Internet Archive ends “emergency library” early to appease publishers; Ars Technica, June 11, 2020

Timothy B. Lee, Ars Technica; Internet Archive ends “emergency library” early to appease publishers

Online library asks publishers to “call off their costly assault.”

"The Internet Archive has ended its National Emergency Library programs two weeks earlier than originally scheduled, the organization announced in a Wednesday blog post. 

"We moved up our schedule because, last Monday, four commercial publishers chose to sue Internet Archive during a global pandemic," the group wrote. The online library called on publishers to "call off their costly assault."

But that doesn't seem very likely. The Internet Archive isn't ending its online book lending program altogether. Instead, the group is returning to a "controlled digital lending" (CDL) model that it had followed for almost a decade prior to March. Under that model, the group allows only one patron to digitally "check out" a book for each physical copy the library has in stock. If more people want to read a book than are physically available, patrons are added to a waiting list until someone checks the book back in...

Experts have told Ars that the CDL concept has a better chance of winning approval from the courts than the "emergency library" idea with unlimited downloads. But the legality of CDL is far from clear. Some libraries have been practicing it for several years without legal problems. But publishers and authors' rights groups have never conceded its legality, and the issue hasn't been tested in court."

National Library of Israel to open access to 2,500 rare Islamic books; Jerusalem Post, June 8, 2020

Jerusalem Post Staff, Jerusalem Post; National Library of Israel to open access to 2,500 rare Islamic books

"The National Library of Israel, in coordination with the Arcadia Fund, has announced a major initiative to open digital access to over 2,500 rare Islamic manuscripts and books, according to a press release from library on Monday. 

With the aid of a grant from Arcadia, a charitable fund of Lisbet Rausing and Peter Baldwin, the National Library's opening of access will include the digitization and uploading of high-resolution images of books and manucripts, improving item descriptions in Arabic and English  and the development of an English-Hebrew-Arabic digital platform."

[Podcast] Trade Secrets: Protection and Defense; Fish & Richardson, March 26, 2020

[Podcast] Leeron Kalay, Seth Sproul, Katie Prescott, Fish & Richardson; Trade Secrets: Protection and Defense

"Trade secrets derive economic value primarily from being unknown by others. But to establish the existence of a protectable trade secret, companies must demonstrate that they have taken reasonable steps to maintain the secrecy of the information in question. A robust trade secret strategy can both protect a company’s trade secrets while also allowing it to defend itself from accusations of trade secret theft. Companies must consider this strategy at all times, including:

• When recruiting and hiring new employees
• When handling employee departures
• When collaborating with business partners and prospects

In this webinar, Fish attorneys Katherine Prescott, Leeron Kalay, and Seth Sproul discuss how to craft a trade secret strategy that protects your company from accusations of trade secret theft while also protecting your company’s trade secrets.

Click the link to download a copy of the webinar slides.

Presenters: Leeron Kalay, Seth Sproul, Katie Prescott"

Best Practices: How to Protect Trade Secrets From Loss Through Departing Employees; JD Supra, June 5, 2020

Fish & Richardson, JD Supra; Best Practices: How to Protect Trade Secrets From Loss Through Departing Employees

"1. Introduction

We start with the assumption that your company has already laid the foundation for IP protection, including the creation of a rock-solid trade secrets program (for more on this topic, see the Fish Trade Secrets: Protection & Defense webinar)...

What follows can help you to build an employee departure checklist to make sure valuable trade secrets aren’t lost.

2. Best Practices For Dealing With Departing Employees"

Trump's Space Force Already Lost Its First Battle; The Hollywood Reporter, June 5, 2020

Eriq Gardner, The Hollywood Reporter; Trump's Space Force Already Lost Its First Battle


"Although the United States operates on what's called a "first-to-use" trademark registration system, where priority is based on actual use in commerce rather than who gets to the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office first, many other countries operate on a "first-to-file" basis. Records show that Netflix was submitting applications for "Space Force" around the world as early as January 2019. In other words, the Department of Defense was caught sleeping."

Copyright bots and classical musicians are fighting online. The bots are winning.; The Washington Post, May 21, 2020

Michael Andor Brodeur , The Washington Post

; Copyright bots and classical musicians are fighting online. The bots are winning.

"“We built these systems around the presumption that everybody is either: A, a pirate, or B, should be a copyright expert,” Rose says.

As it stands, the relationship between classical musicians and copyright bots is a study in contradictions, as newborn technologies police music that has been with us for centuries and individual musicians battle back against the indifference of massive corporations.

But this unhealthy dynamic also presents a consequential conundrum in terms of how the arts engage with social media as they grow more and more dependent on each other."

Publishers Sue Internet Archive Over Free E-Books; The New York Times, June 1, 2020

Elizabeth A. Harris, The New York Times; Publishers Sue Internet Archive Over Free E-Books

Penguin Random House, HarperCollins, Hachette and Wiley accused the nonprofit of piracy for making over 1 million books free online.

"A group of publishers sued Internet Archive on Monday, saying that the nonprofit group’s trove of free electronic copies of books was robbing authors and publishers of revenue at a moment when it was desperately needed.

Internet Archive has made more than 1.3 million books available free online, which were scanned and available to one borrower at a time for a period of 14 days, according to the complaint. Then in March, the group said it would lift all restrictions on its book lending until the end of the public health crisis, creating what it called “a National Emergency Library to serve the nation’s displaced learners.”

But many publishers and authors have called it something different: theft.

“There is nothing innovative or transformative about making complete copies of books to which you have no rights and giving them away for free,” said Maria A. Pallante, president of the Association of American Publishers, which is helping to coordinate the industry’s response. “They’ve stepped in downstream and taken the intellectual investment of authors and the financial investment of publishers, they’re interfering and giving this away.”"