this post was submitted on 07 Jun 2024
1013 points (98.9% liked)
Privacy
31913 readers
905 users here now
A place to discuss privacy and freedom in the digital world.
Privacy has become a very important issue in modern society, with companies and governments constantly abusing their power, more and more people are waking up to the importance of digital privacy.
In this community everyone is welcome to post links and discuss topics related to privacy.
Some Rules
- Posting a link to a website containing tracking isn't great, if contents of the website are behind a paywall maybe copy them into the post
- Don't promote proprietary software
- Try to keep things on topic
- If you have a question, please try searching for previous discussions, maybe it has already been answered
- Reposts are fine, but should have at least a couple of weeks in between so that the post can reach a new audience
- Be nice :)
Related communities
Chat rooms
-
[Matrix/Element]Dead
much thanks to @gary_host_laptop for the logo design :)
founded 5 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
Another excerpt under why from the FAQ section
**The Internet Archive has been scanning millions of print books that they own, and loaning them out to anyone around the world, for free. Other libraries like the Boston Public Library are using the same process to make digital books too.
This is happening because major publishers offer no option for libraries to permanently purchase digital books and carry out their traditional role of preservation.
Instead, libraries are forced to pay high licensing fees to “rent” books from big tech vendors that regard patron privacy as a premium feature and are vulnerable to censorship from book banners. Under this regime, publishers act as malicious gatekeepers, preventing the free flow of information and undermining libraries’ ability to serve their patrons.
But it looks bad if publishers sue the Boston Public Library. So instead, they’ve launched an attack on a groundbreaking nonprofit, including a lawsuit with clear repercussions for every library in the US. On March 24, 2023, a lower court judge issued a ruling that stated the profits of big media companies are more important than the right of libraries to preserve our history and ensure it’s available to the world. Then, in a copyright troll move for the ages, the same attorney representing Big Publishing filed a second absurd lawsuit against the Internet Archive for it’s research library of old music recordings.
Nevertheless, the Internet Archive are appealing to a higher court and will keep fighting for the digital rights of libraries.**
This buries the lede so deep it's popping out the other side of the globe.
The entire core of this case is that (in abscence of more lenient agreements with publishers) traditional libraries are allowed to digitize physical books in their posession, as long as they do not lend out more copies than they physically own. The Internet Archive decided that they would lend out infinite copies, because "covid lol".
Boston Public Library isn't being sued because they don't lend out more than they own! It has precisely zero to do with fucking optics.
Edit: Don't get me wrong, I hope they win this case, but them continuing to play stupid helps nobody. Unfortunately, as discussed thoroughly online when they opened the covid19 emergency digital library, they fucked around. Now it seems they may have to find out.