has lost as a result of Google News posting news content -- or statutory damages, which would allow it to seek up to $150,000 for every instance in which the company used AFP's news and graphics unlawfully, Mr. Kaufman said.

Google may respond by saying its reproduction and display of the news content is a form of fair use, as outlined in the U.S. Copyright Law used to determine whether infringement has occurred, Mr. Spooner said. (Emphasis added.)

Will the copyright laws swallow what First Amendment remnants McCain-Feingold might leave behind?

(As to the MSM defending the blogosphere's right to "fair use" of their stories, dream on.)