Does "The Book Settlement" encourage indirect book censorship?

Fred Van Lohmann has an interesting critique of the Google Books settlement, dated December 3, 2009, link here. He makes a point that makes one think of some of the arguments in the network neutrality debate: the “master company” could have subconscious motives to engage in censorship of what it makes available, with little accountability.

EFF makes the point that the copyright owner of a book is not always the author. As with Howard Hughes, a copyright can be purchased and then the book suppressed; the article gives other examples (and I recall an issue with J.D. Salinger’s (The Catcher in the Rye) works. Foreign governments could apply pressure to suppress certain books.

There is also a question as to whether the contents of a book could be altered, if a “rightsholder” wanted it to be changed, in keeping with the issue noted above. And the public might never be told.