Bestselling Author Of Children's Books Accuses Public Libraries Of Stealing His Paychecks

from the have-denis-leary's-'asshole-song'-stuck-in-my-head-for-some-reason dept

Maybe there's a scientific explanation for the sort of behavior that leads normally beloved people to suddenly veer into previously unexplored areas of misanthropy and jettison all the goodwill they've built up over a lifetime. It's not necessarily just a case of "old men yelling at clouds." The subject of this piece isn't necessarily old (although, I admit I keep moving those particular goalposts with each passing birthday) or incoherent. He's just... so horribly, awfully, completely wrong.

Terry Deary, author of the Horrible Histories line of children's books, has a problem with libraries. Perhaps urged on by UK Publisher's Association's collective mental breakdown (libraries = "tawdry theft") early last year, Deary has joined the not-really-all-that-large number of voices decrying the existence of libraries and the countless free books contained therein.

"I'm not attacking libraries, I'm attacking the concept behind libraries, which is no longer relevant."

Let's stop right there for a moment. When you've read the next few paragraphs, you'll probably come to the conclusion that Deary is attacking libraries. I just want to let you know that you are not crazy. When someone attacks the underlying concept of something, very rarely does that something escaped unscathed. There's a reason for this. Let's use a metaphor to explain Deary's oxymoronic statement:

Underlying concepts are like the foundation of a house, and when someone like Deary attacks this house's "foundation," he's going to sound like the sort of person that, for the good of humanity, should have several filters installed between his brainstem and his mouth. All clear?

Good. Let's proceed.

[I]t's been 150 years, we've got this idea that we've got an entitlement to read books for free, at the expense of authors, publishers and council tax payers. This is not the Victorian age, when we wanted to allow the impoverished access to literature. We pay for compulsory schooling to do that.

Well, there's a lot of offensive stuff in there, almost enough of it to crowd out the ignorant stuff. "Entitlement to read books for free." To tell you the truth, I barely noticed that "entitlement" because it was immediately overshadowed by the author's entitlement. Who do you think it is that grants you the "entitlement" to earn money for writing books? Copyright is granted -- it's not something that has always existed and will always exist.

I'm particularly amazed (and not in the good way) that you feel "impoverished" people should be happy with whatever the school system manages to stock in its library. God forbid the poor get more than the bare minimum the "council tax payers" provide. They've got survival concerns that outweigh your "giving away a book or two" concerns, Deary. So, they want to read a bestseller while it's still on the list. Fuck them, right? Sorry about your dwindling royalties and all, but couldn't you at least have picked a more socially acceptable target, like Amazon or piracy or literacy rates or something?

And what about all the other books in the library that aren't children's fiction written by Terry Deary? Should these societal leeches purchase their own sets of reference books as well? I'm sure much more time and money went into crafting the Encylopaedia Brittanica and yet, these freeloaders are in the library, not paying for all this information. Should they just be pointed in the direction of the internet, another service most libraries provide? And what if they don't have that service at home? A closed library doesn't do the "impoverished" much good at all.

Please... continue.

"People have to make the choice to buy books."

No, they don't, Terry. Not if there's an option, and certainly not if they can only afford the free option. If you think shutting down libraries will force everyone to start buying books (especially yours), then go ahead and grab a seat on the FAILboat crowded with content industry members that think shutting down piracy will force people to start buying their offerings. It's going to be a long, angry ride to a very disappointing destination.

"People will happily buy a cinema ticket to see Roald Dahl's Matilda, and expect to get the book for free."

I've got some bad news for you and your shipmates, Terry: the library lends out movies as well. Audiobooks. Video games. CDs. And yet you think this is all about how you're losing out on one more royalty every time someone uses their library card.

"Books aren't public property, and writers aren't Enid Blyton, middle-class women indulging in a pleasant little hobby."

Nice. A slam against middle-class women and hobby writers, both of whom deserve no respect and for nothing good to happen to them.

Well, that's probably all we need to hear from this author. It's enough to bury him alrea—

"The libraries are doing nothing for the book industry. They give nothing back, whereas bookshops are selling the book, and the author and the publisher get paid, which is as it should be. What other entertainment do we expect to get for free?"

Really? Plenty of people get TV for free. I know everyone pays a license fee back in your homeland, Deary, but that's because it's a public service broadcaster. Over here in the US, advertising pays for our free TV. Even with the surcharge, the effective amount paid (per person) per hour of broadcasting falls well below the 6.2p per lend royalty that has Deary so upset. Or maybe you've heard of this little thing called radio? Music, talk, sports, religion -- all free.

YouTube -- free. (Oh, but the internet connection costs money, I hear you argue, as if that were even remotely a legitimate counterpoint. Sure, you need an internet connection to reach YouTube, but it's hardly the only site on the web. To make Deary's rhetorical question work, we have to pretend YouTube's offerings are the only content in demand on the internet and that YouTube would much rather sell DVDs than allow people to watch for "free.") And, as mentioned before, libraries are diversifying their offerings, so there's many more forms of entertainment people can expect to get for free.

There's also this:

"Bookshops are closing down, he said, "because someone is giving away the product they are trying to sell. What other industry creates a product and allows someone else to give it away, endlessly? The car industry would collapse if we went to car libraries for free use of Porsches … Librarians are lovely people and libraries are lovely places, but they are damaging the book industry. They are putting bookshops out of business, and I'm afraid we have to look at what place they have in the 21st century."

First is was Barnes & Noble crowding out the indie bookstores. Then it was Amazon, crowding out B&N and the indie bookstores. Now, it's libraries, destroying bookstores in their glacially-paced (150 years+) quest to dismantle the publishing industry and undermine their own existence at the same time. And, for no apparent reason, there's our good friend "The Car Metaphor" thrown into the mix.

We can't give everything away under the public purse. Books are part of the entertainment industry. Literature has been something elite, but it is not any more. This is not the Roman empire, where we give away free bread and circuses to the masses."

Literature used to be "elite." Now, they're simply "entertainment," and apparently should be sold as such. No freebies. And there's that ugly undercurrent of resentment aimed at the "masses," most of whom are presumably too "impoverished" to be considered part of Deary's society.

"People expect to pay for entertainment."

Do they? I doubt it. Again: radio, TV, YouTube, etc. You can't even keep your story straight. First, they "expect" to pay for a movie ticket. Then they "expect" to read the book the movie was based on for free. Your views on what the "common man" expects or doesn't expect seem to be based on whichever strawman you're currently trying to erect.

So, which is it, Deary? Are the people expecting to pay and the library system keeps letting them down? Or do they expect it for free, but find they can't enjoy it with all the whinging battering at their ears (and eyes, in this case)?

Here's the worst part and it goes unstated by Deary, who clearly wishes that no one ever purchase a book of his again: show me an author who didn't take great advantage of the library system during his or her formative years and I'll show you a liar. Anyone who either makes a living writing or at least makes a serious attempt has spent years voraciously devouring anything they could get their hands on. That's how writers develop. And there is no way in hell that Deary purchased every single book he read on his way to becoming a successful author. None. At all.

Considering how many lives the library system has enhanced and enriched, the complaint of an author bemoaning the "loss" of £180,000 hardly registers against libraries' priceless contribution to society. Too bad for Deary that his ill-advised rant will result in the "loss" of even more royalties as discerning consumers (and fans of libraries) start putting their money in the pockets of other authors -- ones who share the same respect and love for this so-called "outdated" institution.

Filed Under: entitlement, library, terry deary

Hadopi Says French National Library Needs Unprotected Works... To Put Its Own DRM On

from the locking-up-culture dept

In the past, many have noted that proprietary formats for content almost guarantee that certain works will be lost to history. Backwards compatibility becomes a problem, and before long content that could be accessed by tons of programs may be impossible to open just a few years later. For libraries and archvists this is a huge problem -- and it's made even worse when you add DRM to the mix. It appears that even the "anti-piracy" folks in France recognize this, but only to a limited extent.

According to the French publication, Numerama, Hadopi (the agency in charge of stamping out infringement in France), has published an opinion in which it suggests that content creators give the French National Library (Bibliothèque Nationale de France or BNF) works without any DRM on them. As they quite rightly note, in order to better make sure that the culture is preserved and that future archives are accessible, a lack of DRM makes much more sense. They even note that just providing a DRM'd copy with the keys to decrypt it, or with circumvention tools, really isn't sufficient for proper archiving.

That said, the report also then appears to fret about the BNF leaking these unprotected works out into the world. The suggestion seems to be that (wait for it...) the BNF then create its own DRM to lock up the unprotected works that it needs to keep them from getting locked up. In other words, the whole plan is pretty useless anyway.

This is just an opinion, and not binding in any way. So apparently the French government is still considering what sorts of requirements it intends to put on submissions to the BNF, but once again it seems like an overly aggressive "fear of piracy" may actually lead to some bad technical decisions for the sake of "protecting" some works against infringement.

Filed Under: access, archives, copyright, drm, france, hadopi, library, locked up
Companies: bnf, hadopi

The Biggest 'Pirates' And 'Freeloaders' Of Them All? College Professors And Librarians

from the freetards dept

There's an interesting article over at Law.com highlighting just how many lawsuits there are in which college professors and librarians are fighting back against overly draconian copyright laws. Most of the cases they mention are ones we've discussed here, but it's a good article overall. It talks about the Georgia State fair use case, the UCLA case about streaming video, and the Authors Guild suit against the Hathitrust for trying to make books more accessible.

The really incredible thing in all of this is that copyright is supposed to be about the encouragement of learning. In fact, the first US federal copyright law was called "An Act for the Encouragement of Learning." But, the fact is that universities and librarians are constantly bumping up against the ridiculous and over-aggressive limits of copyright law in ways that prevent them from basic tasks that aid in education and learning.

Copyright system defenders love to paint critics of today's copyright laws as merely being a bunch of "freeloaders" and "pirates." That's a ridiculous assertion. The big problem of copyright law today is how it impacts everyday people doing everyday things. The fact that so many professors and librarians -- those who are at the forefront of the "encouragement of learning" -- are discovering that copyright law gets in their way more than it helps suggests a law that is completely out of touch with its intended purpose. This isn't about freeloaders and pirates. This is about some of the fundamental principles of education.

Filed Under: education, learning, library
Companies: authors guild, hathitrust

Why Ebook Portal Library.nu Differed From Other Filesharing Sites

from the paying-the-price dept

A couple of weeks ago the popular ebook portal Library.nu was shut down, apparently voluntarily, after a coalition of book publishers obtained an injunction against it and a similar site. As an excellent post on the kNOw Future Inc. blog points out, Library.nu was significant in a number of ways:

the demand for the works offered there demonstrates that filesharing is not just about pop music, porn and cams of action movies, but also those forms and sources of knowledge whose acquisition are ritually celebrated within 'enlightenment' culture.

The stereotypical downloader -- young, and looking for easy entertainment online -- was in part a function of what was available initially. The Library.nu site showed that fans of "high culture" were just as keen to obtain digital versions of their stuff as those with more "low-brow" tastes.

Many of those whose works were offered derive income not from royalties, but from related activities such as teaching and research. Such people were themselves an important component library.nu’ user base.

The first part means that the authors of those books wrote not for money, principally, but for other reasons -- for example, prestige or influence. It was actually in their interests for their works to be circulated as widely as possible in order to enhance their reputation, and Library.nu made that possible. It's not clear what evidence there is for the second sentence quoted above, but assuming it's true, it would indicate that for some, at least, the Library.nu ethos was "share and share alike".

The post concludes:

Some [of those downloading from Library.nu] have other means to access the same materials, others, especially those in countries with weaker education infrastructures and more emaciated library budgets, do not. Outside of formal education, the millions of online autodidacts may be denied access to material, seriously impinging on their lives and possibilities. When one considers the cost of text books and more especially scholarly articles, that is no hyperbole, and applies not only to the global south but the post-industrial north as well, awash in its dreams of knowledge economies and human capital.

That suggests two things. First, that publishers are missing out on a huge audience that is hungry for knowledge, but simply can't afford text books, say, at current pricing. Once again, piracy is driven partly by a failure to serve the market properly.

The other point is that although publishers may rejoice that Library.nu has been taken down, readers around the world will suffer in terms of losing access to these works that they can't afford. Some may say that's just tough, or that these people should work harder or make greater sacrifices elsewhere in order to be able to afford such books. But in many locations, those books are not available legally at any price.

As a result, when sites like Library.nu disappear, there is a cost to society as a whole because of the knock-on effects of reduced information flow, and of practical knowledge that is unavailable for application as a result. In this respect, sites with large collections of digitized textbooks are quite different from those that are principally offering music or video downloads for entertainment.

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Filed Under: culture, ebooks, file sharing, library

D.C. Libraries Offering Free, DRM-Free MP3 Downloads From Sony Music

from the well,-look-at-that dept

The legacy entertainment industry has worked so hard to claim that getting any of their works for "free" must be illegal. Remember, the public service announcement created by NBC Universal and used by both the city government of NY and the federal government as an "anti-piracy" advertisement states that "there's no such thing as free" content. EMI, in its fight with MP3tunes, similarly tried to claim that it never, ever, released free music online -- a point easily proven to be false. So it's interesting to see -- as a whole bunch of folks have sent in -- that the DC libraries recently announced that library card holders can download free music from the library website from Sony Music. The library website says that it comes from "the entire Sony Music and IODA catalogs." You only get to download three songs per week, but they appear to be DRM-free mp3s. This is why it gets more and more difficult to take the big labels and the big studios seriously when they go on and on about how bad "free" is. They're using it themselves...

Filed Under: dc, free, library, mp3s
Companies: sony music

University Of Michigan Library Kicks Off Project To Identify All The Orphan Works In Its Collection

from the how-big-is-the-problem? dept

For years, we've seen attempts to create "orphan works" legislation to deal with a much bigger problem caused by the Copyright Act of 1976. Prior to that, when copyright required registration formalities, it was relatively easy to determine if something was covered by copyright and who likely controlled that copyright. After the 1976 Act went into effect, suddenly you had all sorts of works that were probably covered by copyright, but it wasn't always clear who had the copyright, and thus there was no real way to contact them. Many people concerned about this -- including many in the Copyright Office, who usually come down on the side of always ratcheting copyright up, rather than finding exceptions -- started pushing for an orphan works law, that would let people make use of works if they really couldn't find the original owner. Tragically, the photographer community spread a ton of misinformation about the orphan works proposals and scuttled the whole thing.

Of course, there is the flipside to the argument, which is that if we made such a huge mess thanks to the 1976 Act, perhaps we should look at rolling back that Act, or at least rolling back the "automatic copyright" provisions. But, of course, our copyright masters never see the point in admitting they might have gotten something wrong. So, the best interim issue is an orphan works law. Of course, to get that actually through, one of the big questions is how big of an impact do orphan works really have. Along those lines, the University of Michigan Library is kicking off a new project to identify all the orphan works it has in its collection, which sounds like it could take quite some time. However, it would be nice to see some data on just how many works today are technically under copyright, but whose copyright holder is unknown or can't be found. Having some actual data might help shift the debate forward, rather than trekking over the same myths yet again.

Filed Under: copyright, library, orphan works, university of michigan

Why Aren't We Creating A National Digital Library?

from the access-to-knowledge-and-information dept

Justin Levine points us to a column in the New York Review of Books by Harvard's Robert Darnton (based on a speech he gave) questioning why there is no work on a national digital library in the US. There is, obviously, the Google book scanning effort, but as lots of folks are worried about putting all that info in the control of Google, Darnton wonders why others aren't working on similar efforts as well, pointing out that what Google has really done is shown that it is possible to do.

As for the reasons why, Darnton quotes extensively from our founding fathers on the importance of access to knowledge. They talk up the importance of open access and sharing knowledge -- and even highlight technology's wonderful role in making that possible. And yet, today, rather than using technology to continue that tradition, many have fought against what the technology allows -- quite the contrary of what our founding fathers were excited about. It's rather unfortunate.

Behind the creation of the American republic was another republic, which made the Constitution thinkable. This was the Republic of Letters--an information system powered by the pen and the printing press, a realm of knowledge open to anyone who could read and write, a community of writers and readers without boundaries, police, or inequality of any kind, except that of talent. Like other men of the Enlightenment, the Founding Fathers believed that free access to knowledge was a crucial condition for a flourishing republic, and that the American republic would flourish if its citizens exercised their citizenship in the Republic of Letters.

Of course, literacy was limited in the eighteenth century, and those who could read had limited access to books. There was an enormous gap between the hard realities of life two centuries ago and the ideals of the Founding Fathers. You could therefore accuse the Founders of utopianism. For my part, I believe that a strong dose of utopian idealism gave their thought its driving force. I think we should tap that force today, because what seemed utopian in the eighteenth century has now become possible. We can close the gap between the high ground of principle and the hardscrabble of everyday life. We can do so by creating a National Digital Library.

That said, I'd argue that focusing on a centralized method of doing so, whether it's Google or a university or Congress may still be the wrong way of doing it. Why not distribute the work. I would imagine that many people would be quite willing to contribute their time, their technology and their bandwidth in assisting the creation of a truly distributed, open and free digital library.

Filed Under: commons, copyright, culture, library, sharing