@pluralistic As a digital archivist who has managed a web archiving program, I 100% agree with your take on scraping, and THANK YOU for writing this. Is there any meaningful difference between the fair use you're talking about and what happened with Anna's Archive scraping OCLC metadata records? https://torrentfreak.com/lawsuit-accuses-annas-archive-of-hacking-worldcat-stealing-2-2-tb-data-240207/ It's fair use, right?? (I know you're not a copyright lawyer but interested if you have an opinion!)
For years I've wanted to write a guide to academic self-publishing and community peer review. This is the primary way I've published but I learned it / made it up as I went along. I feel like there MUST be a guide somewhere out there already, though? (If not, I want to make it. I fear duplicating resources!)
stories from the pre-temperance movement US like this where people are ripping up chairs and throwing them onstage, trying to burn down the theatre, and starting a huge riot over a theatrical rivalry are a lot easier to understand if you remember that everyone was drunk all day every day.
@jonny
I've been thinking about the influencing public opinion part. Not just widely distributing the info and assuming people will join your cause. The right has done a fantastic job of influencing the spaces where ideology is reproduced. Liberals think it's bad to do that and I don't understand where the left is on it. But our failure to do this is a big reason why the left is losing. Maybe I'll look to the temperance movt to see how they did it.
My real worry with Google's voyage into enshittification (thanks to Cory Doctorow @pluralistic the term) is YouTube.
Through YT, for the past 15 years, the world has basically entrusted Google to be the custodian of pretty much our entire global video archive.
There's countless hours of archived footage — news reports, political speeches, historical events, documentaries, indie films, academic lectures, conference presentations, rare recordings, concert footage, obscure music — where the best or only copy is now held by Google through YouTube.
So what happens if maintaining that archival footage becomes unprofitable?
I wrote for @Nature about how archivists and librarians have laid the groundwork for a smooth transition to open, #FAIR, and reproducible research data. Bring us in early on your next project and get involved in digital library communities to build longlasting relationships✨ https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-023-03935-1
@foone ha, more than that it's just a regular day of work for an archivist at most colonized institutions (not to write off all the wonderful work people are doing to change that)
So I wonder how much of the 'splainy character of this site can be traced to the lack of a QT function.
I swear everytime I post something, I get people "helpfully" replying by explaining the point to me. Maybe that urge could be channeled into talking to their own audiences if there were only a QT?
@emilymbender
Agree, I can't figure out how to channel my big QT energy and really don't wanna become a splainer, think I might have done this a bit already 😳
The enforcement of copyright law is really simple.
If you were a kid who used Napster in the early 2000s to download the latest album by The Offspring or Destiny's Child, because you couldn't afford the CD, then you need to go to court! And potentially face criminal sanctions or punitive damages to the RIAA for each song you download, because you're an evil pirate! You wouldn't steal a car! Creators must be paid!
If you created educational videos on YouTube in the 2010s, and featured a video or audio clip, then even if it's fair use, and even if it's used to make a legitimate point, you're getting demonetised. That's assuming your videos don't disappear or get shadow banned or your account isn't shut entirely. Oh, and good luck finding your way through YouTube's convoluted DMCA process! All creators are equal in deserving pay, but some are more equal than others!
And if you're a corporation with a market capitalisation of US$1.5 trillion (Google/Alphabet) or US$2.3 billion (Microsoft), then you can freely use everyone's intellectual property to train your generative AI bots. Suddenly creators don't deserve to be paid a cent.
Apparently, an individual downloading a single file is like stealing a car. But a trillion-dollar corporation stealing every car is just good business.
