The Internet Archive lawsuit

[workerbee]

As most of you probably know, megapublishers Penguin Random House, Hachette, HarperCollins, and Wiley, have filed a lawsuit against the Internet Archive alleging "mass copyright infringement."

An excellent article by Maria Bustillos, posted yesterday on The Nation's website, outlines the important issues at stake and is well worth reading: https://www.thenation.com/article/societ...-to-court/

[The publishers] love libraries, they say ("Publishers have long supported public libraries, recognizing the significant benefits to the public of ready access to books and other publications"), and are "in partnership" with them: "This partnership turns upon a well-developed and longstanding library market, through which public libraries buy print books and license ebooks (or agree to terms of sale for ebooks) from publishers."

The real issue emerges here: The words "license ebooks" are the most important ones in the whole lawsuit.

Publishers approve of libraries paying for e-book licenses because they’re temporary, just like your right to watch a movie on Netflix is temporary and can evaporate at any moment. In the same way, publishers would like to see libraries obliged to license, not to own, books—that is, continue to pay for the same book again and again. That’s what this lawsuit is really about. It’s impossible to avoid the conclusion that publishers took advantage of the pandemic to achieve what they had not been able to achieve previously: to turn the library system into a "reading as a service" operation from which they can squeeze profits forever.

[RobertX]

Well, a lot of people will cut corners, find the smallest opportunity to make others' lives a living hell, and whine about it.

I just hope that if I land a job at making content, I won't be as spiteful and petty as those goons.

[Pudski]

well that sucks...