Internet Archive Pandemic Library Provokes Broader Lending Fight

"A fight spurred by the Internet Archive throwing its online library’s doors open during the pandemic has drawn myriad industry and academic briefs into what’s now a broad fight over digital lending that seems destined for the US Supreme Court.

Four major publishers sued the digital repository in June 2020, alleging mass copyright infringement in response to its digital “National Emergency Library” during the Covid-19 lockdown. They also challenged the Internet Archive’s pre-existing “Open Library” system—adopted by several brick-and-mortar libraries—in which scanned books are lent to one borrower at a time, a restriction that it lifted during the emergency.

The case has already generated a rare flood of friend-of-the-court briefs into the district court proceedings, with amici primarily battling over the “controlled digital lending” (CDL) system. Both the Internet Archive and the publishers have asked a federal judge in New York for a quick win in the case, each moving for summary judgment in July...."