On Friday, Google and several other author and publisher groups agreed to a revised Google Books settlement, under which the agreement's international scope would be limited, and what have been described as "orphaned works" (works whose writers are unknown) would find a type of trust fund in Google. With the legal settlement approved, Google would be allowed to distribute over a million digital books online.

With the new and revised settlement, Google is hoping to put to rest all the concerns raised by the Justice Department and various other critics, who were quick to say that the initial settlement drafted was "overly broad and anticompetitive".

With the revamped settlement, Google would only be covering books that have either been registered with the U.S. Copyright Office or have been published in the Britain, Australia, or Canada.

The modified settlement document was filed by Google, the Authors Guild and the Association of American Publishers on Friday, minutes before midnight, with the U.S. District Court of the Southern District of New York. The court had, after expressing dissatisfaction over the original draft, given the groups until Friday midnight to file a fresh document.

Although there are chances that the revised legal settlement would make the required cut, there are some who believe that few points still need to be discussed, including some issues that have not been addressed in the revised document.