Mek here, program lead for OpenLibrary.org at the Internet Archive.
Over the last several months, readers have felt the devastating impact of more than 500,000 books being removed from the Internet Archive's lending library, as a result of Hachette v. Internet Archive https://help.archive.org/help/why-are-so-many-books-listed-a...
In less than two weeks, on June 28th, the courts will hear the oral argument for the Internet Archive's appeal.
What's at stake is the fundamental ability for library patrons to continue borrowing and reading the books the Internet Archive owns, like any other library.
Please consider signing the Open Letter to urge publishers to restore access to the 500,000 books they’ve caused to be removed from the Internet Archive’s lending library and let readers read.
I'd love to see the stats about how many books purchases happen on Amazon because they're referred to from openlibrary.org (which has Amazon links on all pages).
I think the 1 hour loan available for so many books on IA feels pretty similar to standing in a bookstore and reading for a little while. You get an idea if the book is worth your time and if you really like it you'll probably want to buy it somewhere that you can easily annotate it and maybe even pass it on to the friend.
when this happens, it signifigantly raises the bar for authors and producers to deliver a desired quality rather than a spiffy promotional campaign for a pulp piece.
A bar that the book industry always seemed happy with. The romantic view of "traditional publishing" contains a value chain that starts with a publisher selecting the best drafts sent to them, spending lots of time in a back and forth between editor and author to polish that draft, and ends with a bookseller who is an avid reader and can give personalized recommendations to every shopper.
Of course in today's reality we have largely anonymous book stores, "bestseller" lists that are systematically manipulated, and publishers that lower their standards in the face of competition from self-publishing (both with cheaper book printing and online publishing). But providing books that are worth your time still seems to be one of the large selling-points of publishers.
Send a Sample from amazon and other eBook suppliers is usually 10% of the book. Another unfortunate metric for modern authors as they now have to make something interesting happen in the first 10% rather than a slow character and plot build up.
10% of the book is like, literally, one tenth of a book. There should be something happening in that span, at the very least some interesting buildup - otherwise, what's all this space used on?
Reading the article, it seems that this relates not to the internet archive, that is privacy preserving, but to another public library (that aparently was leaking or selling data -- I did not read it entirely)
In fact, the article sugests it was a third party, for-profit DRM service, such as OverDrive, which publishers force libraries to use to lend audio and e-books, who sold the patron's data to advertisers. Perhaps this is what the GP comment intended to point out.
The point is that the Archive highlights the risk of surveillance over library patrons, and I highlighted that instances of said risk have been reported.
Isn’t the whole reason the lawsuit started because the Internet Archive went above an own-to-loan ratio of 1? This blog post completely leaves this detail out and makes it seem they were always only doing 1 physical copy to 1 digital copy which is not true.
>Isn’t the whole reason the lawsuit started because the Internet Archive went above an own-to-loan ratio of 1?
No. The lawsuit was about CDL as a whole, and there's plenty of evidence showing publishers were preparing for it even without the COVID emergency library. If the lawsuit was just over the emergency library, I doubt IA would still be fighting.
Am I the only one who feels embarrassed when I see something like this?
I'm just a nerd. I'm not involved with ebook publishing. But I know for a fact that I'm the 1%. 99% of the people can't use a computer as well as I'm able to. So this is my 1%. And when my 1% creates a digital version of a product that is inferior to the physical version of the product, and then tells the 99% it's the better way but it turns out they just didn't consider everything, and they don't even seem to care, and it just keeps making things worse for a lot of people, I just feel embarrassed. It wasn't supposed to be like this. It was supposed to be a total victory, better in every conceivable way. If it's not for the smell and texture of paper, then I don't want to hear "but physical books are better because..." This isn't even a complicated technology. It's just text.
How can an industry that can't figure out how to make a book digital handle something like artificial intelligence?
Honestly, I don't understand why they're picking a fight with publishers. These lawsuits endanger the future of the Internet Archive which does a lot of really unique and irreplaceable work in digital preservation.
There are plenty of other groups with deeper pockets and bigger institutional backing that preserve and share books. Let someone else fight this battle.
Oh, well, I guess I hope they win their appeal because it's too late to unring that bell. When I read about it, it seemed like a very open-and-shut infringement case, though. It seems like their only chance will be drawing some activist judges who want to make new law.
"In this country?" The US deserves it's share of blame for pushing coyright via trade agreements but the berne convention isn't just the US and the situation isn't exactly better in other western countries. At least the US in theory recognizes copyright as an infringement on our rights that is only justified in order to ensure the production of creative works. As flawed and untested as that logic is, it is still much better than the inherent author rights that are more common in e.g. the EU.
Readit News
Mek here, program lead for OpenLibrary.org at the Internet Archive.
Over the last several months, readers have felt the devastating impact of more than 500,000 books being removed from the Internet Archive's lending library, as a result of Hachette v. Internet Archive https://help.archive.org/help/why-are-so-many-books-listed-a...
In less than two weeks, on June 28th, the courts will hear the oral argument for the Internet Archive's appeal.
What's at stake is the fundamental ability for library patrons to continue borrowing and reading the books the Internet Archive owns, like any other library.
Please consider signing the Open Letter to urge publishers to restore access to the 500,000 books they’ve caused to be removed from the Internet Archive’s lending library and let readers read.
Let us make this wretched world worth it.
Deleted Comment
I think the 1 hour loan available for so many books on IA feels pretty similar to standing in a bookstore and reading for a little while. You get an idea if the book is worth your time and if you really like it you'll probably want to buy it somewhere that you can easily annotate it and maybe even pass it on to the friend.
when this happens, it signifigantly raises the bar for authors and producers to deliver a desired quality rather than a spiffy promotional campaign for a pulp piece.
Of course in today's reality we have largely anonymous book stores, "bestseller" lists that are systematically manipulated, and publishers that lower their standards in the face of competition from self-publishing (both with cheaper book printing and online publishing). But providing books that are worth your time still seems to be one of the large selling-points of publishers.
I would like to remind the public of:
# An attorney says she saw her library reading habits reflected in mobile ads. That's not supposed to happen
https://www.theregister.com/2024/05/18/mystery_of_the_target...
No. The lawsuit was about CDL as a whole, and there's plenty of evidence showing publishers were preparing for it even without the COVID emergency library. If the lawsuit was just over the emergency library, I doubt IA would still be fighting.
I'm just a nerd. I'm not involved with ebook publishing. But I know for a fact that I'm the 1%. 99% of the people can't use a computer as well as I'm able to. So this is my 1%. And when my 1% creates a digital version of a product that is inferior to the physical version of the product, and then tells the 99% it's the better way but it turns out they just didn't consider everything, and they don't even seem to care, and it just keeps making things worse for a lot of people, I just feel embarrassed. It wasn't supposed to be like this. It was supposed to be a total victory, better in every conceivable way. If it's not for the smell and texture of paper, then I don't want to hear "but physical books are better because..." This isn't even a complicated technology. It's just text.
How can an industry that can't figure out how to make a book digital handle something like artificial intelligence?
There are plenty of other groups with deeper pockets and bigger institutional backing that preserve and share books. Let someone else fight this battle.