algorithmic book publishing. Getting too much message spam here, pls. use contact form at NimbleBooks.com if you want to chat about work.
1) The membership of this work group contains no one from commercial publishing, in other words, the group that creates most of what the other groups consume. 2) Contrary to the contention that the comments are "out of scope", legality is an absolutely critical requirement that is in scope by definition. Does the NISO's enabling legislation even allow it to promulgate a standard that is known to be illegal? Todd Carpenter 3) The signatories are a Murderer's Row of organizations representing every aspect of commercial book publishing including agents, authors, and publishers from most parts of the world. In short, it looks to an outsider like the problem is that this group was convened with the wrong charter and the wrong membership. As Ms. Halperin suggests, it's a pity the process was allowed to waste two years of everyone's time.
I am stepping down as co-chair of this committee because I believe that publishers and their affiliated trade associations are more interested in undermining NISO and the committee's mission to develop a technical standard for digital lending. We affirm the library’s right to lend and promoting equitable digitization practices in libraries using open standards and protocols. These publishers have no interest in finding a solution for CDL that respects the rights of libraries, authors, publishers, and readers. Read my statement:
Todd Carpenter
1mo
Specifically, many libraries hold special collections which they are the owners of the copyright for those works. Other examples where digitization and secure distribution is supported by coprygiht law include digitization for the purposes of accessibility remediation (Section 121 of Copyright law) and interlibrary loans (Section 108, clause d). These example don't even touch the broader questions of Fair Use, which is currently under consideration in Federal Appeals Court and may eventually be decided by the SCOTUS. Some publishers have licensed the right for digitization and loaning of digital content. Other publishers might begin to sell licenses to libraries to digitize backlist files for which there is no digital copy available, if there was a method and a demand for such a license. This process could look similar to the photocopy licensing system used by CCC, or be managed directly between publisher and library.
The hubris of some publishers is astounding...
Sabine Ruesch
1mo
Well said!
Executive Director at the National Information Standards Organization (NISO)
1moThere is a character limit on a potential response, but in short: To your first point, this is incorrect. At the start of the project, there were publishers involved, three in fact and including a commercial publisher. On the project launch, 11 publishers voted in support of launching the project. Though those volunteers withdrew--for different reasons--before the draft was released. On your second point, the lack of nuance on this point is intentionally misleading. One could use a photocopier to blatantly breach copyright by photocopying an entire copy of a book and walk outside and try to sell those copies on the street. This is obviously illegal. However, practically every library has a photocopier. Because one instance of using a technology is deemed legally illegal, that does not extend to every use of a technology. There are situations in which digitization and secure distribution of digital copies is entirely within the bounds of copyright law. <Insert legal arguements here>