Fight for the Future: What the Archive’s book #library does is scan paper books to make their own digital copies so that they can loan them without letting tech companies and publishing conglomerates spy on readers.

Tomorrow, #InternetArchive will file their reply brief in the suit from major #publishers to end the right of IA and all #libraries to own and preserve spyware-free digital #books. Reading what they’re replying to, we’ve gotta ask: Who is the real “Napster” here? A thread.

What the Archive’s book #library does is scan paper books to make their own digital copies so that they can loan them without letting tech companies and publishing conglomerates spy on readers.

25+ Human Rights Organizations Call on 2024 Congress to Investigate Big Tech and Publishing’s Stranglehold over Digital Bookswww.fightforthefuture.org A broad civil society coalition is sounding the alarm on Big Tech and Big Publishing’s unchecked power over digital books—and surveillance of those who read them. 25+ human rights organizations are ca...

And loan such books out in a 1-to-1 ratio, just like they would the paper book sitting in their warehouse, without paying totally atrocious licensing fees over and over.

E-Books for Usebooksforus.com Demand for e-books is at an all-time high, but library collections are being hijacked by corporations.

But tomorrow, Internet Archive is replying to legal arguments that libraries scanning and loaning the books they own amounts to the impact of #Napster on the music industry in the ‘00s, but for publishing revenue. …does it now?

The #RIAA even included this chart in their amicus brief, which shows how #recordingindustry revenues plunged down by half over the years that the internet really started to happen.

(Whether that was the fault of piracy or just the fact that dinosaur record execs were plugging their ears and saying “lalala the internet doesn’t exist” is for another thread. As is the fact that recording industry profits are higher than ever yet musicians are struggling worse than ever.)

Either way, the numbers don’t lie in the RIAA’s chart. The recording industry had a huge revenue problem in the ‘00s. So if Internet Archive and other libraries are devastating publishing by lending books, there’s a chart to show that too, right?

No. There is no chart to show the same economic harm to publishing from what @InternetArchive or any other library does, not even from piracy. So, we charted it ourselves using ten years of data from Association of American Publishers.

Libraries effect on sales has been studied a lot-- see Guy LeCharles Gonzalez or the Panorama Project. Publisher's Weekly has written about it often. Public libraries are good for book sales because book displays, author readings, hosting clubs etc etc are free publicity.

It feels like the Archive picked a poor position in this fight when it dropped the 1-1 requirement for lending during the early days of the pandemic. Ultimately I do hope the "this is transformational speech/protected" argument wins out, but that decision is going to make it harder.

And I have repeatedly and happily given books to the Archive for this purpose: to enable books I bought and like to be read by others.

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