Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

National Emergency Library

archive.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

11–20 of 59 posts

Re: National Emergency Library

#11

Post by supernova87a »

While I'm sure it's a wonderful resource, those cover scans as the thumbnails are generally useless (wall full of blank colored tiles?), and many of the titles are so uninformative and badly organized you almost have to know what you want to search productively -- it's not like you're going to randomly stumble across something interesting in a sea of 1M titles.

Seems like it needs some volunteer contribution to do some curation / tagging / rating to get people to be able to use it successfully...

Re: National Emergency Library

#12

Post by 8bitsrule »

leephillips wrote: post #10
Rebelgecko wrote: post #8

Does anyone know how they're legally able to do this, when publishers make my local library buy a license for every concurrent copy of an ebook that someone checks out?

They are not. They are violating copyright law, and stealing from writers and publishers. Twitter is full of complaints by writers who discovered their illegally scanned books here, pointing out that this will make it harder for them to eat and pay rent during the isolation period.

In my whole life, I've never heard of a significant author who complained about one of their books being in a library, or about library patrons as 'thieves'.

IA has deals with countless libraries, and since the libraries are closed, and the online schools are open, I very much doubt that IA will keep up with the temporary loss of the libraries or the needs of schools.

"Public support for this emergency measure has come from over 100 individuals, libraries and universities across the world"

Re: National Emergency Library

#13

Post by shakna »

leephillips wrote: post #10
Rebelgecko wrote: post #8

Does anyone know how they're legally able to do this, when publishers make my local library buy a license for every concurrent copy of an ebook that someone checks out?

They are not. They are violating copyright law, and stealing from writers and publishers. Twitter is full of complaints by writers who discovered their illegally scanned books here, pointing out that this will make it harder for them to eat and pay rent during the isolation period.

> pointing out that this will make it harder for them to eat and pay rent during the isolation period.

Which makes very little sense. Royalties on books already pay out very little, and at very inconvenient timespans. It is probably not going to make any impact for most authors.

Re: National Emergency Library

#14

Post by 8bitsrule »

supernova87a wrote: post #11

While I'm sure it's a wonderful resource, those cover scans as the thumbnails are generally useless (wall full of blank colored tiles?), and many of the titles are so uninformative and badly organized you almost have to know what you want to search productively -- it's not like you're going to randomly stumble across something interesting in a sea of 1M titles. Seems like it needs some volunteer contribution to do so…

Their search engine is quite good. The IA is always asking for volunteers. Maybe you've got some time off?

Re: National Emergency Library

#15

Post by aiscapehumanity »

leephillips wrote: post #10
Rebelgecko wrote: post #8

Does anyone know how they're legally able to do this, when publishers make my local library buy a license for every concurrent copy of an ebook that someone checks out?

They are not. They are violating copyright law, and stealing from writers and publishers. Twitter is full of complaints by writers who discovered their illegally scanned books here, pointing out that this will make it harder for them to eat and pay rent during the isolation period.

Imagine getting mad at archive for nearly doing the exact same thing that Google books does more or less. It's Google library but more liberal in it's approach, which was initially what Google wanted it's ebook part to be, an accessible elibrary, until authors who did not pay attention to the evolution of music distribution successfully pulled a partial injunction against them. Laughing in hexadecimal, until neural nets become the new authors in 25 years.

Re: National Emergency Library

#16

Post by michaelmrose »

leephillips wrote: post #10
Rebelgecko wrote: post #8

Does anyone know how they're legally able to do this, when publishers make my local library buy a license for every concurrent copy of an ebook that someone checks out?

They are not. They are violating copyright law, and stealing from writers and publishers. Twitter is full of complaints by writers who discovered their illegally scanned books here, pointing out that this will make it harder for them to eat and pay rent during the isolation period.

How will someone who always works remotely be financially impacted by isolation orders?

Re: National Emergency Library

#18

Post by leephillips »

8bitsrule wrote: post #12
leephillips wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They are not. They are violating copyright law, and stealing from writers and publishers. Twitter is full of complaints by writers who discovered their illegally scanned books here, pointing out that this will make it harder for them to eat and pay rent during the isolation period.

In my whole life, I've never heard of a significant author who complained about one of their books being in a library, or about library patrons as 'thieves'. IA has deals with countless libraries, and since the libraries are closed, and the online schools are open, I very much doubt that IA will keep up with the temporary loss of the libraries or the needs of schools. "Public support for this emergency measure has co…

This is not a complaint about libraries or library patrons. I love and use libraries. Authors love to see their books in libraries, including their ebooks. The details matter. Scanning a book and putting it on the internet without the right to do so is not what a library does.

Re: National Emergency Library

#19

Post by leephillips »

shakna wrote: post #13
leephillips wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They are not. They are violating copyright law, and stealing from writers and publishers. Twitter is full of complaints by writers who discovered their illegally scanned books here, pointing out that this will make it harder for them to eat and pay rent during the isolation period.

> pointing out that this will make it harder for them to eat and pay rent during the isolation period. Which makes very little sense. Royalties on books already pay out very little, and at very inconvenient timespans. It is probably not going to make any impact for most authors.

Thanks for deciding for authors whether they have a right to be paid for their labor.

Re: National Emergency Library

#20

Post by leephillips »

michaelmrose wrote: post #16
leephillips wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They are not. They are violating copyright law, and stealing from writers and publishers. Twitter is full of complaints by writers who discovered their illegally scanned books here, pointing out that this will make it harder for them to eat and pay rent during the isolation period.

How will someone who always works remotely be financially impacted by isolation orders?

If you steal my book from the "Emergency Library" instead of buying an electronic copy, I get financially impacted.
Post reply on HN