Internet Archive forced to remove 500,000 books after publishers’ court win; Ars Technica, June 21, 2024

ASHLEY BELANGER, Ars Technica; Internet Archive forced to remove 500,000 books after publishers’ court win

"As a result of book publishers successfully suing the Internet Archive (IA) last year, the free online library that strives to keep growing online access to books recently shrank by about 500,000 titles.

IA reported in a blog post this month that publishers abruptly forcing these takedowns triggered a "devastating loss" for readers who depend on IA to access books that are otherwise impossible or difficult to access.

To restore access, IA is now appealing, hoping to reverse the prior court's decision by convincing the US Court of Appeals in the Second Circuit that IA's controlled digital lending of its physical books should be considered fair use under copyright law."

Unpublished Letter Sent to New York Times Editor on 10/2/23 re “The Enemies of Literature Are Winning” by Matthew Walther (Oct. 1, 2023)

[Kip Currier: Unpublished Letter I sent to New York Times Editor on 10/2/23 re “The Enemies of Literature Are Winning” by Matthew Walther (Oct. 1, 2023).]

Nowhere in the author’s jeremiad does he address the two most important reasons for the continuing existence and relevance of Banned Books Week: providing readers with access to the broadest spectrum of information and including the voices of all, particularly BIPOC and LGBTQ+ persons who have historically been absent from library collections. In the words of the late Banned Books Week co-founder and longtime intellectual freedom champion Judith Krug, “We have to serve the information needs of everybody.” Not some, but everyone.

Column: Here’s why you can’t ‘own’ your ebooks; Los Angeles Times, December 8, 2022

 MICHAEL HILTZIK, Los Angeles Times; Column: Here’s why you can’t ‘own’ your ebooks

"What’s really happening here is that everyone involved — publishers, online distributors, authors and readers — is trying to come to terms with the capacity of digital technology to overthrow the traditional models of printing, selling and buying readable content. 

Publishers and authors are predictably, and rightly, fearful that they’ll lose out financially; but it’s also quite possible that, properly managed, the technological revolution will make them more money."

Who Owns a Recipe? A Plagiarism Claim Has Cookbook Authors Asking.; The New York Times, November 29, 2021

Priya Krishna , The New York Times; Who Owns a Recipe? A Plagiarism Claim Has Cookbook Authors Asking.

U.S. copyright law protects all kinds of creative material, but recipe creators are mostly powerless in an age and a business that are all about sharing.

"U.S. copyright law seeks to protect “original works of authorship” by barring unauthorized copying of all kinds of creative material: sheet music, poetry, architectural works, paintings and even computer software.

But recipes are much harder to protect. This is a reason they frequently reappear, often word for word, in one book or blog after another.

Cookbook writers who believe that their work has been plagiarized have few options beyond confronting the offender or airing their grievances online. “It is more of an ethical issue than it is a legal issue,” said Lynn Oberlander, a media lawyer in New York City...

“The whole history of American cookbook publishing is based on borrowing and sharing,” said Bonnie Slotnick, the owner of Bonnie Slotnick Cookbooks, an antique bookstore in the East Village of Manhattan...

Mr. Bailey said many cookbook authors are used to the free exchange of ideas on social media, and may not be conscious of the importance of giving credit. “It has become so tempting in this environment to just take rather than to create,” he said."

Giant Publisher Macmillan Goes To War Against Libraries; TechDirt, November 15, 2019

Mike Masnick, TechDirt; Giant Publisher Macmillan Goes To War Against Libraries

"In September, librarians around the US launched a campaign -- ebooksforall.org urging Macmillan to rethink this awful plan:

This embargo limits libraries’ ability to provide access to information for all. It particularly harms library patrons with disabilities or learning issues. One of the great things about eBooks is that they can become large-print books with only a few clicks, and most eBook readers offer fonts and line spacing that make reading easier for people who have dyslexia or other visual challenges. Because portable devices are light and easy to hold, eBooks are easier to use for some people who have physical disabilities.
Macmillan is the only major publisher restricting public libraries’ ability to purchase and lend digital content to their communities. Before the embargo took effect, we collected 160,000 signatures from readers who urged Macmillan not to go through with their plan. And we delivered these signatures in person to CEO John Sargent. Sadly, he did not listen."

'I can get any novel I want in 30 seconds': can book piracy be stopped?; The Guardian, March 6, 2019

Katy Guest, The Guardian;

'I can get any novel I want in 30 seconds': can book piracy be stopped?

"The UK government’s Intellectual Property Office estimates that 17% of ebooks are consumed illegally. Generally, pirates tend to be from better-off socioeconomic groups, and aged between 30 and 60. Many use social media to ask for tips when their regular piracy website is shut down; when I contacted some, those who responded always justified it by claiming they were too poor to buy books – then tell me they read them on their e-readers, smartphones or computer screens - or that their areas lacked libraries, or they found it hard to locate books in the countries where they lived. Some felt embarrassed. Others blamed greedy authors for trying to stop them.

When we asked Guardian readers to tell us about their experiences with piracy, we had more than 130 responses from readers aged between 20 and 70. Most regularly downloaded books illegally and while some felt guilty – more than one said they only pirated “big names” and when “the author isn’t on the breadline, think Lee Child” – the majority saw nothing wrong in the practice. “Reading an author’s work is a greater compliment than ignoring it,” said one, while others claimed it was part of a greater ethos of equality, that “culture should be free to all”."

New Life for Old Classics, as Their Copyrights Run Out; The New York Times, December 29, 2018

Alexandra Alter, The New York Times; New Life for Old Classics, as Their Copyrights Run Out

"This coming year marks the first time in two decades that a large body of copyrighted works will lose their protected status — a shift that will have profound consequences for publishers and literary estates, which stand to lose both money and creative control.

But it will also be a boon for readers, who will have more editions to choose from, and for writers and other artists who can create new works based on classic stories without getting hit with an intellectual property lawsuit...

 

Still, many scholars and legal experts argue that American copyright law, which is mind-numbingly complex, has skewed toward enriching companies and the heirs of writers and artists at the expense of the public. When the first Copyright Act was passed in the United States in 1790, the maximum term was 28 years. Over the decades, lawmakers repeatedly prolonged the terms, which now stretch to over a century for many works. “It’s worse than the tax code,” said Rebecca Tushnet, an intellectual property expert at Harvard Law School. “The copyright term is way too long now.”"

Tor, OverDrive Comment on Library Ebook Embargo; Library Journal, September 6, 2018

Matt Enis, Library Journal; Tor, OverDrive Comment on Library Ebook Embargo

"In a move that has raised concern throughout the library field, Macmillan in July announced that it would be testing a four month embargo on selling new ebooks published by its Tor imprint to libraries. The publisher said the test would help it determine whether library lending is having a negative impact on retail ebook sales. For libraries, the embargo recalled a time less than a decade ago when many major publishers refused to license ebooks to libraries altogether."

Post-Gazette Is Going Digital, At Least On Some Days, With An Ad Campaign That Is Raising Eyebrows; KDKA 2 CBS Pittsburgh, August 22, 2018

Jon Delano, KDKA 2 CBS Pittsburgh; Post-Gazette Is Going Digital, At Least On Some Days, With An Ad Campaign That Is Raising Eyebrows

"The PG has billboards up around town and television ads on-air, featuring those who say they will never go digital.

One TV advertisement: “PGe and PG NewsSlide, who the bleep needs them. Last time I went on line they tried to track my cookies. They’ll never get my cookie recipe.” 

Another TV advertisement: “Now they’re telling me PG is going digital. They can stick their digital. I’m not doing that.” 

“It’s a little insensitive to the readers who really are connected to print, who really depend on print,” said [Andrew] Conte [director of Point Park University’s Center for Media Innovation].

Not true, says [Allan] Block [chairman of Block Communications that owns the PG]."

Math Journal Editors Quit for Open Access; Inside Higher Ed, July 31, 2017

Lindsay McKenzie, Inside Higher Ed; Math Journal Editors Quit for Open Access

"The four editors in chief of the Journal of Algebraic Combinatorics have informed their publisher, Springer, of their intention to launch a rival open-access journal to protest the publisher’s high prices and limited accessibility. This is the latest in a string of what one observer called “editorial mutinies” over journal publishing policies.

In a news release last Thursday, the editors said their decision was not made because of any “particular crisis” but was the result of it becoming “more and more clear” that Springer intended to keep charging readers and authors large fees while “adding little value.”"

The Blog That Disappeared; New York Times, 7/29/16

Roxane Gay, New York Times; The Blog That Disappeared:

"On June 27, Mr. Cooper’s Google account was deactivated, he has said. He lost 14 years of his blog archives, creative work, email and contacts. He has hired a lawyer and made complaints, and many of his readers and fans have tried to support his efforts. There is a petition circulating, urging Google to restore his work. Pen America, an organization that promotes free expression, has weighed in, saying that Mr. Cooper deserves a substantive response from Google.

Thus far, these efforts have been in vain. Google has not responded beyond saying there was a violation of the Terms of Service agreement. It has neither identified the specific violation nor indicated why it also deleted Mr. Cooper’s email account. It has not provided Mr. Cooper with the ability to download his personal information so he might rebuild his blog and email account elsewhere. In one interview, Mr. Cooper said he thought that the male escort ads might have led to his account’s being deactivated, but this has not been confirmed by the company.

When I contacted Google for further comment, I got a response that said, “We are aware of this matter, but the specific Terms of Service violations are ones we cannot discuss further due to legal considerations.” I asked about why Mr. Cooper’s Gmail account was also deleted and whether or not he would be able to retrieve the archive of his work, and I was directed to Google’s Terms of Service, Gmail Policy and Blogger Content Policy, which did not offer any useful specifics."

Cassandra Clare Created a Fantasy Realm and Aims to Maintain Her Rule; New York Times, 4/23/16

Penelope Green, New York Times; Cassandra Clare Created a Fantasy Realm and Aims to Maintain Her Rule:

"These high stakes may be why so many young-adult and fantasy authors find themselves ensnared by lawsuits.

In February, Ms. Clare was sued for copyright infringement, among other charges, by Sherrilyn Kenyon, an American young-adult author who writes an urban fantasy series about demon killers named Dark-Hunters. Ms. Clare’s lawyer, John R. Cahill, said he expected the suit to be dismissed and issued a statement that read, in part, “The lawsuit failed to identify a single instance of actual copying or plagiarism by Cassie.”

But the dispute puts Ms. Clare in good company: Ms. Meyer; Rick Riordan, another successful author who drew from Greek mythology when he created his young-adult series; and Ms. Rowling have all been sued for plagiarism, often more than once."

Why Google's deal with Italy is a good thing for readers; Christian Science Monitor, 3/11/10

Marjorie Kehe, Christian Science Monitor; Why Google's deal with Italy is a good thing for readers:

"Good news for Google and also for readers hoping to brush up on their Dante: The Italian government and the search-engine giant have agreed that Google will digitize up to 1 million books from the national libraries in Florence and Rome. The books to be digitized were all published before 1868 (which means that copyright laws do not apply) and will include antiquarian texts, including works by Dante, Machiavelli, and Galileo.

Although Google has struck similar deals with universities in England and Spain and a state museum in Germany, The Wall Street Journal notes that this is Google's "first publishing partnership with a national government."

It's a good deal for Google, which will be able to expand the offerings – and particularly the non-English-language offerings – of its Book Project, which currently lists about 12 million books. The deal also means a win in Europe where recent Google-related headlines have been unfortunate for the company. (A French court has ruled that Google committed copyright violation by scanning certain French-language titles, and an Italian court recently slapped Google officials with jail sentences in connection with an ugly abuse-related video made popular on YouTube.)

It's also a good deal for the Italian government. Google will bear all costs for the project just at a moment when budget cuts are making it harder for Italian libraries to preserve their valuable texts. The Italian libraries will also be able to share digitized copies of the scanned books with readers on other platforms, including Europeana, the online publishing project of the European Commission.

But most of all it's a good deal for readers. A million years ago (well, in the 1980s), when I was at grad school in New York studying Italian renaissance poetry, I went to the New York Public Library to consult an antiquarian text. Holding my credit card as collateral, they gave me a pair of gloves, ushered me into the Rare Book room, and let me handle (very carefully) a yellowing text printed in Naples several centuries earlier.

It was a thrill I will never forget. There is no substitute for laying your hands on a text like that.

However, for every bibliophile and/or Italophile who does not live in the shadow of a major cultural institution with the stature and holdings of the New York Public Library (and that now includes me), the Google deal is a very good thing."

http://www.csmonitor.com/Books/chapter-and-verse/2010/0311/Why-Google-s-deal-with-Italy-is-a-good-thing-for-readers

E-Book Fans Keep Format in Spotlight; New York Times, 10/21/09

Brad Stone, New York Times; E-Book Fans Keep Format in Spotlight:

"The publishing industry has been under a dark cloud recently.

Sales are down this year, despite prominent books by Dan Brown and Edward M. Kennedy. Wal-Mart and Amazon are locked in a war for e-commerce dominance, creating new worries among publishers and authors about dwindling profits.

But amid the gloom, some sellers and owners of electronic reading devices are making the case that people are reading more because of e-books.

Amazon for example, says that people with Kindles now buy 3.1 times as many books as they did before owning the device. That factor is up from 2.7 in December 2008. So a reader who had previously bought eight books from Amazon would now purchase, on average, 24.8 books, a rise from 21.6 books.

“You are going to see very significant industry growth rates as a result of the convenience of this kind of reading,” said Jeffrey P. Bezos, chief executive of Amazon."

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/21/technology/21books.html?scp=1&sq=e-books&st=cse

Libraries and Readers Wade Into Digital Lending; New York Times, 10/15/09

Motoko Rich, New York Times; Libraries and Readers Wade Into Digital Lending:

"Pam Sandlian Smith, library director of the Rangeview Library District, which serves a suburban community north of Denver, said that instead of purchasing a set number of digital copies of a book, she would prefer to buy one copy and pay a nominal licensing fee each time a patron downloaded it.

Publishers, inevitably, are nervous about allowing too much of their intellectual property to be offered free. Brian Murray, the chief executive of HarperCollins Publishers Worldwide, said Ms. Smith’s proposal was “not a sustainable model for publishers or authors.”

Some librarians object to the current pricing model because they often pay more for e-books than do consumers who buy them on Amazon or in Sony’s online store. Publishers generally charge the same price for e-books as they do for print editions, but online retailers subsidize the sale price of best sellers by marking them down to $9.99."

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/15/books/15libraries.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=libraries%20rich&st=cse

State AGs Don't Like Google Books Deal, What About Readers?; PC World, 9/18/09

Dave Coursey, PC World; State AGs Don't Like Google Books Deal, What About Readers?:

"Five state attorneys general have joined the opposition to the Google Books settlement, but what the deal means to readers isn't clear. Access to more books sounds great, but will it be?

The five AGs, from Missouri, Connecticut, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts and Washington, have varied reasons for their opposition, ranging from anti-monopoly to how money owed missing authors should be handled. The attorneys general are relatively late arrivals to the case, which already involves the U.S. Justice Department and others"

http://www.pcworld.com/businesscenter/article/172229/state_ags_dont_like_google_books_deal_what_about_readers.html

Steal This Book (for $9.99); The New York Times, 5/17/09

Motoko Rich via The New York Times; Steal This Book (for $9.99):

"Publishers are caught between authors who want to be paid high advances and consumers who believe they should pay less for a digital edition, largely because the publishers save on printing and shipping costs. But publishers argue that those costs, which generally run about 12.5 percent of the average hardcover retail list price, do not entirely disappear with e-books. What’s more, the costs of writing, editing and marketing remain the same...

The doomsday scenario for publishing is that the e-book versions cannibalize higher-price print sales...

Another possibility is that the cheaper prices for e-books entice consumers to buy more titles...

There is some precedent for that theory. When the smaller-format mass-market paperbacks that now populate airport bookstores and grocery checkout racks were introduced, publishers expressed fears that the lower-priced books might destroy the market for hardcovers. They didn’t. Instead, they expanded demand for books beyond elite readers."

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/17/weekinreview/17rich.html?scp=3&sq=e-books%20motoko%20rich&st=cse