this post was submitted on 07 Jun 2024
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Internet Archive is in danger (www.battleforlibraries.com)
submitted 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago) by Moorshou@lemmy.zip to c/privacy@lemmy.ml
 

It looks like the internet archive is needed assistance, I just heard about this today and figured lemmy could help spread this message around

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[–] Scrubber0777@lemmy.ml 45 points 5 months ago (40 children)

Would you care the elaborate more?

[–] Moorshou@lemmy.zip 95 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago) (39 children)

The nonprofit Internet Archive is appealing a judgment that threatens the future of all libraries. Big publishers are suing to cut off libraries’ ownership and control of digital books, opening new paths for digital book bans and dangerous surveillance.

Join 28,000+ signers on the petition below to show your support for the Internet Archive, libraries’ digital rights, and an open internet with safe, uncensored access to knowledge.

Battleforlibraries

[–] FaceDeer@fedia.io 18 points 5 months ago (12 children)

Except it's not a threat to the future of all libraries, it's a threat to the future of "libraries" that decide to completely ignore copyright and give out an unlimited number of copies of ebooks. Basically turning themselves into book-focused piracy sites.

I'm incredibly frustrated with Internet Archive for bringing this on themselves. It is not their mandate to fight copyright, that's something better left in the hands of activist organizations like the EFF. The Internet Archive's mandate is to archive the Internet, to store and preserve knowledge. Distributing it is secondary to that goal. And picking unnecessary fights with big publishing houses like this is directly contrary to that goal, since now the Internet Archive is in danger.

It's like they're carrying around a precious baby and they decided it was a good idea to start whacking a bear with a stick. Now the bear is eating their leg and they're screaming "oh my god help me, the bear is threatening this baby!" Well yeah, but you shouldn't have brought a baby with you when you went on a bear-whacking expedition. You should have known exactly what that bear was going to do.

[–] wizardbeard@lemmy.dbzer0.com 11 points 5 months ago

Exactly. I hate fucking everything about this. I love the internet archive and ^nearly^ all they do.

In principal I love their "covid-19 emergency library" or whatever they called it. In practice? They absolutely know better than to pull stunts and I'm terrified that this will spell the end for one of the greatest knowledge and media resources of the modern age. For shit that was effectively already available to the public through ebook piracy sites.

They already operated on shaky ground, hosting downloads for a metric ton of shit that is unquestionably still under copyright (despite their claims to only be archival of things that are not), skating by on technicalities and by not drawing too much attention to themselves.

Plus, there were so fucking many better ways to do the "free digital library" thing without jeapordizing themselves.

  • Have some volunteers "misuse resources": load an SSD up with the book files, "borrow" some compute power to decrypt/remove drm, pass batches off to existing ebook "dumping" groups to stagger releases and obsfucate the true source. This would ensure that any material they had which was not already available on the high seas would get there.
  • Make a big red banner on the site to a blog post with the generic "While we would never condone piracy or copyright infringement, we understand that times are extremely hard right now [blah blah] here are some links to community guides on how to access learning literature (pirate ebooks) during these trying times [blah blah] Please abide by your local laws."
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