From Ars Technica:
The law firm of Camara & Sibley has decided to take on document-sharing website Scribd in a big way, seeking class action status against the site in a lawsuit filed Friday in a Texas federal court. The charge: like YouTube, Veoh, and other user-generated content sites, Scribd makes it just too easy to [...]
Archive of entries posted on September 2009
Scribd sued over copyright
Testing the waters with open-access funds
From SPARC:
In a move to encourage researchers to make their work open to the public, the University of California at Berkeley and the University of Calgary established funds that faculty and graduate students could use cover publication charges for open-access journals. Berkeley and Calgary are two of several funds established in recent years, including the [...]
Open Letter on Open Access
From Inside Higher Ed:
The presidents of 57 liberal arts colleges released an open letter on Tuesday endorsing the Federal Research Access Act of 2009, a bill aimed at increasing public access to academic research that is funded by the federal government.
A Writer’s Plea: Figure Out How to Preserve Google Books
From Wired:
The dispute over Google Books continues to rage in the courts and op-ed pages of the country. There are legitimate questions about Google, profit sharing and privacy. But let’s not let the litigation obscure that Google Books provides an unprecedented and irreproducible service to its users.
German book trade slams EU stance on Google books
From Reuters:
The German book trade slammed European regulators on Thursday for failing to take a stand against an agreement allowing U.S. internet company Google (GOOG.O) to create an online library.
Google has agreed a settlement with U.S. publishers who had accused Google of copyright infringement for scanning libraries full of books but, last week, the U.S. [...]
Obama to Set Higher Bar For Keeping State Secrets
From the Washington Post:
The Obama administration will announce a new policy Wednesday making it much more difficult for the government to claim that it is protecting state secrets when it hides details of sensitive national security strategies such as rendition and warrantless eavesdropping, according to two senior Justice Department officials.
The new policy requires agencies, including [...]
Parties seek Google Books hearing delay; new deal brewing
From cnet:
The parties involved in the Google Book Search settlement have asked a federal court to postpone an October hearing to approve the proposed settlement while they work out a new deal.
When the Department of Justice made it clear last Friday that it could not support the settlement as written–which would give Google unique rights [...]
French Parliament Approves ‘three-strikes’ Anti-piracy Law
From PC World:
The French National Assembly voted Tuesday to adopt, by 258 votes to 131, the so-called “three strikes” law criminalizing file-sharing. Those caught infringing copyright online could face the suspension of their Internet access, a fine or even prison.
The Senate approved the same text on Monday. With the two houses of parliament in agreement, [...]
Norman parent’s questions stop author’s visit to school
From The Oklahoman:
A visit by a best-selling author to a Norman middle school was canceled after a parent questioned the content of one of the author’s books.
Author Ellen Hopkins was scheduled to speak to eighth-graders at Whittier Middle School today about her career, writing process and books.
Hopkins is the author of several New York Times [...]
Philadelphia libraries in danger of closing are now safe
From the Seattle Books Examiner:
The people of Philadelphia can breathe easy now. It was announced earlier this evening that the Pennsylvania State senate passed bill 1828 by a vote of 32 to 17. This was the legislation that was needed for the City of Philadelphia to avoid the layoff of 3,000 city workers and the [...]