Honestly, if the publishers settle for the IA just taking the books down and don't use them into oblivion that's probably a win for them, given how shaky the ground they were standing on was. It...
Honestly, if the publishers settle for the IA just taking the books down and don't use them into oblivion that's probably a win for them, given how shaky the ground they were standing on was. It always seemed such a stupid move given how legally risky their core business was to risk getting this kind of case against them that could risk their core project for financial or precedent reasons.
Well, they may still be sued into oblivion. It's just that the immediately injunction to stop hosting these books happens first, the amount of money IA is going to lose comes after some more...
Publishers are seeking statutory damages and have asked for a judgment that would directly declare that IA’s copying constitutes clear infringement. Ars couldn’t immediately reach the publishers’ lawyer for comment.
Well, they may still be sued into oblivion. It's just that the immediately injunction to stop hosting these books happens first, the amount of money IA is going to lose comes after some more months of court.
All hail the shadow libraries. If publishers can't even handle IA's reasonable approach, they're just fueling piracy and that's fine with me, they deserve it. "Any sufficiently organized Piracy is...
All hail the shadow libraries. If publishers can't even handle IA's reasonable approach, they're just fueling piracy and that's fine with me, they deserve it.
"Any sufficiently organized Piracy is indistinguishable from Preservation."
Do you think it's reasonable? At least from a legal angle it involves a very... uh broad interpretation of copyright law. Maybe it's something you could shoot for if you knew you had like a very,...
Do you think it's reasonable? At least from a legal angle it involves a very... uh broad interpretation of copyright law. Maybe it's something you could shoot for if you knew you had like a very, very, very liberal supreme court, but 99% of intermediate courts are going to slap you down.
I'm really surprised they even tried to go through with it given how dire the ramifications could be to the entire project. And how likely they are to lose in any court.
I mean, yes I think it's reasonable personally, but I also think copyright/IP law is ridiculously unreasonable, maliciously interpreted and overly litigated, and so on, and honestly, in general,...
I mean, yes I think it's reasonable personally, but I also think copyright/IP law is ridiculously unreasonable, maliciously interpreted and overly litigated, and so on, and honestly, in general, needs an overhaul if not an outright absolute annihilation from existence.
I mean, also reasonable in terms of not being remotely equivalent to piracy (they are lending books they own and putting in measures to prevent copying). I feel it is no different from a physical library, personally. Reasonable in terms of being a good faith approach to what they're doing. Reasonable in that, a publisher encountering what they're doing could decide not to take this to a court and cause these problems for them.
Do I think it was reasonable strategically on the part of IA? Not necessarily. Touching that hornet's nest is better left to strong free-knowledge advocates and civilly disobedient preservationists
Well, the first part is subjective. Personally, I don't think being able to simply take a book you bought, scan it, and "lend" it out digitally is ever going to fly. With just the Internet Archive...
Well, the first part is subjective. Personally, I don't think being able to simply take a book you bought, scan it, and "lend" it out digitally is ever going to fly. With just the Internet Archive doing it, and only on old books, the effect may be limited, but that's not how laws or legal precedents work. If that were legal, it really would spell the end of traditional book publishing, which was really reliant on the limitations of the physical world.
Reasonable in that, a publisher encountering what they're doing could decide not to take this to a court and cause these problems for them.
This one, though, I think is just objectively wrong lol. A publisher would absolutely see what they're doing as a threat, and they absolutely have a strong legal case.
Were the copies being "lent" unlimited in quantity? If so then I could see it being more of a threat. A single digital copy mapped to a single physical copy though I think should be even legally...
Were the copies being "lent" unlimited in quantity? If so then I could see it being more of a threat. A single digital copy mapped to a single physical copy though I think should be even legally reasonable (even if the current power structures do not consider it so).
Either way, yes most of what I'm saying is indeed subjective and I'm both aware and okay with that, in that its legality has no effect on my opinion of the ideas themselves, though if the lending was unlimited, then it was a bad idea for IA to pursue strategically.
The end thought being that, in our current power structures, IP frameworks, and legal systems, and such which I have nothing but absolute vitriol for, yeah IA should leave it to the shadows
The lending was unlimited at first, but then after they got sued they started doing "limited lending" where ostensibly the number of copies was kept at the same number as their physical copies as...
The lending was unlimited at first, but then after they got sued they started doing "limited lending" where ostensibly the number of copies was kept at the same number as their physical copies as a stopgap.
The issue with the latter is twofold: one is that it's practically unenforceable, second is that it just doesn't scale. Books aren't sold with a price that correlates with the possibility of them being added to a potentially global pool that is able to be "lent".
Traditional libraries have agreements with publishers to do their digital lending. I think certainly in the current state libraries do not have the bargaining power to have equal grounds in that negotiation, but that's an issue that can be solved separately. Being able to lend out a physical copy of a book digitally will just lead to the end of physical book sales, and I think that would be a shame.
Yeah unlimited lending basically is equivalent to piracy, not something they should have pursued in the first place as a very public entity with a huge risk potential, and given the state of our...
Yeah unlimited lending basically is equivalent to piracy, not something they should have pursued in the first place as a very public entity with a huge risk potential, and given the state of our society, limited lending even as a start probably also too big a risk, regardless of whether I determine if I agree with any of the supposed issues with limited lending
If I recall, they were limited originally then during COVID they went for an unlimited model. But it's possible I'm unaware of the previous unlimited option. I'd borrowed an out of print, never...
If I recall, they were limited originally then during COVID they went for an unlimited model. But it's possible I'm unaware of the previous unlimited option.
I'd borrowed an out of print, never converted to ebook, only ever in paperback book from them before 2020 and I had to wait my turn.
Wikipedias article and connected articles describing what they are can eventually lead you there. Though as with all things like this, be very careful, especially if you start looking things up on...
Wikipedias article and connected articles describing what they are can eventually lead you there. Though as with all things like this, be very careful, especially if you start looking things up on Google or other search engines. There are "fake" versions of sites like this that are probably infested with malware, surveillance, or many other ills, that are set up to look just like the real ones.
Even this link, I provide simply for educational purposes, it is up to individuals to choose how to proceed (or not). I'd prefer not to link them directly, even privately.
Also I am not saying what anyone here should do, just that I value the individuals, communal structures, systems, and tools that are opposing and fighting against the status quo and for more open access to knowledge in general, especially in light of IA's strategic missteps (despite their heart being in the right place). Just inform oneself and be aware of the options and choose whatever paths seem right to you based on various factors (your income, out of print / availability, pricing, small vs big, individual vs corporate, legalities, geography, open access to academic research, etc)
If you want to support smaller authors trying to make a living in societies that often do not value creative work and make it difficult for anyone to survive on that type of work, I'm all for that (as I am with buying music on bandcamp and whatnot).
I don't think anyone can get in trouble for sharing Wikipedia links. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anna%27s_Archive https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Library_Genesis...
I don't think anyone can get in trouble for sharing Wikipedia links.
Of those, I'd note that Sci-Hub is somewhat different. The rest are indisputably both violating copyright and generally seen as piracy. Scholarly papers, however, exist in an complex, shifting...
Of those, I'd note that Sci-Hub is somewhat different. The rest are indisputably both violating copyright and generally seen as piracy. Scholarly papers, however, exist in an complex, shifting environment very different from other publications, where many of the most open and frequent copyright violations are by the authors of the copied works, authors see no negative impacts to copyright infringement, payments primarily go from authors to publishers, publishers primarily profit in distribution from large-scale contracts to libraries and individual sales don't really matter, publishers are limited in their ability to pursue many copyright violators if they wish to remain viable (because they are also usually frequent authors), and the general direction of the industry seems to be going more toward profiting from authors (and their institutions and funders) and providing free access for readers.
While technically not legal in most places, I'd have little anxiety about using Sci-Hub, or recommending it, for downloading individual papers.
Honestly, if the publishers settle for the IA just taking the books down and don't use them into oblivion that's probably a win for them, given how shaky the ground they were standing on was. It always seemed such a stupid move given how legally risky their core business was to risk getting this kind of case against them that could risk their core project for financial or precedent reasons.
Well, they may still be sued into oblivion. It's just that the immediately injunction to stop hosting these books happens first, the amount of money IA is going to lose comes after some more months of court.
All hail the shadow libraries. If publishers can't even handle IA's reasonable approach, they're just fueling piracy and that's fine with me, they deserve it.
"Any sufficiently organized Piracy is indistinguishable from Preservation."
Do you think it's reasonable? At least from a legal angle it involves a very... uh broad interpretation of copyright law. Maybe it's something you could shoot for if you knew you had like a very, very, very liberal supreme court, but 99% of intermediate courts are going to slap you down.
I'm really surprised they even tried to go through with it given how dire the ramifications could be to the entire project. And how likely they are to lose in any court.
I mean, yes I think it's reasonable personally, but I also think copyright/IP law is ridiculously unreasonable, maliciously interpreted and overly litigated, and so on, and honestly, in general, needs an overhaul if not an outright absolute annihilation from existence.
I mean, also reasonable in terms of not being remotely equivalent to piracy (they are lending books they own and putting in measures to prevent copying). I feel it is no different from a physical library, personally. Reasonable in terms of being a good faith approach to what they're doing. Reasonable in that, a publisher encountering what they're doing could decide not to take this to a court and cause these problems for them.
Do I think it was reasonable strategically on the part of IA? Not necessarily. Touching that hornet's nest is better left to strong free-knowledge advocates and civilly disobedient preservationists
Well, the first part is subjective. Personally, I don't think being able to simply take a book you bought, scan it, and "lend" it out digitally is ever going to fly. With just the Internet Archive doing it, and only on old books, the effect may be limited, but that's not how laws or legal precedents work. If that were legal, it really would spell the end of traditional book publishing, which was really reliant on the limitations of the physical world.
This one, though, I think is just objectively wrong lol. A publisher would absolutely see what they're doing as a threat, and they absolutely have a strong legal case.
Were the copies being "lent" unlimited in quantity? If so then I could see it being more of a threat. A single digital copy mapped to a single physical copy though I think should be even legally reasonable (even if the current power structures do not consider it so).
Either way, yes most of what I'm saying is indeed subjective and I'm both aware and okay with that, in that its legality has no effect on my opinion of the ideas themselves, though if the lending was unlimited, then it was a bad idea for IA to pursue strategically.
The end thought being that, in our current power structures, IP frameworks, and legal systems, and such which I have nothing but absolute vitriol for, yeah IA should leave it to the shadows
The lending was unlimited at first, but then after they got sued they started doing "limited lending" where ostensibly the number of copies was kept at the same number as their physical copies as a stopgap.
The issue with the latter is twofold: one is that it's practically unenforceable, second is that it just doesn't scale. Books aren't sold with a price that correlates with the possibility of them being added to a potentially global pool that is able to be "lent".
Traditional libraries have agreements with publishers to do their digital lending. I think certainly in the current state libraries do not have the bargaining power to have equal grounds in that negotiation, but that's an issue that can be solved separately. Being able to lend out a physical copy of a book digitally will just lead to the end of physical book sales, and I think that would be a shame.
Yeah unlimited lending basically is equivalent to piracy, not something they should have pursued in the first place as a very public entity with a huge risk potential, and given the state of our society, limited lending even as a start probably also too big a risk, regardless of whether I determine if I agree with any of the supposed issues with limited lending
If I recall, they were limited originally then during COVID they went for an unlimited model. But it's possible I'm unaware of the previous unlimited option.
I'd borrowed an out of print, never converted to ebook, only ever in paperback book from them before 2020 and I had to wait my turn.
Can you PM me some links please?
Wikipedias article and connected articles describing what they are can eventually lead you there. Though as with all things like this, be very careful, especially if you start looking things up on Google or other search engines. There are "fake" versions of sites like this that are probably infested with malware, surveillance, or many other ills, that are set up to look just like the real ones.
Even this link, I provide simply for educational purposes, it is up to individuals to choose how to proceed (or not). I'd prefer not to link them directly, even privately.
Also I am not saying what anyone here should do, just that I value the individuals, communal structures, systems, and tools that are opposing and fighting against the status quo and for more open access to knowledge in general, especially in light of IA's strategic missteps (despite their heart being in the right place). Just inform oneself and be aware of the options and choose whatever paths seem right to you based on various factors (your income, out of print / availability, pricing, small vs big, individual vs corporate, legalities, geography, open access to academic research, etc)
If you want to support smaller authors trying to make a living in societies that often do not value creative work and make it difficult for anyone to survive on that type of work, I'm all for that (as I am with buying music on bandcamp and whatnot).
If anyone is willing to link them directly, even privately, please reply/PM me.
I don't think anyone can get in trouble for sharing Wikipedia links.
I like Torrent Freak for related news and articles. /r/Piracy can be helpful for more specific questions.
Of those, I'd note that Sci-Hub is somewhat different. The rest are indisputably both violating copyright and generally seen as piracy. Scholarly papers, however, exist in an complex, shifting environment very different from other publications, where many of the most open and frequent copyright violations are by the authors of the copied works, authors see no negative impacts to copyright infringement, payments primarily go from authors to publishers, publishers primarily profit in distribution from large-scale contracts to libraries and individual sales don't really matter, publishers are limited in their ability to pursue many copyright violators if they wish to remain viable (because they are also usually frequent authors), and the general direction of the industry seems to be going more toward profiting from authors (and their institutions and funders) and providing free access for readers.
While technically not legal in most places, I'd have little anxiety about using Sci-Hub, or recommending it, for downloading individual papers.