>In
><c=US%a=_%p=InterWorld%l=INTERWORLD2-960912124831Z-986@www1.interworld.com>,
>David Levine <David@InterWorld.com> wrote:
>>books. Users of the library are still bound by copyright laws,
>>however. This does seem somewhat similar...
>
>But while you may go to a library to use (read) the books, you are bound
>by copyright law anywhere should you want to copy (parts of) the books.
>
>Yes, most libraries have copy machines, but many of them also
>have signs nearby that try to briefly explain "fair use."
Notice that I did recognize that users of the library
are still bound by copyright laws.
By "use" I meant utilize the information, not copy (i.e.
perform research). I would assume that the same
thing would be said of the Internet "library" that the
Internet Archive hopes to achieve - you could go to
their "library" to do the same kind of research you
would in a real library. However, much of what they
have available "in the stacks" (so to speak) would be
information that users might have to pay for if they
had retrieved it directly from the net (the same as
purchasing a book with information). In a real library,
when you borrow a book, you get the same
information value from the book, but you have not
purchased it. If one were to do this on the Internet,
many of the content providers would balk, and I
certainly can understand why, but I still can't see the
technical difference.
>But an archive of copies of web pages is not exactly the same as a
>library of books, or netnews articles, or TV news broadcasts, and the
>issues that it faces under copyright law would seem to also be different.
>
>Whether we argue by analogy or try to extrapolate from both book law and
>case law, this will be an interesting situation - and it will be
>interesting to see how it affects the growth of the web.
I guess, then, that the problem would be if one wanted
to create something akin to a library on the Internet,
how would it be done? In many cases, there is no
equivalent to purchasing a book. Of course, one
could argue that the Internet itself -is- the library, and
there is no need for such an institution
>
>--
>Denis McKeon
>dmckeon@swcp.com
David Levine
david@interworld.com