Five universities participating in efforts to digitize books for student usage, including the University of Wisconsin, are battling a lawsuit over copyright protections filed by author guilds and authors.
The Authors Guild, the Australian Society of Authors, the Quebec Writers Union and eight separate authors filed the suit Monday afternoon, stating the digitalization of the universities’ library books violated authors’ copyright protections.
This digitization effort targets the sued universities’ participation in HathiTrust, which contains approximately 10 million digital files as a result of working with Google since 2004, according to Deputy Director of UW Libraries Ed Van Gemert.
Headed by the University of Michigan, HathiTrust is a collaboration of more than 40 universities that first create digital copies of their books and then combine these digital libraries.
Authors Guild President Scott Turow said this digitalization threatens the books’ rightful preservation.
“These books, because of the universities’ and Google’s unlawful actions, are now at needless, intolerable digital risk,” Turow said in a recent Authors Guild press release.
The Library Copyright Alliance – which includes the American Library Association, the Association of Research Libraries and the Association of College and Research Libraries – disagrees with the lawsuit, according to a statement released Wednesday.
“We are deeply disappointed by the Authors Guild’s decision to file a lawsuit […] against HathiTrust and its research library partners,” the statement said. “The case has no merit and completely disregards the rights of libraries and their users under the law, especially fair use.”
Another area of contention in the lawsuit is the “Orphan Works Project,” slated to begin Oct. 13. This project digitizes books protected by copyright but whose rights holders cannot be found.
The Authors Guild is accusing the Orphan Works Project of not putting forth significant effort in finding these rights holders, according to its two most recent blog posts.
Angelo Loukakis, the executive director of the Australian Society of Authors, said this project is a direct attack on authors. In a recent statement, he also said American universities do not have the right to forfeit protections without consent.
“Maybe it doesn’t seem like it to some, but writing books is an author’s real-life work and livelihood. … These aren’t orphaned books, they’re abducted books,” Loukakis said in the release.
Van Gemert said he believed the Orphan Works Project is a way to cover the lawsuit’s anti-digitization focus. He described the project as a “smokescreen,” claiming the organization is actually attacking the importance of preservation and going after the reformatting of physical items to digital files.
Stating that the Orphan Works Project includes none of the plaintiff’s material, Van Gemert said it would be difficult for the guilds to convince the court they have legal standing and can represent their position.
Van Gemert also emphasized the importance of digital information for students.
“Printed material is and will continue to be important, especially in humanities but also the sciences,” he said. “Access to digital information is not only convenient but it is the preferred method of access for students and faculty.”
