4 ms·
>The problem is, did the books actually exist in the quantities being lent? IA has no proof that they do IIUC that's not how this works, legally. The publisher
by bsanr 6y ago
>The problem is, did the books actually exist in the quantities being lent? IA has no proof that they do
IIUC that's not how this works, legally. The publishers have to prove damage; the defense isn't just automatically assumed to have injured the plaintiff. Even if IA has been proven to infringe, the judge can massively reduce awarded damages if they weren't actually hurt.
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- kmeisthax 6y agoNot if they pre-registered their copyrights - and I'd be shocked if they didn't, as you can't even sue anyone without a valid registration. If the infringement happens after the registration then you don't have to calculate and prove damages. Instead, the judge or jury awards damages based on some chosen number from $750 to $30,000 times the number of infringements proven. Sometimes, they literally just pick a total damage award and divide out the number of infringements, like in the billion-dollar Cox lawsuit. Furthermore, even if they didn't preregister, and they somehow cannot prove actual damages, it's still infringing conduct. They could, say, get a permanent injunction barring Internet Archive from operating their library program. This might actually be what they really want, moreso than money damages.
- icebraining 6y agoUnfortunately copyright has "statutory damages". Hence why Jammie Thomas-Rasset was hit with a court order to pay $222,000 to the RIAA (down from almost $2 million!) for sharing 24 songs on Kazaa, despite the plaintiff obviously having no chance of proving they actually lost sales from it. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capitol_Records,_Inc._v._Thomas-Rasset https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capitol_Records,_Inc._v._Thoma...