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Comment by Wowfunhappy | Hacker News Reader

Would you prefer that the Internet Archive not make these books available at all? That was likely the alternative possibility.

I assume that the Internet Archive is holding onto the original, DRM-Free master copies. That's a job I trust the Internet Archive with, even if ideally I wish the data was more distributed.

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I would actually, because it sets a bar that if you’d like your book to be preserved then you need to make a choice, is your book so valuable that it should be free? If not, there’s plenty of other places for DRM books. What they’re doing instead is trying to have it both ways.

They are having it both ways. A non-encrypted copy is preserved digitally within the Internet Archive, and that copy is made available, now, in the only way it legally can be. Once that copyright expires, the Archive can make the content freely available to all, having already been digitized.

In some cases the content doesn't belong to the person restricting it however, they're effectively copyrighting the digital medium, do you think that's right for them to DRM it?

e.g. clearly the authors of these texts aren't around any more: http://blog.archive.org/2018/10/04/worlds-largest-collection...

> In some cases the content doesn't belong to the person restricting it however, they're effectively copyrighting the digital medium, do you think that's right for them to DRM it?

No, I don't think it's right for a separate entity to usurp this kind of authority, but that's not really a battle the Internet Archive can win.

They are doing their best within the restrictions placed on them. If you'd like to lobby for more sane copyright laws, please go ahead, I'll be behind you 100%. That does not negate the good being done by the Internet Archive right now.

It's not copyright law or authority, the Internet Archive can just say no. They can't be forced to take material.

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