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Internet Archive's big battle with music publishers ends in settlement

(arstechnica.com)
335 points coloneltcb | 4 comments | 15 Sep 25 22:34 UTC | HN request time: 0.769s | source
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badlibrarian ◴[19 Sep 25 13:57 UTC] No.45301736[source]▶
A search for "Internet Archive rumors" returns a copy of Fleetwood Mac "Rumours" on my first page of results. Playable in browser and downloadable in high-quality lossless format.

The book lawsuit was over current titles (not really archival and preservation), and the record lawsuit wasn't really about the rare 78s, it was about the modern Jimi Hendrix and Paul McCartney records that somehow slipped in. And their refusal to follow the modern law that they themselves celebrated that made what they're trying to do (including downloads) explicitly legal. But that law prohibited fundraising, and they couldn't resist tweeting out links to Frank Sinatra records with a big banner on top asking for money.

In both lawsuits the discovery revealed tech debt and sloppy process at the Archive that made it impossible for them to argue on behalf of the future we all want.

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NemoNobody ◴[19 Sep 25 15:58 UTC] No.45303142[source]▶
"Somehow slipped in" - are you fr rn?

I don't wonder anything about that, was very convenient.

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1. aerostable_slug ◴[19 Sep 25 19:12 UTC] No.45305275[source]▶
Are you claiming the copyright holders put them there?

You might want to be specific about which ones were some kind of false flag conspiracy plot (is it just "Rumours"?) because there are thousands and thousands of pirated pieces of media on archive.org. I am behind there being some kind of archive project but as things stand the site was/is just Mega with a veneer of respectability.

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2. badlibrarian ◴[19 Sep 25 19:26 UTC] No.45305414[source]▶
Internet Archive continues to leak the verified email address of the uploader of each item, so conspiracy guy can run a spot check should he so desire.
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3. AnthonyMouse ◴[19 Sep 25 19:51 UTC] No.45305755[source]▶
Mega isn't indexed and decrypts content in javascript on the client. If people are using it to share your stuff, you have to find where they're sharing it to even find out that it's on there. Now, Hollywood did this to themselves, because back when it was Megaupload the fact that they had a search index was used as an excuse to shut down the whole service because a couple of employees used it to access infringing stuff without taking it down, so Mega got rid of that as a means to prevent it from happening again.

Internet Archive is searchable and executes DMCA takedown notices. If something of yours is on there and you don't want it to be, it's not because they're making it hard to change that.

4. xp84 ◴[19 Sep 25 22:06 UTC] No.45307281[source]▶
Fair if true, though it's not like someone uploading things to IA is likely to be using an address like michael.scott @ dundermifflin.com or something. More likely it's something anonymous. Certainly so if they were planting things to sue over, you can bet they'd use an account like dsfhakeij@ mail.ru or something.