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Authors Fume as Online Library “Lends” Unlimited Free Books

posted by Fnord666 on Thursday April 02 2020, @08:28AM   Printer-friendly
from the writers-gotta-eat dept.

upstart writes in with an IRC submission for SoyCow8162:

Authors fume as online library "lends" unlimited free books:

For almost a decade, the Internet Archive, an online library best known for its Internet Wayback Machine, has let users "borrow" scanned digital copies of books held in its warehouse. Until recently, users could only check out as many copies as the organization had physical copies. But last week, The Internet Archive announced it was eliminating that restriction, allowing an unlimited number of users to check out a book simultaneously. The Internet Archive calls this the National Emergency Library.

Initial media coverage of the service was strongly positive. The New Yorker declared it a "gift to readers everywhere." But as word of the new service spread, it triggered a backlash from authors and publishers.

"As a reminder, there is no author bailout, booksellers bailout, or publisher bailout," author Alexander Chee tweeted on Friday. "The Internet Archive's 'emergency' copyrights grab endangers many already in terrible danger."

"It is a tarted-up piracy site," wrote author James Gleick.

Previously:

Internet Archive Suspends E-Book Lending "Waiting Lists" During U.S. National Emergency

Original Submission

 
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  • (Score: 5, Touché) by ikanreed on Thursday April 02 2020, @02:49PM

    by ikanreed (3164) Subscriber Badge on Thursday April 02 2020, @02:49PM (#978317) Journal

    Also I just looked and none of his books:
            1987 Chaos: Making a New Science, Viking Penguin (ISBN 0670811785); revised edition 2008 (ISBN 0143113453)
            1990 (with Eliot Porter) Nature's Chaos, Viking Penguin. (ISBN 0316609420)
            1992 Genius: The Life and Science of Richard Feynman, Pantheon Books. (ISBN 0679747044)
            1999 Faster: The Acceleration of Just About Everything, Pantheon. (ISBN 067977548X)
            2000 (editor) The Best American Science Writing 2000, HarperCollins. (ISBN 0060957360)
            2002 What Just Happened: A Chronicle from the Electronic Frontier, Pantheon. (ISBN 0375713913)
            2003 Isaac Newton, Pantheon. (ISBN 1400032954)
            2011 The Information: A History, a Theory, a Flood. New York: Pantheon Books. (ISBN 9780375423727 )
            2016 Time Travel: A History, Pantheon Books. (ISBN 0307908798)[22]

    are even fucking there [archive.org]

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