The Internet Archive is losing its legal recourse. Wired reports that the nonprofit Internet cataloger of videos, games, and books has lost its appeal in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. The court rejected Archive.org’s argument in its lawsuit against several major book publishers that its virtual book library can operate legally under fair use doctrine.
The lawsuit stems from the National Emergency Library (NEL), an online archive that launched in March 2020. NEL helped readers access library materials during the COVID pandemic by offering digital copies of books that users could borrow one at a time. Shortly thereafter, the Internet Archive allowed users to borrow unlimited e-books, leading authors such as Colson Whitehead and Neil Gaiman, as well as the Writers Guild of America to denounce NEL, NPR reported.
The website reinstated the book lending limits, but that didn’t stop publishers including Hachette Book Group, HarperCollins, and Random House from suing the following June. Less than three years later, a federal judge ruled in favor of the plaintiffs, declaring that the non-profit website had violated the publishers’ copyright protections.
The only positive aspect of Archive.org’s appeal is that the court recognized the Internet Archive as a nonprofit organization. The Internet Archive is still facing a separate copyright infringement lawsuit filed last year by Universal Music Group and Sony over a music digitization project.
