Open Library -- have they changed borrowing policy?

[Quoth]

Extending copyright was driven by USA corporations. More than Life + 25 to 50 almost entirely only benefits large (mostly USA) Corporations. Not the creators of the works or their children.

[ownedbycats]

Originally Posted by Quoth

Extending copyright was driven by USA corporations. More than Life + 25 to 50 almost entirely only benefits large (mostly USA) Corporations. Not the creators of the works or their children.

It's okay, "Disney" is not a bad word.

[SleepyBob]

Originally Posted by ownedbycats

The "lack of interest" I was referring to is apathy rather than fear. If a book didn't sell well, or the author is dead and their family doesn't really care, some of the books simply will not get digitized until they become out of copyright, which runs the (admittedly tiny, but still there) risk of losing the work entirely.

And, still their right.

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by ownedbycats

The "lack of interest" I was referring to is apathy rather than fear. If a book didn't sell well, or the author is dead and their family doesn't really care, some of the books simply will not get digitized until they become out of copyright, which runs the (admittedly tiny, but still there) risk of losing the work entirely.

It doesn't take that long. One author I did some work for had to scan and OCR a book she wrote in the late 1980s. Due to a couple of moves and a marital split, she no longer had her original manuscript or a copy of the book and the publisher she recovered the rights from evidently did not have any copies around either. We were lucky enough to find a copy at Brown's Books which was in pretty sad shape which made it easier to break up for the scanning process. Even with using the various tools to clean up after the OCR, it was not fun.

[John F]

Originally Posted by DNSB

It doesn't take that long. One author I did some work for had to scan and OCR a book she wrote in the late 1980s. Due to a couple of moves and a marital split, she no longer had her original manuscript or a copy of the book and the publisher she recovered the rights from evidently did not have any copies around either. We were lucky enough to find a copy at Brown's Books which was in pretty sad shape which made it easier to break up for the scanning process. Even with using the various tools to clean up after the OCR, it was not fun.

Just curious, but how long did it take?

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by John F

Just curious, but how long did it take?

My side of it took me about 7 hours from scanning the pages to OCR and cleanup to generating the epub with a very simple stylesheet. I don't know how long her side of it took but she did a pretty massive rewrite with the justification that she had grown a lot as a writer since she originally wrote the book. She sent me a copy of the final product to look over and one of the few times I've thought the ebook cover was an improvement over the original. The original cover made vanilla custard look exciting.

[John F]

Originally Posted by DNSB

My side of it took me about 7 hours from scanning the pages to OCR and cleanup to generating the epub with a very simple stylesheet. I don't know how long her side of it took but she did a pretty massive rewrite with the justification that she had grown a lot as a writer since she originally wrote the book. She sent me a copy of the final product to look over and one of the few times I've thought the ebook cover was an improvement over the original. The original cover made vanilla custard look exciting.

7 hours sounds pretty good to me. Did that include a proof read, or did she do that.

Again, just curious.

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by John F

7 hours sounds pretty good to me. Did that include a proof read, or did she do that.

Again, just curious.

By his description, she did a lot more than proof it if it included significant rewriting. Could have been weeks or months of work.
Figure a couple hundred hours or more.

One thing that story does is highlight the legal position the IA faces: ebooks are a separate, derivative product from the print edition and require a separate license to distribute, regardless of how easy or hard to produce, whether ten hours or a thousand.

(Personal use is a different netherland; producing an ebook for *personal* use out of a pbook is *probably* legal as long as nobody else gets to use it. Copyright is about *distribution*.)

[murraypaul]

Originally Posted by fjtorres

(Personal use is a different netherland; producing an ebook for *personal* use out of a pbook is *probably* legal as long as nobody else gets to use it. Copyright is about *distribution*.)

Clearly any discussion about legality will depend on location.
Where I am (the UK), it is unambiguously not legal to produce an eBook from a pBook, even for personal use, just as it is not legal to produce an mp3 from a CD.

It is also equally clear that most people, including the government, thinks that this is silly, and that there is no chance of you ever being prosecuted for it, nor has it stopped me doing both things.

Copyright law in my jurisdiction is not just about distribution, one of the rights restricted to a copyright holder is the right to copy. (Unsurprisingly, given the name )

17 Infringement of copyright by copying.
(1)The copying of the work is an act restricted by the copyright in every description of copyright work; and references in this Part to copying and copies shall be construed as follows.
(2)Copying in relation to a literary, dramatic, musical or artistic work means reproducing the work in any material form.This includes storing the work in any medium by electronic means.
(3)In relation to an artistic work copying includes the making of a copy in three dimensions of a two-dimensional work and the making of a copy in two dimensions of a three-dimensional work.
(4)Copying in relation to a film [F3or broadcast] includes making a photograph of the whole or any substantial part of any image forming part of the film [F3or broadcast].
(5)Copying in relation to the typographical arrangement of a published edition means making a facsimile copy of the arrangement.
(6)Copying in relation to any description of work includes the making of copies which are transient or are incidental to some other use of the work.

On a very quick look, the same would appear to be true in the US, but not my area.

[John F]

Originally Posted by fjtorres

By his description, she did a lot more than proof it if it included significant rewriting. Could have been weeks or months of work.
Figure a couple hundred hours or more.

...

What meant to ask DNSB was if he checked for OCR errors.

DNSB, did you check for OCR errors?

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by murraypaul

Clearly any discussion about legality will depend on location.
Where I am (the UK), it is unambiguously not legal to produce an eBook from a pBook, even for personal use, just as it is not legal to produce an mp3 from a CD.

It is also equally clear that most people, including the government, thinks that this is silly, and that there is no chance of you ever being prosecuted for it, nor has it stopped me doing both things.

Copyright law in my jurisdiction is not just about distribution, one of the rights restricted to a copyright holder is the right to copy. (Unsurprisingly, given the name )



On a very quick look, the same would appear to be true in the US, but not my area.

The difference in the US vs everybody else is the US has Fair Use Doctrine which is open ended and guided by a Four Factor test of common sense:

https://fairuse.stanford.edu/overvie.../four-factors/

The four factors judges consider are:

• the purpose and character of your use
• the nature of the copyrighted work
• the amount and substantiality of the portion taken, and
• the effect of the use upon the potential market.

It hasn't been formally tested in court (hence my description of it as "probably") but the first and fourth factors strongly suggest scanning a book you own for your *own* use is fair use since you already paid for the right to read and are less likely to buy an ebook version (if it exists) so the market impact is likely minimal.

Distributing a scan globally, on the other hand, isn't personal enough and is more likely to be replacing a legal purchase and be doing significant harm.

There is a fair body of case law dealing with things that are legal for personal use but not for commercial use/replacement. Scale matters. The legal theory there is "De Minimis":

https://legal-dictionary.thefreedict...com/De+Minimis

An abbreviated form of the Latin Maxim de minimis non curat lex, "the law cares not for small things." A legal doctrine by which a court refuses to consider trifling matters.

In a lawsuit, a court applies the de minimis doctrine to avoid the resolution of trivial matters that are not worthy of judicial scrutiny. Its application sometimes results in the dismissal of an action, particularly when the only redress sought is for a nominal sum, such as one dollar. Appellate courts also use the de minimis doctrine when appropriate.

Fair Use is intended to allow reasonable enjoyment of purchased content without forcing creators to compete against their own creation.

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by John F

7 hours sounds pretty good to me. Did that include a proof read, or did she do that.

Again, just curious.

That included a quick proof read by me. Most of the process was done in Microsoft Word to use it's spellchecker to cleanup the blatant errors and then a quick eyeball pass to cleanup most of the remaining errors. She had the joy of the final proofread and then rewrite.