Lawsuit over online book lending could bankrupt Internet Archive
> In March, as the coronavirus pandemic was gaining steam, the Internet Archive announced it was dispensing with this waiting-list system. Under a program it called the National Emergency Library, IA began allowing an unlimited number of people to check out the same book at the same time—even if IA only owned one physical copy.<p>This was a complete overreach by IA and they are paying the price. If you lend out digital versions all of which are backed by a physical copy, it is hard to argue that the publisher is being harmed. However, if you loan out unlimited digital versions of a single copy, that is much harder to justify, and that provided the the opening the publishers needed for a lawsuit.<p>I love what the IA has done, but i think they unnecessarily stepped into a minefield for not that much benefit. Even Google with all its resources has not directly challenged the publishers.