With the court’s unequivocal decision in Hachette et al. v. Internet Archive, and the continued failure of ebook legislation in various states, it is time for policymakers and librarians to understand the reason why this two-pronged campaign against copyright rights in ebooks is losing—because the academics, organizations, and lobbyists behind the effort are lying. Yes, that’s a big accusation to ...

In a recent article for The Scholarly Kitchen, Todd A. Carpenter, Executive Director of the National Information Standards Organization (NISO), defends Internet Archive (in Hachette et al. v. Internet Archive) and the practice called Controlled Digital Lending (CDL). Proving that one need not be Lindsey Graham to engage in propaganda disguised as legal opinion, Carpenter predictably elides any mention of ...

On Monday last week, oral arguments were presented in cross-motions for summary judgment in Hachette et al. v. Internet Archive, and by end-of-business Friday, the court delivered its opinion thoroughly rejecting IA’s fair use defense. Although many of us watching this case felt a little whiplash Friday evening, the speed with which the court responded can perhaps be explained by ...

One would think this is obvious, particularly to a librarian, but perhaps not to Douglas Lord, President of the Connecticut Library Association (CLA). In a letter addressed to the state assembly advocating passage of H.B. 6829, Connecticut’s version of similar bills proposed (and shot down) in other states to address alleged unfairness in eBook licensing to libraries, Lord writes: It ...

“Black history is American history.” There is more than one way to read (or use) that phrase. On its face, it affirms that no honest or thorough narrative about the United States can possibly exclude the Black story. But from there, one might say, as Morgan Freeman suggested in a 2005 interview with Mike Wallace, that to distinguish or compartmentalize ...

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