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Activists rally to save Internet Archive as lawsuit threatens site

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Re: Activists rally to save Internet Archive as lawsuit threatens site

#41

Post by jakeogh »

ComputerGuru wrote: post #27

I warned about this very outcome when they announced the initiative [0]. The Internet Archive is too big and too important to gamble on this short term of a win (giving everyone free and unlimited access to all books for a few months at most). Assuming the organization continues to exist after this ordeal, their entire board should step down for putting at risk one of the most invaluable archives in existence. I’m an…

archive.org is a primary target for the book burners. As with any big thorn; they dont need coordination to attack it; it's practically a law of nature.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20623177

Archive team: is there a 101 on getting pages? I struggle to archive the things I want because of the JS interface and the generated data. I just want the links to the original GET 's and source files.

Torrents for the lowest level data per domain would be excellent. I would donate (again) to get priority for the ones I am interested in.

https://archive.org/donate

Re: Activists rally to save Internet Archive as lawsuit threatens site

#42

Post by AmericanChopper »

themodelplumber wrote: post #24
dehrmann wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure why they thought this would be OK without getting permission from rights holders.

It seems more like they thought it was worth a try, for prospective reasons. From that perspective I find it hard to fault them based on the potential reward ratio for opening such knowledge, much of it no longer in stores or libraries at all, to all of society. The Internet Archive is broadly improving on the library concept by leveraging their technology to push for innovation in intersecting areas of law and cultu…

This reward ratio concept that you invented to frame this only accounts for one side of the transaction. For starters, to give something away for free, you have to own it first. There no moral high ground in deciding to give away other people’s things. But if you want to only focus on the potential for public good, then where would you put the “reward ratio” for the authors who’s work was given away by the internet archive? They struggle enough as it is to make money without a global financial crisis, and without large organisations taking it upon themselves to give their content away. What’s the “reward ratio” for all the book retails going out of business at the moment, and all the staff they’re laying off? Even if you hate publishers, and for some reason think they’re not entitled to property rights, what’s the “reward ratio” for their employees, or the people who’s retirements are invested in their publicly traded companies?

It’s easy to sympathise with the motivation behind the decision, but really their decision was to summarily strip people of their rights, and the payoff for their hard work. It wasn’t a noble decision, because they didn’t own what they were giving away, and an attempt to rationalize the deprivation it contributed to is really just sad. It was truly a monumentally stupid decision on their part, and they’ve jeopardized their entire mission because of it.

Re: Activists rally to save Internet Archive as lawsuit threatens site

#43

Post by matheusmoreira »

zozbot234 wrote: post #35
sergeykish wrote: post #33

> Libraries pay three-to-five times more than retail price for eBook access. If an individual is charged $15 for an eBook license, a library often pays $50 or even $84 for one license. Why? I should be able to donate book to the library. Is it possible with eBook?

Because an eBook is not at all like a physical book. It's more like a service that interacts with DRM to provide an illusion of physicality. Libraries should be enabled to digitally lend their physical holdings and not have to rely on these eBook licenses, and CDL is a great model to that effect.

> Libraries should be enabled to digitally lend their physical holdings and not have to rely on these eBook licenses, and CDL is a great model to that effect.

Why must we come up with increasingly complicated ways to hide the fact unlimited copies are available? The right thing to do is to abolish copyright. It's time to stop pretending copyright makes sense in the 21st century.

Re: Activists rally to save Internet Archive as lawsuit threatens site

#44

Post by shard »

Scientificx wrote: post #38
mikequinlan wrote: post #16

I would love to support the Internet Archive but the people behind it deliberately took steps that were guaranteed to bankrupt them once the publishers filed their (inevitable) lawsuit. Why would I support an organization that is determined to commit suicide?

> I would love to support the Internet Archive but the people behind it deliberately took steps that were guaranteed to bankrupt them once the publishers filed their (inevitable) lawsuit. Why would I support an organization that is determined to commit suicide? Because they hold a part of our digital history.

You make it sound like this is the tech version of "too big too fail".

Re: Activists rally to save Internet Archive as lawsuit threatens site

#45

Post by jariel »

bosswipe wrote: post #7

Losing the Wayback Machine alone as a free resource would be a tragedy of bigger magnitude than the destruction of the Library of Alexandria. It must be saved!

"would be a tragedy of bigger magnitude than the destruction of the Library of Alexandria."

No, it would not even be close to that scale.

Re: Activists rally to save Internet Archive as lawsuit threatens site

#46

Post by jakeogh »

jonah-archive wrote: post #17
DaiPlusPlus wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does that 1.5m figure include redundancy (e.g. RAID)? What about if the data is compressed (either trivial gzipping each "file" the archive has, or using a compression window that spans multiple files)? I imagine the HTML/plaintext content of the Internet Archive would compress very well.

No, that's for a single raw copy (it could go lower based on implementation -- the sweet spot on $/bit pricing is around 8TB/disk right now, but that would actually be more expensive for us in total cost because of the increased infra/space/power necessary to run them). We could probably get a relatively trivial 20-30% savings on space for Wayback contents via compression, maybe more with work (various projects are u…

By unique data, that excluding generated data? Can you please estimate the space for just the wayback machine? It's the actual target.

What's the wayback machine with and without images? Is it possible that we could distribute the ASCII/Unicode content now?

Re: Activists rally to save Internet Archive as lawsuit threatens site

#47

Post by jakeogh »

jariel wrote: post #45
bosswipe wrote: post #7

Losing the Wayback Machine alone as a free resource would be a tragedy of bigger magnitude than the destruction of the Library of Alexandria. It must be saved!

"would be a tragedy of bigger magnitude than the destruction of the Library of Alexandria." No, it would not even be close to that scale.

I suspect so too, but please; if you know more please elaborate.

Re: Activists rally to save Internet Archive as lawsuit threatens site

#48

Post by easytiger »

sergeykish wrote: post #33

> Libraries pay three-to-five times more than retail price for eBook access. If an individual is charged $15 for an eBook license, a library often pays $50 or even $84 for one license. Why? I should be able to donate book to the library. Is it possible with eBook?

eBooks and paper books share very little in common legally. e-ownership is generally a best efforts service to which you have a license.

In some jurisdictions they are even taxed differently. Just to highlight to morose creeping evil that is VAT. Paper book is a necessity. eBook is a luxury. Apparently

Re: Activists rally to save Internet Archive as lawsuit threatens site

#49

Post by AnthonyMouse »

ComputerGuru wrote: post #27

I warned about this very outcome when they announced the initiative [0]. The Internet Archive is too big and too important to gamble on this short term of a win (giving everyone free and unlimited access to all books for a few months at most). Assuming the organization continues to exist after this ordeal, their entire board should step down for putting at risk one of the most invaluable archives in existence. I’m an…

If you want to establish a legal precedent, you can't just go to a court and ask them to. Courts only hear "cases and controversies" -- to establish what the law is, you have to get somebody to sue you.

The reason this could bankrupt them is mostly because they don't have a lot of money. Their net assets are only a couple million dollars. They have to raise more than that every year just to keep operating.

But it's also because the plaintiffs are vindictive. They know this is about setting a precedent. They don't like the precedent, so they're out for blood. They could have been civilized and only asked for an injunction.

Re: Activists rally to save Internet Archive as lawsuit threatens site

#50

Post by Ygg2 »

jariel wrote: post #45
bosswipe wrote: post #7

Losing the Wayback Machine alone as a free resource would be a tragedy of bigger magnitude than the destruction of the Library of Alexandria. It must be saved!

"would be a tragedy of bigger magnitude than the destruction of the Library of Alexandria." No, it would not even be close to that scale.

Well yes, the library was smaller.
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