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Internet Archive responds to recording industry lawsuit targeting obsolete media

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Re: Internet Archive responds to recording industry lawsuit targeting obsolete media

#151

Post by quitit »

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #6

While I strongly disagree with the length of copyright protection, after reading this and reading more about the case, from a purely legal perspective, I just don't see how IA has any defense. They basically just seem to be saying "these are old records, so we should be able to copy them. Also, our work is mainly for academic researchers." My guess is that they are arguing fair use, but I just don't see how that appl…

Just to present a counterpoint, I can see a range of fair use exceptions that IA could argue, these largely align with the educational exceptions present in US copyright law.

What's working in their favour:

1. The intended use of the copyrighted work. The recordings are not pristine, culturally important, and have limited commercial consumption potential in their available form.

2. Nature of the copyrighted work, i.e. Is the use to further creative expression(yes) or consumption(no). IA's own access statistics and duration of the project can strengthen this point.

3. Potential market/value of the copyrighted work: This will play significantly in their favour as the records are dated, rarely sold and not pristine/remastered.

What isn't working in their favour:

1. Unvetted self-serve distribution over the Internet: However this case is an excellent opportunity to extend the face-to-face education exception to self-serve online educational resources. This would be a reasonable modernisation of the clause, and would still provide a clear boundary between the education and commercial use purposes.

Re: Internet Archive responds to recording industry lawsuit targeting obsolete media

#152

Post by wazoox »

dehrmann wrote: post #55

Isn't vinyl the most popular physical medium by sales right now? Sure, 78s aren't as supported, but the first Technics turntable I clicked on can play them, and the Wirecutter has a recommendation that plays them. "Obsolete" is a stretch.

Techmoan has a video where he explains and shows that reading 78s with a microgroove head gives very bad results, low sound, high noise, and no bass. It's a workaround, not a workable solution; you need a special 78RPM head which exist but are rare and expensive.

Basically the technical reason is that the 33/45 record groove is read laterally, while the 78 groove is read vertically. So both cannot be properly achieved with the same reading apparatus.

Re: Internet Archive responds to recording industry lawsuit targeting obsolete media

#154

Post by bryanrasmussen »

dmbche wrote: post #15
hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #6

While I strongly disagree with the length of copyright protection, after reading this and reading more about the case, from a purely legal perspective, I just don't see how IA has any defense. They basically just seem to be saying "these are old records, so we should be able to copy them. Also, our work is mainly for academic researchers." My guess is that they are arguing fair use, but I just don't see how that appl…

"Statement from Brewster Kahle, digital librarian of the Internet Archive: “When people want to listen to music they go to Spotify. When people want to study sound recordings as they were originally created, they go to libraries like the Internet Archive. Both are needed. There shouldn’t be conflict here.”" From the article I believe they are arguing that the intent behind the digitization is fair use, as you say, bu…

there is another issue here also which applies to video not music, but would probably end up coming up in the future.

If people want to watch a video (assuming they don't pirate) they use the video service that provides them that video.

If people want to use a clip from that video in some other production (fair use scenario applies here) they can't copy it from the video service because of DRM.

Re: Internet Archive responds to recording industry lawsuit targeting obsolete media

#155

Post by bryanrasmussen »

112233 wrote: post #138
jonhohle wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Shellac 78s are old but equipment to play them is commercially available and they can be played on turntables that support 78 rpm with the right cartridge. I misplaced the 78 belt for my Pro-ject turntable during a move a few years ago and in the mean time found a copy of New World Symphony that I’ve been wanting to listen to.

Do you know what are current sales figures for 78s? If I release on 78 rpm, how much can I expect to sell?

probably not much, but here wouldn't the case be if you streamed content that was originally from RPM how many views would I get?

Re: Internet Archive responds to recording industry lawsuit targeting obsolete media

#156

Post by guax »

slim wrote: post #111
RcouF1uZ4gsC wrote: post #44

Regardless of the moral merit, I feel Internet Archive is taking on way too much risk with regard to these copyright fights. Internet Archive, in my mind is one of the most valuable things on the Internet mainly for their massive archive of web sites. Risking losing all that over music records and a very risky “loan” program of copyrighted books seems rather reckless.

what's preventing them from getting sued for the websites? it's the same copyright law being infringed on, on the same pretenses

The form in which the websites were made available originally. They were public, so its more than fair to store a copy. It would be different if they were archiving content hidden behind a paywall or bypassing login, etc.

Other media and books have a more restrictive implied license of access and reproduction.

Re: Internet Archive responds to recording industry lawsuit targeting obsolete media

#157

Post by cxr »

JakeAl wrote: post #73
JakeAl wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They are indeed making copies in the strictest sense, but the real problem is if the copyright holders don't enforce their copyrights in the strictest sense they can forfeit their copyright. For example, if I let the public use an image copyrighted by me long enough without strict guidelines and I try to take someone to court, the court can say yes well you let the horse out of the barn and now you are trying to put…

Just a side note/addendum, I worked with entertainment lawyers A LOT in the early days of the web on copyrighted images and while they start from a rigorous position what one simply has to do is find out what the guidelines are that alleviate any issues. For example, with an image or a video clip it often only requires explicit attribution (so every image at the bottom must carry the legal/copyright line, and likewis…

Your two responses in this thread are awful: awfully confident while awfully misinformed. Even calling them misleading would be an understatement. You are spreading outright bad information here. Please stop.

Re: Internet Archive responds to recording industry lawsuit targeting obsolete media

#158

Post by realusername »

Dalewyn wrote: post #123
hunter2_ wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What should the M.O. of an archive be, then? Paid access? That would be an even worse offense! Zero access except for the person who created the archive? That makes no sense either. The archivist needs to vet potential accessors for certain motives? Only offer access to small samples?

>Paid access? No, in that case you need permissions or licensing from the rightsholders to resell or otherwise profit en masse from their work. >Zero access except for the person who created the archive? This is, fundamentally, what archiving something means. It is legal for someone to rip a music CD that they own for archival purposes, but it is illegal to share the resulting archives. >The archivist needs to vet po…

> This is, fundamentally, what archiving something means.

I completely disagree, you can't separate archiving from the accessibility of the content, the whole point of why you are archiving something is to make sure it's not lost and future generations can still access it in the first place!

Re: Internet Archive responds to recording industry lawsuit targeting obsolete media

#159

Post by account42 »

piperswe wrote: post #107
isykt wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How big are we talking?

90 PB as of a couple years ago: https://www.protocol.com/internet-archive-preserving-future > The web archive alone is about 45 petabytes — 4,500 terabytes — and the Internet Archive itself is about double that size (the group has other collections, like a huge database of educational films, music and even long-gone software programs).

How the fuck do you get that unit conversion wrong and not fixed in the 3 years the article has been published.

Re: Internet Archive responds to recording industry lawsuit targeting obsolete media

#160

Post by matwood »

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #89
matwood wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, and if you read the ruling in the controlled digital lending case, it was a mess. IA wasn't making sure the print copy came off the shelf, and they were linking to their own site (BWB) to sell copies of the book. Not a well built case to take to court.

Isn't linking to a place to buy a licensed copy an argument in favor? It implies that they sincerely believe that the "free download" doesn't hurt the market for the book, given that they expect people to still be willing to pay for it. And not making sure the book is removed from the self seems kind of irrelevant when the book is on a shelf in a closed library where nobody can borrow it anyway. Are we really suppose…

If I put up a copyrighted work and link from that work to my own company to buy a copy, that is not going to look very good in court. It also undermines my claimed altruistic reasons. Linking to the publisher site or even Amazon to purchase would have been better to show increasing marketshare.

Ignore the covid emergency library. The entire CDL was never setup to do what was claimed. Libraries uploaded their holdings list, the books were made available digitally, and nothing was done to verify the books came off the shelf when a digital copy was checked out. The emergency library simply pushed publishers to stop looking the other way.

What IA did here actually hurt possibility of CDL or an interesting court case challenging various pieces of copyright.

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