IA does a lot more than being a library and this lawsuit will probably crush them. For the big publishers, the lent files are probably a fraction of a fraction of a percentage for their business.

IA also archives a lot of data, including hard to find books, websites, trailers, etc. I don’t think anyone else will step up to replace them.

[–] TWeaK@lemm.ee 7 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago)

Publishers absolutely were in the wrong, morally, but my point is that IA stepped out of the legal grey area and into what was completely wrong in law. Then, they (and apparently their argument still does) rely on a judge basically making the law up, and in doing so left no real option for the judge but to rule against them. Now, the grey area isn't grey anymore, it's explicitly prohibited.

If IA hadn't broken the one digital per physical copy rule, or if they'd settled out of court or done anything sensible with their lawsuit, they wouldn't have made the law worse.

[–] conciselyverbose@kbin.social -2 points 11 months ago

In the wrong how?

If you don't believe in copyright, whatever, but IA was doing something blatantly violating the law and getting away with it until they decided to flamboyantly draw attention to themselves by removing the veneer of legality and just giving away unlimited copies.