91–100 of 226 posts
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It might not be widely known, but they have in the past had copies of the Archive in Alexandria and other locations. From my brief time there, I know that issues like these are of great concern to the Archive.
I recall they'd announced the intention to set up a mirror in Canada, did that ever materialize? https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2016/11/worried-about-us...
This is pretty much why I stopped donating to them, not like they'll miss the sporadic $50 they'd get from me. Getting sued is a pretty obvious result of their decision to ignore copyright laws. If they didn't realize that they'd be sued then they're hopelessly shortsighted (there's no "emergency" exemption to copyright laws, even if you can make the argument that morally there should be). If they did know that they'…
This is pretty much why I stopped donating to them, not like they'll miss the sporadic $50 they'd get from me. Getting sued is a pretty obvious result of their decision to ignore copyright laws. If they didn't realize that they'd be sued then they're hopelessly shortsighted (there's no "emergency" exemption to copyright laws, even if you can make the argument that morally there should be). If they did know that they'…
There are exceptions to copyright law: https://www.copyright.gov/fair-use/more-info.html Maybe they're trying to set a legal precedent, which sounds great. I don't know why but I read your comment in such a negative tone. "Rebel"gecko indeed
Part of being a good rebel is to choose your battles wisely :) I think IA does a good job at that when they distribute abandonware or public domain materials. Trying to share unlimited copies of Harry Potter seems much more quixotic.
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The mission of preserving human culture is far more important than respecting rent-seeking copyright holders. At the end of the day, The Internet Archive has good intentions and is morally in the right. The time has come to consider changing the laws to allow for truly fair use, especially for physical items scanned to digital (e.g. books), old video games, and more. It's about selecting for the common good over the…
This wasn't about preserving archives, or distributing old works that should have been in the public domain by now, or even "lending" out digital copies backed by physical copies they owned. This was about distributing unlimited digital copies of current works (some published just the year before). Legally and morally I cannot see this as any different or better than blatant copyright piracy. The Internet Archive doe…
So...they didn't think the law should apply so they just decided to ignore it? What were they expecting? How can they possibly expect to win this lawsuit? I hate copyright with all my soul but this is just stupid. You can't just decide to take the law into your own hand. This is just a waste of money and effort.
To be honest I love their computer games archive, but it boggles my mind that it's allowed to exist.
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The mission of preserving human culture is far more important than respecting rent-seeking copyright holders. At the end of the day, The Internet Archive has good intentions and is morally in the right. The time has come to consider changing the laws to allow for truly fair use, especially for physical items scanned to digital (e.g. books), old video games, and more. It's about selecting for the common good over the…
Disclosures: I've written a book I'm currently trying to get published. Also, almost all of my professionally-written (as well as personal) code is open source. And I have used the Wayback Machine extensively. To be honest, I'm having a hard time getting upset over this lawsuit. As best I can tell, IA isn't getting sued over having scanned the books. They're not even getting sued over lending them out. Instead, they'…
OK, well enough.
But TIA then does something that clearly violates copyright. And the fig leaf that is "But COVID" really doesn't make a difference.
And, yes, copyright terms are too long etc. but I'd actually be willing to bet that most extra lending TIA did was for recent works.
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The mission of preserving human culture is far more important than respecting rent-seeking copyright holders. At the end of the day, The Internet Archive has good intentions and is morally in the right. The time has come to consider changing the laws to allow for truly fair use, especially for physical items scanned to digital (e.g. books), old video games, and more. It's about selecting for the common good over the…
> The mission of preserving human culture is far more important than respecting rent-seeking copyright holders That genuinely may be so, but "this law i broke shouldn't exist" is not an advisable legal defense. Also, what you call "rent seeking" others would call "return on investment". I do think there is a grey area here, "fair use" being one example, but i think summarily discounting distributors and publishers wh…
It may or may not succeed in courts, because our "justice" system is anything but. Even if it doesn't succeed in court, it's still a worthwhile stance and it may succeed in other ways. Especially if enough people who recognize where justice actually lies stand up to support those taking the risk to point it out.
The line between "rent seeking" and "return on investment" lies at the spot past which those who produced a work have been fairly compensated for their time and effort, past that, it's rent seeking. If you want a good metric, break the return down to an hourly wage for each participant in producing the work. Does it seem obscene? That's because it is.
I never understood how the IA can get away with copying all those websites and all their content as if copyright did not exist. Can anybody enlighten me how they have not been sued into oblivion and sit in prison already?
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To be honest I love their computer games archive, but it boggles my mind that it's allowed to exist.
Which is where the thinking that lead to this lawsuit begins. Almost all those games are abandonware and or over 20 years old. Normal copyright should not apply there.
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> I believe there are certain large corporations(far larger then Harper Collins et al.) which would benefit from an enlarging of the domain of fair use around now. Who are those corporations and how would they benefit?
Tech is far larger than publishing and there's potentially more money to be made organizing/consuming the world's information than in owning it. Some people have been pointing this out for 20 years.
News Corporation enterprise value: $11bn
Apple quarterly profit: $25bn