Internet Archive: We Will Not Appeal 'Hachette v. Internet Archive' Ruling (archive.org)
- Reference: 0175596095
- News link: https://yro.slashdot.org/story/24/12/05/0141258/internet-archive-we-will-not-appeal-hachette-v-internet-archive-ruling
- Source link: https://blog.archive.org/2024/12/04/end-of-hachette-v-internet-archive/
Today, the Internet Archive made an announcement: that "While we are deeply disappointed with the Second Circuit's opinion in Hachette v. Internet Archive, [3]the Internet Archive has decided not to pursue Supreme Court review ."
> We will continue to honor the Association of American Publishers agreement to remove books from lending at their member publishers' requests.
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> We thank the many readers, authors and publishers who have stood with us throughout this fight. Together, we will continue to advocate for a future where libraries can purchase, own, lend and preserve digital books.
[1] https://yro.slashdot.org/story/23/03/25/0112229/internet-archive-loses-in-court-judge-rules-they-cant-scan-and-lend-ebooks
[2] https://news.slashdot.org/story/24/09/04/1728215/internet-archive-digital-lending-isnt-fair-use-2nd-cir-says
[3] https://blog.archive.org/2024/12/04/end-of-hachette-v-internet-archive/
Well (Score:1)
there are still a couple of libraries on tor that will do the job without any need to play along with the "legal" demands of the lawyer crowd, which stole the public domain from us, the people.
No surprise, they were ultimately doomed to lose (Score:4)
The basic idea of copyright law is that the human creator of a work has a basic human right to be the only one having the right to make and distribute copies of that work. Because that human lacks the physical ability to actually enforce the right, society makes a bargain with him: for some limited time, the government will enforce his rights, thereby allowing him to justly profit from his creativity, but then after that time is up and in exchange for the protection, the work will become public domain and anybody will be able to have and make copies.
The public library was always an odd exception that society tacked-on to the deal after the original base of copyright law was established. The public library would properly BUY a copy (thus benefiting the creator of the work) and then lend it to people. This hurt the creator of the work by depriving him of a sale, but it was deemed to be sufficiently in the public interest AND the damage was very limited: only one person could borrow the book at a time, and there would be a natural limit to the number of people who would go to the trouble of going to a physical library, getting on a waiting list (if needed) and then only having access to the work for a limited time (libraries typically time-limit the borrowing).
An online electronic archive of scanned copies is a complete subversion of the very idea of copyright. Being scanned digital documents, these works may not have been initially bought by the archive, but in any event they are making an unlimited number of copies while having no legal right to do so (only a copyright owner may legally make copies (that's what "copyright" MEANS)) and then the only limit on how many copies they distribute is internet bandwidth. Remember: a physical library DOES NOT make an unlimited number of physical duplicates of the physical book and lend those duplicates out with no intention of ever getting any of them back. There is simply no equality here between a physical library and an online electronic archive. Additionally, every person who gets a digital copy from an online archive can potentially further violate the copyright rights of the creator of the work by making and distributing an unlimited number of copies of the copy. Then others might make copies of the copies of the copy... and all are of equal quality; there's no degradation like one would get with generations of photocopying. There's simply no way that such a digital lending library of copyrighted works (works which have not fallen into public domain status) can possibly be compatible with basic copyright law or any actual copyright protection for the creator of any works.
SCOTUS calculus (Score:3, Insightful)
Asking The Supreme Court to rule is risking they will create a binding nationwide precedent against others who are in the same situation you are in now.
If you are an advocacy organization, sometimes it's better to take a lower-court loss now then wait for the legal climate to change then support "the next guy" who is in your situation.
Re: SCOTUS calculus (Score:2)
Good legal strategy for a foundation that really doesnt have the financial backing to push this issue.
Legal chess (Score:1)
> Asking The Supreme Court to rule is risking they will create a binding nationwide precedent against others who are in the same situation you are in now.
> If you are an advocacy organization, sometimes it's better to take a lower-court loss now then wait for the legal climate to change then support "the next guy" who is in your situation.
In addition to that, the *correct* way to deal with the issue is to get legislation passed.
We're about to have a new administration with a panel looking into efficiency - I'll bet Elon Musk would be sympathetic to the idea of modifying copyright law.
I'm pretty certain that Elon could come up with a law that would allow for the free exchange of abandoned books, but also allow long-term rights holders to retain their rights. Something like a trivial $10 renewal fee would suffice.
While we're on the subject, so