5 ms·

> Trouble is, this mob was so successful at Berne that ever since they've assumed that they've a god-given right to take umbrage and raise utter hell whenever a

by comex 7y ago

> Trouble is, this mob was so successful at Berne that ever since they've assumed that they've a god-given right to take umbrage and raise utter hell whenever anyone takes the slightest liberties with copyright—even if those actions are lawful. It's true, they do do that even when the actions are lawful. However, in this particular case, the Internet Archive's actions are almost certainly not lawful, although the whole "public service during coronavirus crisis" angle means that they probably won't be sued for it. Even with controlled (one-at-a-time) digital lending, although the blog post does cite multiple arguments that it counts as fair use, it has never been tested in court and I'm not particularly optimistic. But what they're currently doing is not one-at-a-time and thus not controlled digital lending. The blog post takes care to distinguish the two things – saying CDL is their legal basis "during normal times", emphasizing the "careful controls" used with CDL to ensure books are lent to "one reader at a time" – yet conspicuously omits any explanation of why their current practice would be legal.

tomrod 7y ago
Lots of physical books not available otherwise due to lockdown. I figure that is sufficient justification.
- geofft 7y ago
  What's preventing a library whose physical premises are closed from saying, "Okay, there are 10 copies of this book that literally nobody can get to, we'll lend out 10 e-books," using the old Controlled Digital Lending model? That is, what about the lockdown requires moving away from the established (even if not court-tested) one-to-one basis and making a new fair use argument about uncontrolled digital lending?
  - silverreads 7y ago
    > What's preventing a library It's a huge waste of taxpayer money?
    - geofft 7y ago
      Sorry, I don't understand what you mean. It's a huge waste of taxpayer money for a library, which is already closed and which is already in possession of lots of books, to share those books electronically? How is taxpayer money being used here, let alone wasted?
    - silverreads 7y ago
      You know exactly how much an SRE makes. That's not what a library should be spending money on. Simply making a copy is thousands of man hours simpler than making a consumer facing online asset tracking system. You wildly misrepresent my obvious intent.
      - geofft 7y ago
        Oh, that wasn't obvious to me at all - I thought you knew that plenty of libraries already have a consumer-facing online asset tracking system already, powered by the Internet Archive, which is why these books got scanned in the first place.
hilbert42 7y ago
"Internet Archive's actions are almost certainly not lawful<...>" This raises an even more important point: what do citizens do when laws are enacted that do not have acceptance or are not considered as legitimate by a majority of citizens? This is why enacting treaties such as the Berne Conventions (WIPO etc) are so damned dangerous. By their intrinsic nature, it's quite possible for small non-representative groups to have an international treaty enacted/agreed to by all 'member' states without all states even knowing the full ramifications of the said treaty are—they're forced to sign for some other 'quid pro quo' or special trade-off deal etc. Let's face it, this is how Victor Hugo and his cronies 'won' the copyright war (one must concede they played a masterful game and won outright). As their champions know full well, once a treaty such as the Berne Convention is up and running then it is almost impossible to change it let alone have it abolished. Savvy operators such as Victor Hugo knew this from the very beginning before even entering the campaign (as that's how international politics works). This is especially the case when treaties are about matters that are not considered truly high stakes such as nuclear disarmament. It depends on one's political stance how one views treaties that have little or no legitimacy among a majority of citizens. Some would argue that they are technically lawful and should be obeyed, others would say they're morally corrupt and thus should be disobeyed or ignored. It's this dichotomy that's at the center of Copyright Law/Treaties today. The very fact that the 'Big Boys' consider this treaty little more than a nuisance—just noise in the grand scheme of things—is why disputes over Copyright won't end anytime soon. The fact that such flaky and unrepresentative international treaties can exist says more about the unhealthy state of the laws in each member state. In recent decades we've all witnessed citizens' growing disrespect for institutions such as democracy and its democratic processes. It doesn't take much imagination to realize that all these problems are interrelated. When systems of law break down or lose their legitimacy what does one do? Again, this depends on one's politics and worldview. At one end there's disorder and anarchy, at the other one becomes subservient to a corrupt state. Take your choice. What I know is that I certainly don't want anarchy or revolution as many people die and in the long run they end up benefiting no one. Nor do I want to be subservient to law that's been 'legitimized' by corrupt non-repetitiveness processes.
- geofft 7y ago
  The Berne Convention only took effect in the US in 1989, well after Victor Hugo was dead and quite thoroughly decomposed. (I mention the US because the Internet Archive is in the US and subject to US law, as is the Author's Guild. The National Emergency Library is tied to the duration of the US national emergency.) The idea that the majority of people in the US are dissatisfied with the 1989 changes to US copyright law is a pretty strong one, and is at least nominally at odds with the fact that it finally got passed after a century - how did it finally become time to pass it if people were against it? (Take care to distinguish opposing the law from being indifferent to it - certainly there are many laws that do not affect me that I'm indifferent to, such as the Railroad Retirement Act of 1974, and even if the majority of the country feels as I do, it would not really follow that that law is illegitimate.) Yes, it's a serious problem when there are laws that the majority of citizens find illegitimate - but the contrapositive of that is that most of the time the default assumption is that for any given law, it probably is legitimate.

by comex 7y ago

tomrod 7y ago

Lots of physical books not available otherwise due to lockdown. I figure that is sufficient justification.

geofft 7y ago
What's preventing a library whose physical premises are closed from saying, "Okay, there are 10 copies of this book that literally nobody can get to, we'll lend out 10 e-books," using the old Controlled Digital Lending model? That is, what about the lockdown requires moving away from the established (even if not court-tested) one-to-one basis and making a new fair use argument about uncontrolled digital lending?
- silverreads 7y ago
  > What's preventing a library It's a huge waste of taxpayer money?
  - geofft 7y ago
    Sorry, I don't understand what you mean. It's a huge waste of taxpayer money for a library, which is already closed and which is already in possession of lots of books, to share those books electronically? How is taxpayer money being used here, let alone wasted?
  - silverreads 7y ago
    You know exactly how much an SRE makes. That's not what a library should be spending money on. Simply making a copy is thousands of man hours simpler than making a consumer facing online asset tracking system. You wildly misrepresent my obvious intent.
    - geofft 7y ago
      Oh, that wasn't obvious to me at all - I thought you knew that plenty of libraries already have a consumer-facing online asset tracking system already, powered by the Internet Archive, which is why these books got scanned in the first place.

hilbert42 7y ago

"Internet Archive's actions are almost certainly not lawful<...>" This raises an even more important point: what do citizens do when laws are enacted that do not have acceptance or are not considered as legitimate by a majority of citizens? This is why enacting treaties such as the Berne Conventions (WIPO etc) are so damned dangerous. By their intrinsic nature, it's quite possible for small non-representative groups to have an international treaty enacted/agreed to by all 'member' states without all states even knowing the full ramifications of the said treaty are—they're forced to sign for some other 'quid pro quo' or special trade-off deal etc. Let's face it, this is how Victor Hugo and his cronies 'won' the copyright war (one must concede they played a masterful game and won outright). As their champions know full well, once a treaty such as the Berne Convention is up and running then it is almost impossible to change it let alone have it abolished. Savvy operators such as Victor Hugo knew this from the very beginning before even entering the campaign (as that's how international politics works). This is especially the case when treaties are about matters that are not considered truly high stakes such as nuclear disarmament. It depends on one's political stance how one views treaties that have little or no legitimacy among a majority of citizens. Some would argue that they are technically lawful and should be obeyed, others would say they're morally corrupt and thus should be disobeyed or ignored. It's this dichotomy that's at the center of Copyright Law/Treaties today. The very fact that the 'Big Boys' consider this treaty little more than a nuisance—just noise in the grand scheme of things—is why disputes over Copyright won't end anytime soon. The fact that such flaky and unrepresentative international treaties can exist says more about the unhealthy state of the laws in each member state. In recent decades we've all witnessed citizens' growing disrespect for institutions such as democracy and its democratic processes. It doesn't take much imagination to realize that all these problems are interrelated. When systems of law break down or lose their legitimacy what does one do? Again, this depends on one's politics and worldview. At one end there's disorder and anarchy, at the other one becomes subservient to a corrupt state. Take your choice. What I know is that I certainly don't want anarchy or revolution as many people die and in the long run they end up benefiting no one. Nor do I want to be subservient to law that's been 'legitimized' by corrupt non-repetitiveness processes.

geofft 7y ago
The Berne Convention only took effect in the US in 1989, well after Victor Hugo was dead and quite thoroughly decomposed. (I mention the US because the Internet Archive is in the US and subject to US law, as is the Author's Guild. The National Emergency Library is tied to the duration of the US national emergency.) The idea that the majority of people in the US are dissatisfied with the 1989 changes to US copyright law is a pretty strong one, and is at least nominally at odds with the fact that it finally got passed after a century - how did it finally become time to pass it if people were against it? (Take care to distinguish opposing the law from being indifferent to it - certainly there are many laws that do not affect me that I'm indifferent to, such as the Railroad Retirement Act of 1974, and even if the majority of the country feels as I do, it would not really follow that that law is illegitimate.) Yes, it's a serious problem when there are laws that the majority of citizens find illegitimate - but the contrapositive of that is that most of the time the default assumption is that for any given law, it probably is legitimate.