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The Internet Archive has lost its appeal in Hachette vs. Internet Archive

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Re: The Internet Archive has lost its appeal in Hachette vs. Internet Archive

#601

Post by mezzie2 »

forrestthewoods wrote: post #530
rockskon wrote: post #498

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The idea is to impose the restrictions of physical goods onto the digital one. Your idea is to eliminate the very concept of a library where ebooks are concerned. You may want to rethink your argument.

> The idea is to impose the restrictions of physical goods onto the digital one. You know how some people think rent control is a good idea but then every economist explain how it’s actually bad? That’s how I feel about “impose the restrictions of physical goods onto digital”. It’s a terrible idea that has terrible ramification if you follow things to their logical conclusion. > Your idea is to eliminate the very con…

> Yeah that’s totally fine. The metaphor of an ebook library is bad and illogical.

E-book lending is pretty much the only accessible option for people with sensory impairments. I think they're a larger portion of the population than writers, so why do writers' monetary interests overwrite accessibility concerns? Plenty of books aren't available in large print or audio versions; e-books are a great way for us to read those books. Big text is best text.

Re: The Internet Archive has lost its appeal in Hachette vs. Internet Archive

#602

Post by matwood »

Amezarak wrote: post #597
vesinisa wrote: post #522

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But that's not what this case was about. Throughout the trial they have been allowed to provide continued digital access to the scanned books, granted they operate like a library (each borrowed book is backed by a physical copy.) The case was launched when during the Covid-19 pandemic they removed the limitations under the veil of "National Emergency Library": https://blog.archive.org/2020/03/30/internet-archive-resp…

Under US copyright law controlled digital lending was clearly illegal. This case did not establish any new precedent, it's a plain reading of the law and the decision reflects that. You and I can both not like it, we can wish the law was different, but no court ruling was ever going to go any other way, and the reckless move of opening uncontrolled digital lending doesn't change that. It may make logical sense to thi…

I agree it was going to be a hard case, but I don't think CDL properly implemented is automatically illegal. The issue here is IA had a lack of control and couldn't assert the print copy came down in their CDL implementation. It's unfortunate this was the case used to test CDL since it was a loser from the start.

Re: The Internet Archive has lost its appeal in Hachette vs. Internet Archive

#603

Post by iggldiggl »

riffraff wrote: post #415
codedokode wrote: post #298

Earlier quoted context omitted.

With physical books the library doesn't need to pay anything to lend it; with digital books it has to pay for every view. Why is it so? Shouldn't the buyers of digital books have the same rights, i.e. the right to re-sell or lend it? As for authors, nothing changes here: libraries lent their physical books without paying before.

The difference between physical books and digital books is apparently wear https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41452031

Although at least in the local library that I'm familiar with, wear is nowhere near as severe as what e-book lending licenses might suggest. From a quick search in the US those often seem restricted to two years or twenty-six lends. The former condition seems totally ridiculous (my library has tons of books older than two years) and even the latter seems questionable – from back when they used to stamp the return dates into the books [1], quite a few books had managed 26 lendings without falling apart yet.

[1] My favourite library branch in my town is, while associated with the city library system, partly volunteer-run and was consequently the last to computerise its lending system, and therefore kept on using the classic system until I think somewhere around 2010 or so, whereas the rest of the city library had already switched in the 90s.

Re: The Internet Archive has lost its appeal in Hachette vs. Internet Archive

#604

Post by matwood »

tptacek wrote: post #299
matwood wrote: post #296

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The further you take a federal case the more precedent you create. Not really. This put a huge chilling effect on real attempts at CDL, which IA was not.

I think we agree.

Yes we do. I misread your comment that this case was somehow a good thing.

Re: The Internet Archive has lost its appeal in Hachette vs. Internet Archive

#605

Post by beretguy »

Yawrehto wrote: post #15

I hope this doesn't bankrupt the Internet Archive (either the legal fees or the case - I don't recall what they're asking for). It would be bad if the Wayback Machine, the biggest internet archivist around, went under, and also all the books, software, et cetera that the Archive hosts. I wonder if there's any way to archive all of the Wayback Machine (82.3 petabytes), or, better yet, all of the Internet Archive (whic…

We need to archive the archive.

Re: The Internet Archive has lost its appeal in Hachette vs. Internet Archive

#606

Post by MetaWhirledPeas »

hilbert42 wrote: post #463
kmeisthax wrote: post #447

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Basically, physical books wear out with use, ebooks don't, so there's a built-in mechanism for revenue recurrence that happens with print books but not ebooks. As someone who understands the ruling and why IA lost completely, I still hate this argument, because it gets the history backwards. When first sale was put into (case)law, ebooks didn't exist. First sale doesn't exist because "oh, well, the book wears out e…

"the law decided that, no, there is no rights exhaustion whatsoever" Ultimately, the law will either have to change to be fairer and recognize the buyer's investment or digital copying (piracy) will overwhelm it. It's not if but when (technology almost makes that axiomatic). This will not happen immediately but as US influence in the world declines other fairer paradigms will emerge. As we've seen already, probably a…

This whole thing is backwards. Selling books began in a time when there was inherent value in distributing books, meaning there was no other way to read a book than to purchase or borrow a physical copy.

The money followed the value.

The value of distribution is no longer there. We are trying to push yarn up a chimney.

I like living in a world where authors make a living by writing books, but if the inherent value isn't there then it's all fake, fake fake.

This is the same predicament we've been in for years with other forms of media, but those with big corp backing have managed to synthesize value through various forms of sabotage like DRM or linking their software to a remote server somehow. We've come to accept it because there's value in dodging all of the nonsense.

Consumers will always be the barometer for fairness; if they perceive value, they will pay for it. But all the controversy is about fairness for the authors and publishers. If authors can figure out some money-making scheme then great, but let's not concern ourselves with "fairness" for the author because that went out the window a long time ago. This is all just a big money grabbing game at this point. (And what they really mean is fairness for popular authors anyway.)

Maybe the future will look different. We need authors, we need editors, but do we need publishers? Probably not. Maybe a trend will form where groups or individuals commission a work from an author, taking the place of the publisher on a more ad hoc basis. Or maybe concepts like Patreon will evolve to better compensate authors. I don't know exactly what it will look like, but I do know that targeting groups like the Internet Archive is nothing more than a delay tactic.

Re: The Internet Archive has lost its appeal in Hachette vs. Internet Archive

#607

Post by jasode »

pk-protect-ai wrote: post #599
sumeno wrote: post #586

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Why did only Kahle do it, and why was it only Kahle coming up with CDL as an idea to prevent the death of first sale, of lending a book, of the idea of a free library in a digital future? Lots of libraries do free digital lending of ebooks in a legal way and have done so for a long time

And now there will be a legal precedent to shut down all CDLs of these "lots of libraries".

>And now there will be a legal precedent to shut down all CDLs of these "lots of libraries"

No, it's a different situation. In contrast, the government public libraries legitimately purchased ebook licenses (aka "renting") from the publishers and then "loaned" out a limited # of simultaneous copies in a legal manner. The book publishers approved this arrangement.

The Internet Archive didn't do that. Instead, they "loaned" out digital scans of books they did not buy ebook licenses for and took it upon themselves to name it "Controlled Digital Lending". This method circumvents the book publishers which is the opposite of what government public libraries did.

EDIT reply to: >If they have the physical book how is this any different,

When I wrote, "different situation" , it's about the "legal difference" and not "philosophical difference".

- situation with govt public libraries: The book publishers did not sue the public libraries that legitimately purchase ebook licenses from them. The publishers receive payments from that arrangement so there's no lawsuit for "copyright violation".

- situation with Internet Archive: The book publishers sued IA for copyright violation by lending books it never purchased ebook licenses for. The circuit appeals court sided with the book publishers unanimously by a vote of 3-to-0.

Those 2 situations above are different legally such that whatever precedent that's set by IA losing the case doesn't affect govt libraries that have been purchasing legitimate ebook licenses. I was trying to clarify gp's incorrect statement which could spread misinformation: "And now there will be a legal precedent to shut down all CDLs of these "lots of libraries"

Re: The Internet Archive has lost its appeal in Hachette vs. Internet Archive

#608

Post by hiatus »

pk-protect-ai wrote: post #599
sumeno wrote: post #586

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Why did only Kahle do it, and why was it only Kahle coming up with CDL as an idea to prevent the death of first sale, of lending a book, of the idea of a free library in a digital future? Lots of libraries do free digital lending of ebooks in a legal way and have done so for a long time

And now there will be a legal precedent to shut down all CDLs of these "lots of libraries".

As I understand it, libraries with CDL have purchased licenses for the works they allow to be checked out in this way and do not scan books and lend out their digital scans.

Re: The Internet Archive has lost its appeal in Hachette vs. Internet Archive

#609

Post by gigel82 »

ilamont wrote: post #52

This has been playing out for many years. And it's all because Brewster Kahle decided that an overly broad interpretation of the Internet Archive's mission trumped the rights of authors and publishers, and the laws of the United States. When IA was asked to stop CDL - many times - he continued. The National Writers Union tried to open a dialogue as early as 2010 but was ignored: The Internet Archive says it would rat…

I also have a personal gripe with the Wayback Machine; there is absolutely no way to get something removed once they archive it (despite the data including accidentally leaked PII for example - which can cause actual harm to someone).

Not only do they ignore robots.txt, they ignored all emails sent to info@archive.org from the actual domain in question which I owned, with a link to a URL on the domain asking them to remove it.

I can understand wanting to preserve some large website's article that is of public interest but this is just malicious / dangerous. It took me 2 years and working with a lawyer friend to draft a DMCA request to finally have them remove the content.

Re: The Internet Archive has lost its appeal in Hachette vs. Internet Archive

#610

Post by ilamont »

SllX wrote: post #512
teruakohatu wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In his many interviews with U.S. media, he portrays the court cases and legal judgements as a crusade against the Internet Archive and all librarians. It's not. It's the logical outcome of one man's seemingly fanatical conviction against the law and the people who work very hard to bring new books into being. If IA had won, IA would be hailed as a cultural hero. They hit and they missed. Claiming Brewster Kahle is…

This isn’t about swinging and missing. This was a project in direct contravention of the copyright laws and agreements they have within the very jurisdiction they operate. It’s like if they saw the ball coming, and in that moment decided baseball is dumb and they they would rather be playing soccer instead so they threw the metaphorical bat down, tried to kick the ball already pitched at them and somehow broke their…

Thank you for this analogy. Lightens up the thread and put a smile on my face.
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