HathiTrust’s book digitization and accessibility efforts
have once again been found to be fair uses of copyrighted works, as a
federal appeals court on Tuesday dealt a further blow to authors’ groups
and publishers. The opinion,
delivered by a three-judge panel in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the
Second Circuit, affirms nearly all of a lower court’s ruling that
praised the “transformative uses” of HathiTrust and its “invaluable
contribution to the progress of science and cultivation of the arts.” ...
HathiTrust
is a consortium of about 80 member institutions working with Google to
digitize the books in their libraries. The HathiTrust Digital Library
hosts those books -- there are more than 10 million in total -- and if a
member loses a book in its collection, it can get a replacement copy if
one isn’t available at a fair price. Scholars can also search the database for content, but
unless the copyright holder authorizes broader use, results only show
page numbers and where search terms appear. That information can still
be useful for researchers conducting text analysis -- or as an indicator
of which sources they should track down. The digital library offers additional features to scholars
with disabilities, who can access complete copies if they can show that
they are unable to read a work in print...
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