The starting point is that scanning a book and making it available to somebody else involves copying the book, and therefore infringes copyright unless you have

The starting point is that scanning a book and making it available to somebody else involves copying the book, and therefore infringes copyright unless you have the copyright holder’s permission or a fair use justification. In contrast, lending a physical book does not result in a copy being created. The e-lending system you have proposed is essentially what the Internet Archive calls “controlled digital lending.” The publishers say it is copyright infringement [1]; the Internet Archive says it is analogous to traditional library lending and falls under fair use [2]. The case hasn’t gone to trial yet. [1] https://www.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.nysd.537900/gov.uscourts.nysd.537900.1.0.pdf https://www.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.nysd.537900... [2] https://www.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.nysd.537900/gov.uscourts.nysd.537900.33.0.pdf https://www.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.nysd.537900...