31–40 of 88 posts
https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20151016/08010632559/appea...
http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2015/10/appeals-court-rul...
And the Court's actual written opinion:
http://www.ca2.uscourts.gov/decisions/isysquery/c3458e0a-f3d...
As a former librarian I say YES! The typical librarian actually doesn't fight for the access of materials but fights to enforce copy right stricter than the copy right law even calls for. At my college I took down the sign that said "No Copying of Books" at the photo copier and I put in place the actual copy right law. I can't tell you how many visiting librarians were "shocked" I did that. Well we also allowed bottl…
This is awesome. I can remember clearly, in junior high school, the librarian informing us that we were only allowed to copy six pages of a book for homework assignments. I don't really have a strong opinion on much of this (one way or the other), because I'm not well enough informed on the topic, but I remember feeling weird about it, becaus the library aid made us feel like criminals for wanting to copy more than 6…
DRM, copyright and the cultural myth perpetrated by big media producers that every tiny bit of content must be paid for are real the threats to libraries.
As a new academic librarian and recent graduate of UIUC's iSchool (top library school in the country[0] and an active hub of computer science), my experience is that the strict and shushing librarian is, mostly, as you all are recalling, a thing of the past. Libraries are more and more about collaboration, computing, and guidance. Kitchens more than grocery stores. Librarians are more and more facilitators, teachers, and collaborators. The open access movement has a very strong base in libraries.
[0] http://grad-schools.usnews.rankingsandreviews.com/best-gradu...
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Based on your experience, do you think this kind of attitude just typical of the sorts of folks who tend to be librarians, or is there some top-down reason for it?
One word - Lawsuit Every time any of this is spoken it is in terms of job security. If the place you are employed at is sued you could then easily lose your job. It happens not a lot but enough to scare every librarian. When I proposed we leave the $4 a book library management system to a Open Source Evergreen the words spoken behind the companies was hysterically wrong but enough to scare anyone from using them. Bac…
Since when does the right of the owner shift to the consumer with respect to artistic creation? This sets off all kinds of red flags on all things created. The view is narrow, and lacks a broader view on the scope of artists in particular - namely photographers!
Earlier quoted context omitted.
This is awesome. I can remember clearly, in junior high school, the librarian informing us that we were only allowed to copy six pages of a book for homework assignments. I don't really have a strong opinion on much of this (one way or the other), because I'm not well enough informed on the topic, but I remember feeling weird about it, becaus the library aid made us feel like criminals for wanting to copy more than 6…
Yeah, we were only allowed to use the first 30 seconds of songs in school projects. Presumably that rumor started because of iTunes (which is crazy of course because iTunes obviously negotiates extra rights that you and I don't have). Meanwhile we just had to cite where entire photos came from! I think it was just the recency of the music piracy issues that made them care.
More likely, it was a rule adopted because fair use analysis is generally helped by using a limited portion of the copyrighted work, and organizations concerned with liability don't really want everyone independently trying to figure out how limited a portion is limited, so they like to set some standard that is likely to be limited enough in most real cases of the type they are likely to be exposed to (e.g., nonprofitable educational uses, for school projects) as to mitigate risk sufficiently.
> Meanwhile we just had to cite where entire photos came from! I think it was just the recency of the music piracy issues that made them care.
That's actually perfectly sensible -- the demonstrated propensity of interested parties to file a lawsuit, and the likely damages in the case a suit is lost, are perfectly rational factors to consider when determining how to craft a legal risk mitigation policy.
Since when does the right of the owner shift to the consumer with respect to artistic creation? This sets off all kinds of red flags on all things created. The view is narrow, and lacks a broader view on the scope of artists in particular - namely photographers!
If yes, then ever since copyright law was enacted. It's called fair use and the public domain. Also note not all artistic creation is actually copyrightable.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yeah, we were only allowed to use the first 30 seconds of songs in school projects. Presumably that rumor started because of iTunes (which is crazy of course because iTunes obviously negotiates extra rights that you and I don't have). Meanwhile we just had to cite where entire photos came from! I think it was just the recency of the music piracy issues that made them care.
> Yeah, we were only allowed to use the first 30 seconds of songs in school projects. Presumably that rumor started because of iTunes More likely, it was a rule adopted because fair use analysis is generally helped by using a limited portion of the copyrighted work, and organizations concerned with liability don't really want everyone independently trying to figure out how limited a portion is limited, so they like t…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
One word - Lawsuit Every time any of this is spoken it is in terms of job security. If the place you are employed at is sued you could then easily lose your job. It happens not a lot but enough to scare every librarian. When I proposed we leave the $4 a book library management system to a Open Source Evergreen the words spoken behind the companies was hysterically wrong but enough to scare anyone from using them. Bac…
I've seen this type of behavior in Sweden though. Noone is really afraid of that type of lawsuits here.
Note, though, that Google in the middle years of this dispute sought to acquiesce to a class-action settlement with the Author's Guild. That would have more-or-less abandoned the (strong and ultimately successful) fair-use argument, and set up a system where Google and the Author's Guild were economically aligned, with a precedent against other (less deep-pocketed) groups who might want to make a similar fair-use argument in the future.
Third parties including the American Libraries Association, EFF, and ACLU objected to the potential negative effects on competition, privacy, and free-speech of that proposed settlement, which helped prevent it from being accepted by the courts. That forced Google to fall back to its original defense, and led to this broader win for fair-use principles. For more details, see:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Book_Search_Settlement_...