Archive.org

[MikeB1972]

Originally Posted by HarryT

I really don't think that the fact that it's "a non-profit with a laudable public purpose" makes a difference. There are numerous works that are perfectly legally held on "archive.org", being in the US public domain, which would infringe copyright if you or I were to download them. Australian and British copyright law are not the same as US law. As you know, anything published prior to 1923 is automatically in the US public domain, but that's not the case in Australia or the UK. Early works by long-lived authors can, therefore, be legally downloaded by people in the US, but not by you or me.

If you were talking about a site such as PG Australia, then you would have a reasonable claim that it was their responsibility to check that the works they were offering were legal for people in Australia to download, but that certainly doesn't hold true for a site in a country with entirely different copyright rules, such as the US.

It's an interesting point though, archive.org has been around as long as Amazon, has it's servers in the US and has never been shut down so on that basis you would assume they are legal. Amazon gives away free books and no one questions their right to do it. I'm wondering where the burden of proof would lie for downloading illegal stuff, there are so many free/subscription sites out there that I suspect the average user wouldn't know if a site was illegal or not.

Even here the worst thing that can happen with the Creative Content UK Act is they will throttle back or temporarily suspend your internet if you consistently download from illegal sites.

The main problem is that there is no way to check if content is legal or not.

And I think we can all agree that your average person-on-the-street is not going to understand international copyright law, I think the general rule of thumb is that if its offered to you and looks legit then it's probably legit and a quick read of it's about page doesn't say it's US only.

[darryl]

@Harry. We are talking about what is reasonable and an objective rather than subjective test. The so-called man on the Clapham omnibus would know little about Public Domain laws of his own country let alone other countries. He is niether a lawyer nor a student of archaeology. To quote from Wikipedia which is fairly accurate in this instance:

"The man on the Clapham omnibus is a hypothetical reasonable person, used by the courts in English law where it is necessary to decide whether a party has acted as a reasonable person would" .....

[darryl]

Originally Posted by MikeB1972

And I think we can all agree that your average person-on-the-street is not going to understand international copyright law, I think the general rule of thumb is that if its offered to you and looks legit then it's probably legit and a quick read of it's about page doesn't say it's US only.

Exactly. As I pointed out to Harry, the question is what a hypothetical reasonable person would do. The so-called man on the Clapham Omnibus. In Australia you will sometimes here people talk of "the smell test". On archive.org I think you would only have to check if something failed the smell test.

[SteveEisenberg]

Originally Posted by HarryT

I really don't think that the fact that it's "a non-profit with a laudable public purpose" makes a difference.

By itself, probably not.

However, my state library's decision to participate almost certainly makes a legal difference for me. The reason for the word "almost" in the last sentence is lack of case law.

Someone from Florida, earlier in the thread, said they didn't like their web site being archived. Given likely lack of financial harm, I'm not totally sympathetic to that one. When people create copyrighted materials in the US, they are on notice about our expansive fair use doctrine, and have reasonable expectation that the wayback machine will pick it up. There is a public interest in web content not being lost.

However, if the the author of a book, currently sold for profit, sends openlibrary.org a takedown notice, I hope they honor it, without need for followup notices, until the copyright period expires.

[Calenorn]

Perhaps a bit off the topic, but I hope helpful: the Internet Archive seems to be a fairly anarchic place. I have observed numerous titles there that would seem to qualify as racist or extremist or as hate speech. The possibility to encounter offensive material is rather high there. Careful what you click!

[pendragginp]

Correct me if I'm wrong - doesn't Open Library only loan books?

[gweeks]

Originally Posted by pendragginp

Correct me if I'm wrong - doesn't Open Library only loan books?

Yep.

Archive.org has an area where anyone can upload texts though. You can find anything that someone uploaded there. They do respond to DMCA notices for the public upload areas.

Greg

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by gweeks

Archive.org has an area where anyone can upload texts though. You can find anything that someone uploaded there. They do respond to DMCA notices for the public upload areas.

Greg

And that's the problem with it. People can, and frequently do, upload pirated material, and very little of it ever gets removed. Hence my caution to check what you're downloading. I'm not saying that it's a pirate site - it has a lot of extremely useful and entirely legal content - but it also has an awful lot that is not legal.

[CWatkinsNash]

Originally Posted by Calenorn

Perhaps a bit off the topic, but I hope helpful: the Internet Archive seems to be a fairly anarchic place. I have observed numerous titles there that would seem to qualify as racist or extremist or as hate speech. The possibility to encounter offensive material is rather high there. Careful what you click!

What you see as "anarchic", I see as appropriately neutral, as an archive should be. Access to these materials is important to fulfill the purpose of the Archive - to preserve society's cultural artifacts and provide permanent access to them. Its usage as a source of entertainment is, while popular, secondary.

[Cinisajoy]

To me, the big problem is not Mary who goes to a site and grabs "The Great Gatsby" to read for herself. To me the big problem would be Tom, who has grabbed "The Great Gatsby" and republishes it under his own publishing company to make a profit.
I know that book is not PD but some of the author's works are.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by Cinisajoy

To me, the big problem is not Mary who goes to a site and grabs "The Great Gatsby" to read for herself.

If Mary would have otherwise purchased the book, the author's estate has still lost out financially as a result of Mary's illegal download of the book. That's the problem with "archive.org"; unlike MR or Project Gutenberg, it's not a "curated" collection.

[darryl]

Originally Posted by HarryT

If Mary would have otherwise purchased the book, the author's estate has still lost out financially as a result of Mary's illegal download of the book. That's the problem with "archive.org"; unlike MR or Project Gutenberg, it's not a "curated" collection.

Harry. It is interesting that this argument is always put in terms of the author (or in this case their estate) losing financially. But of course the real loser financially is the rights owner, usually the Publisher, who loses many times the usually pitiful royalties paid.

A monopoly eliminates competition and leads to high prices. It is generally recognised as being undesirable. Modern copyright law grants a statutory monopoly. The so-called Copyright clause of the US Constitution explains the rationale for this, giving Congress the power to make laws:

To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries.

How do you consider that this statutory monopoly still existing some 75 years after the authors death possibly serves these aims? How does it promote the progress of useful arts?

The author died in 1940. His wife died in 1948. His only daughter died in 1986, apparently leaving 4 children who were (or perhaps still are) the benificiaries of a trust which receiveds the royalties. There is a very good article on, of all things, the authors finances including discussion of Royalties, at:

https://theamericanscholar.org/living-on-500000-a-year/

[HarryT]

That's a matter that concerns neither you nor me; it's for Americans to decide what the term of copyright in the U.S. should be.

We are straying from the issue, though, which is that it's extremely unwise to indiscriminately download from "archive.org", due to the large amount of pirated material on the site.

[Cinisajoy]

Originally Posted by HarryT

That's a matter that concerns neither you nor me; it's for Americans to decide what the term of copyright in the U.S. should be.

We are straying from the issue, though, which is that it's extremely unwise to indiscriminately download from "archive.org", due to the large amount of pirated material on the site.

Cannot argue with you there.

[darryl]

Originally Posted by HarryT

That's a matter that concerns neither you nor me; it's for Americans to decide what the term of copyright in the U.S. should be.

We are straying from the issue, though, which is that it's extremely unwise to indiscriminately download from "archive.org", due to the large amount of pirated material on the site.

Unfortunately the length of US Copyright is very relevant to the rest of the World, since their politicians seem intent on forcing their own bad decisions on not only their own citizens but also the rest of us. Hence things like their annual "Special 301 list" and their demands in negotiating trade agreements, the latest being the secretive Trans Pacific Partnership negotiations.

I'll respect your view that a discussion of whether Copyright laws are bad laws and whether they are achieving their ostensible aims is stretching the orginal topic too far. Though, of course, if a Publisher is entitled to profit and is deprived of that profit by piracy then whether the law enabling the profit is a bad law is hardly irrelevant to any discussion of the morality or otherwise of the Pirate's actions. In due course we may discuss this in another thread.