Archive.org, Google and Piracy

[tubemonkey]

Originally Posted by stumped

I am with the Internet Archive on this: a temp fix to help with lockdowns trumps copyright. ( as most libraries and bookstores have been force-closed anyway)

"Right now, today, there are 650 million books that tax-paying citizens have paid to access that are sitting on shelves in closed libraries, inaccessible to them. And that’s just in public libraries."

Public libraries still have digital collections that are available 24/7 for check out during their closures. So lack of access to physical books is not an excuse for piracy by the IA.

[Quoth]

Originally Posted by pdurrant

I doubt that abolishing copyright would win a poll on MobileRead. But why wonder? Here we go!

Maybe not, but it would elsewhere.

[SteveEisenberg]

Originally Posted by Quoth

DRM needs to be abolished and be illegal.

This idea has greater risk of impoverishing major publisher authors, now earning enough to quit their day job, than the Open Library's uncorrected scans.

Originally Posted by Quoth

This is a deliberate and long planned attack on copyright existing at all.

I would guess it was planned for a couple days, with much of the time spent on the phone with lawyers.

That's my guess.

How long do you believe it was planned, and do you have any more evidence than I do?

Originally Posted by murraypaul

It is clear that there is no legal justification for what they are doing.

In international law, I think you are likely correct. But, then, U.S. law clearly violates the Berne Convention due to going by years since publication instead of Life +.

If this is clearly in violation of U.S. case law (what determines, and not always the same as literal law), they will be successfully sued. Problem solved.

Only thing is -- there is a legal justification. I linked to part of it on their web site. You just don't agree with it. We have no knowledge what U.S. courts would say.

If they aren't sued, it will be because the publishers and authors fear losing.

The 650 million idle library books while kids are out of school theme may have jury appeal. If the members of the jury could find any possible way to interpret the judge's instructions as allowing for an all-libraries-closed exception, I think they would grab it.

[SteveEisenberg]

Originally Posted by tubemonkey

Public libraries still have digital collections that are available 24/7 for check out during their closures.

That won't help much if a math textbook is in the high school locker. Nor will it help if there is a specific high-interest low-ability novel that a class, working from home, is assigned.

I'm not a lawyer. But I do subscribe to a newspaper, and from what I read, there is an actual emergency.

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by murraypaul

Yes, they are.
It is clear that there is no legal justification for what they are doing.
Whether someone is breaking the law or not does not depend on whether you like them.

They claim to be doing it for educational purposes but academic books aren't the focus of their library. Plus the HaithiTrust and the Library of Congress, who do, are making their collections available.

https://the-digital-reader.com/2020/...ergency-basis/

https://the-digital-reader.com/2020/...access-ebooks/

These are legal and professionally vetted.
There isn't even a need for their site.

They aren't sued because it costs money to fight a suit and there is no way to recover it. So the autgors and publishers have been writing it off as the digital equivalent of shoplifting. But by going unlimited they have revealed their true colors. Maybe this time, somebody like Patterson will take them on, on principle.

Still, principle is rare in the world of publishing.

Of course, pirates put out of business simply resurface somewhere else, typically on a web site hosted outside the US.

[Quoth]

Originally Posted by SteveEisenberg

That won't help much if a math textbook is in the high school locker. Nor will it help if there is a specific high-interest low-ability novel that a class, working from home, is assigned.

I'm not a lawyer. But I do subscribe to a newspaper, and from what I read, there is an actual emergency.

Yes, and it's up to governments to change any laws that need changed. Your examples are rubbish and don't justify this attack on copyright, even if the examples were true, it's up to the publishers to make them available. This is a large scale massive violation of copyright that that has been going on for years. The covid-19 pandemic is just an cynical attempt by the Internet Archive to get public support for their violation of copyright and attack on it.

[Quoth]

Originally Posted by fjtorres

Of course, pirates put out of business simply resurface somewhere else, typically on a web site hosted outside the US.

One of their hosting sites is the controversial "Library of Alexandria" in Egypt. Controversial because much more was spent on the building than books and the "human rights" record of Egypt. I believe there may be currently no European Journalists left. The last one fled recently.

[Quoth]

Originally Posted by SteveEisenberg

How long do you believe it was planned, and do you have any more evidence than I do?

Years. Look at the dates of scans that THEY did (over 10 years?) and how long the Open Library has been running. Obviously they think the present situation is a great opportunity to relax the rules on their already copyright violating "Open Library" and publicise it.

Where does their funding come from?
Why or how have they got so many PDF scans from Google (and some from Microsoft) that don't seem available except as extracts elsewhere?

Very little of it is current educational material.

[barryem]

Originally Posted by Quoth

Your examples are rubbish

I've been enjoying this thread but I guess this ends it for me. That's the kind of talk that turns discussions into arguments and I don't think I want to follow it down that tube.

Barry

[murraypaul]

Originally Posted by SteveEisenberg

Only thing is -- there is a legal justification. I linked to part of it on their web site.

They claim a legal right to single lending for each physical copy.
Even if you believe in that, they don't even attempt to claim a legal justification for unlimited lending, only a moral one.

You just don't agree with it. We have no knowledge what U.S. courts would say.

Lets consider the idea that it is legal for a library to buy a single physical copy of a book and lend that eBook out an unlimited number of times.
Given that, why hasn't a single real library done so?
Why are they paying through the nose for eBook editions, and having some titles restricted from being available at all, if they could simply bypass all the limits whenever they wanted?
The Library of Congress in the US, the British Library in the UK, and similar institutions around the world, hold copies of (close enough to) all books published. So they could scan them and lend them out an unlimited number of times, without permission from the publishers or authors?
Could Amazon?
The question only has to be asked for it to be clear what the answer is?

How is what the Open Library doing legally different from me taking a book off my shelf, scanning it and uploading it to a torrent site?

[stumped]

Originally Posted by Quoth

..
Where does their funding come from?
.

donations, like Wikipedia.
A Message from Internet Archive Founder, Brewster Kahle
Brewster Kahle
Brewster Kahle, Founder & Digital Librarian
Dear Internet Archive Community,

We need your help to ensure that anyone curious enough to seek knowledge will be able to find it here, for free. We’re an independent, non-profit website that the entire world depends on.

We are powered by gifts averaging $45.00. If everyone who uses the Internet Archive donates just $5, we can keep offering these services for free and ad-free. That’s right, for the price of a paperback, you can sustain a library the whole world trusts.
If the Internet Archive is useful to you, please donate today!
Did you know:

We’ve fixed 11 million broken links in Wikipedia using the Wayback Machine?
You can listen to recordings of 200,000 live concerts from 7,800 bands—all for free?
Readers are borrowing 17,500 books per day with complete reader privacy?
The key is to keep improving—and to keep it free.

The Internet Archive has only 150 staff but runs one of the top websites in the world. Reader privacy is very important to us, so we never track you. We don’t accept ads. But we still need to pay for servers, staff and rent.

They are not in it for the advertising revenue, like many torrent / file share sites.

I checked with no ad blockers running; admission is free and there are zero advertisements on that site.

board of directors, and executive staff bios are impressive - these are not corner shop anarchists...
https://archive.org/about/bios.php

[pwalker8]

Originally Posted by barryem

I've been enjoying this thread but I guess this ends it for me. That's the kind of talk that turns discussions into arguments and I don't think I want to follow it down that tube.

Barry

Never understood why some people are unable to discuss a point without being insulting. I guess there are a lot of people who are unable to accept the idea that there are many issues where reasonable people can differ. I like a good discussion, I don't like arguments where people resort to insults or sneers.

[Quoth]

I'm totally sceptical that it runs even 1/2 on donations.

All the good things they do doesn't give them a licence or right to ignore copyright.

[Quoth]

Originally Posted by barryem

I've been enjoying this thread but I guess this ends it for me. That's the kind of talk that turns discussions into arguments and I don't think I want to follow it down that tube.

Barry

Sorry, Barry. Perhaps I should have been more explicit about why the maths textbox and english reader examples were spurious.

[tubemonkey]

Originally Posted by SteveEisenberg

That won't help much if a math textbook is in the high school locker. Nor will it help if there is a specific high-interest low-ability novel that a class, working from home, is assigned.

I'm not a lawyer. But I do subscribe to a newspaper, and from what I read, there is an actual emergency.

Does the IA have school textbooks in their collection?

If a novel was assigned reading, then the students would already have copies of it.

Would you be so kind as to point out the law that suspended copyright laws for the duration of this national emergency?