Judge rules online archive's book service violated copyright

[salamanderjuice]

Originally Posted by Quoth

Also IA is putting copyright texts (available on paper and as ebooks currently, so not even the OOP spurious excuse) in their general download offerings and ignore notifications & comments.

Which is not what this case is about. Pretty sure what you're referring to are things uploaded by users to IA. I imagine if given a DMCA claim they take them down. Recently Nintendo Power issues were uploaded by a fan to IA, they were then taken down a month later:

https://gamerant.com/nintendo-power-...letter_popup=1

Even on YouTube you can still find copies of old TV shows and things the uploader probably doesn't have the rights to despite all the effort to automate and police such things.

[Quoth]

I'm writing purely about scanned books.

The IA is sharing scanned books, in copyright, to the public both via Open Library and their regular downloads.
One example:
https://archive.org/details/TheAshleyBookOfKnots


The Open Library case was about violation of the rights of copyrtight holders, basically IA sharing a copy without the right holders permission. Mostly that is via Open Library. They have been accepting uploads of scans and doing their own scans for over twenty years. They have consistently abused copyright of printed material.

They've only taken notice of big corporates over non-book media.

That's why the publishers brought the court case.

[salamanderjuice]

Originally Posted by Quoth

I'm writing purely about scanned books.

The IA is sharing scanned books, in copyright, to the public both via Open Library and their regular downloads.

The Open Library case was about violation of the rights of copyrtight holders, basically IA sharing a copy without the right holders permission. Mostly that is via Open Library. They have been accepting uploads of scans and doing their own scans for over twenty years. They have consistently abused copyright of printed material.

They've only taken notice of big corporates over non-book media.

That's why the publishers brought the court case.

Read the ruling. It's pretty clear that the case is discussing the Open Library and controlled digital lending as it's about violating copyright for 100+ specific books from the 4 publishers made available in Open Library.

Again, Internet Archive allows for user uploaded content. The book you linked is exactly that which is why the "scanner" is "Internet Archive HTML5 Uploader 1.6.3". You can find pirated material on YouTube too.

[Quoth]

Yes, I agree.

I'm just pointing the Open Library is part of a wider "we will ignore copyright" of the IA.

Why is that obviously copyright book still there? It's the copyright corrected 1993 edition and added over 8 years ago. It's not the 1944 edition. They ignore anything other than direct legal action.

[DiapDealer]

Originally Posted by Quoth

Why is that obviously copyright book still there? It's the copyright corrected 1993 edition and added over 8 years ago. It's not the 1944 edition. They ignore anything other than direct legal action.

You're entirely positive that the rights holder has submitted a dmca takedown notice for that title and that it's is being ignored by IA?

[Sarmat89]

Originally Posted by salamanderjuice

You can only read them in the browser. For books with longer loans you can download them but once the loan period is active they can't be read because of DRM.

To view a book in a browser, a page image must be created by copying the original image, and it must be distributed by sending it to another computer. Both of those acts are illegal without the exclusive rights holder's authorization (which the libraries have, but IA don't).

[Quoth]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

You're entirely positive that the rights holder has submitted a dmca takedown notice for that title and that it's is being ignored by IA?

Not a DMCA.

They shouldn't need ANY official notification when a title is obviously copyright and it's flagged.

[ownedbycats]

Originally Posted by Sarmat89

If they are checked out, even for an hour, an unlicensed copy is made and distributed to a user. When the loan ends, that copy is not deleted, therefore it is a book distribution, not lending a book out.

Originally Posted by Sarmat89

To view a book in a browser, a page image must be created by copying the original image, and it must be distributed by sending it to another computer. Both of those acts are illegal without the exclusive rights holder's authorization (which the libraries have, but IA don't).

If you borrow a book, then return it, the images are deleted from your browser cache.

Can you please stop making up shit?

[Sarmat89]

Originally Posted by ownedbycats

If you borrow a book, then return it, the images are deleted from your browser cache.

It is irrelevant to the illegal duplication and distribution.

[DiapDealer]

Originally Posted by Quoth

They shouldn't need ANY official notification when a title is obviously copyright and it's flagged.

"Shouldn't need" is not a legal argument. The onus has always been on the rights holder to protect their copyright by reporting violations. This is not new. The DMCA takedown procedure IS the legal mechanism rights holders need to use to remove online content (if they don't wish to sue). IA is not responsible for doing this process for them.

I happen to think rights holders shouldn't need to do this either. But in the real--legal--world, "shouldn't need to" is quite meaningless. Until laws change, only doing what you shouldn't need to do will ever move the needle.

[ownedbycats]

Originally Posted by Sarmat89

It is irrelevant to the illegal duplication and distribution.

You said 'the copy is not deleted.' I refuted that. Now it's irrelevant???!?

[SteveEisenberg]

Originally Posted by Quoth

Why is that obviously copyright book still there? It's the copyright corrected 1993 edition and added over 8 years ago. It's not the 1944 edition. They ignore anything other than direct legal action.

Your specific example furthers the discussion. Thank you.

The Book of Knots is different from what I was thinking was typical Internet Archive (IA) because few people would be reading it in eInk, even though IA does have an EPUB lending option. The scans look, to me, blurier than what I think would be on paper, but not being a mariner I don't know how big of a negative transformation, from the original, that bluriness really is. (I'm using the word transformation because lack of same was cited by the judge, in the ruling linked in the OP, as a reason for IA having lost their case.)

The Book of Knots is in print (no eBook for sale, only the expensive hardcover) by Penguin Random House (PRH):

https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/b...ifford-ashley/

In two places in the PRH web page, there is a date of publication mentioned -- June 21, 1944. Whether the in-print copy has the 1993 corrections, I don't know, but if so, the corrections were apparently so minor PRH doesn't see a need to brag about selling a second edition.

The book is old, but unambiguously within United States copyright period. That's where the Internet Archive is headquartered, and where the government entities that give IA a large portion of its funding are. Also, the author, who died in 1947, was American, and published first with an old American publisher (Doubleday). The fact that this book, or at least the June 1944 version, has been public domain by the Life + 70 standard for about five years, is minimally relevant.

Does anyone have the list of books that the big publishers included in their lawsuit? I'd be interested to see what books the publishers are presumably most worried about. My guess was that they would care more about newer fiction where IA has a EPUB with fewer than normal scan errors, but maybe I'm wrong.

Something tells me that The Book of Knots is not the kind of copyright violation PRH and friends care about. And I don't think the IA hurts sales in this kind of situation. Instead, people serious about knots may find the IA copy just blurry enough to be a tease, and will, if they can afford it, buy a paper copy -- maybe even a new hardcover from PRH.

Small changes are made in a lot of books as the publisher fixes typos in subsequent printings, and nobody thinks that extends the generally (yes, I am simplifying) 95 year U.S. copyright. The Book of Knots seems to be somewhere in-between just having minor fixes, and having a real new edition. I hope that borderline minor fixes don't generally result in a copyright extension. And I think The Book of Knots is a good example of a borderline case where the IA is doing a service.

[Quoth]

Most epub and Kindle on the IA are simply unproofed OCR of the scans. I gave up of those due to quality. I now only download definitely pd books in pdf format (after checking nowhere else has it) and usually have to process them to read on the eink due to scan quality especially coloured background. I'd usually crop and then after fixing background/text colour/contrast I'd convert to monochrome then 4bit 14 shades, black and white if it's a monochrome book (so far all are).

The Book of Knots had some bad errors in the 1944 edition, not just typos.

[Quoth]

Originally Posted by SteveEisenberg

Something tells me that The Book of Knots is not the kind of copyright violation PRH and friends care about. And I don't think the IA hurts sales in this kind of situation. Instead, people serious about knots may find the IA copy just blurry enough to be a tease, and will, if they can afford it, buy a paper copy -- maybe even a new hardcover from PRH.

Possibly.

In the end I bought this:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/New-Encyclo...dp/B00ZPB525C/

I did learn a load of special knots for fishing and fly-tying from my grandfather and also a load from an old guy in the boat club when I was learning to sail. I wanted a simple reference for research rather than actual use, or I'd have bought the more expensive famous one.

The famous book of Knots is on Amazon as 1993 hardback, paperback and as Kindle:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Ashley-Book...dp/057109659X/
Publisher ‏ : ‎ Faber & Faber; Main edition (5 April 1993)

[Quoth]

Originally Posted by SteveEisenberg

Does anyone have the list of books that the big publishers included in their lawsuit? I'd be interested to see what books the publishers are presumably most worried about. My guess was that they would care more about newer fiction where IA has a EPUB with fewer than normal scan errors, but maybe I'm wrong.

Worried might not be the exact term. List was probably picked as the most likely to help them win with highest damages.