Statement on Internet Archive’s oral arguments in appeal for the right to own digital books

Ahead of the Internet Archive’s oral arguments in its appeal of Hachette v. Internet Archive this Friday June 27, the authors of Flaming Hydra and the activists at Fight for the Future are taking direct action in Manhattan and at the American Library Association Conference in San Diego today and tomorrow.

The following statement can be attributed to Lia Holland (they/she) Campaigns and Communications Director at Fight for the Future:

“Major publishing conglomerates and their allies in Big Tech seem hellbent on turning data on readers into a product. What we read, who we are, where we are—all of it. The biggest thing that stands in their way right now is the Internet Archive, which is fighting for the right to own and preserve digital books in its appeal of a lower court decision in Hachette v. Internet Archive. If libraries and individuals own digital books—instead of license them—then we can choose how we read and choose privacy-preserving alternatives to data-hungry tech companies like Amazon, Hoopla, or Elsevier. 

The right to read without fear of being punished for what you read has never been more under threat. With rollbacks on privacy and human rights like bodily autonomy, AI supercharging surveillance and analysis of our every move, and book bans sweeping the nation, major publishers are putting readers in danger. It’s time for the publishers suing the Internet Archive to put the global human right to knowledge and to privacy first, and let everyone—libraries and individuals alike—own our digital book files and build surveillance-free alternatives to Big Tech.

We applaud the librarians of the Internet Archive for vigorously objecting to a future where every copy of a book is subject to censorship with a click of a mouse, and people seeking information on LGBTQ+ topics or reproductive healthcare have to think twice before reading at all.”

For more on these issues, please see our joint letter with 25+ civil and human rights organizations including GLAAD, Color of Change, and Plan C at https://www.fightforthefuture.org/news/2023-12-07-25-human-rights-organizations-call-on-2024-congress-to-investigate-big-tech-and-publishings-stranglehold-over-digital-books/ or visit https://BattleForLibraries.com 

Further photos and videos are available on request by emailing press@fightforthefuture.org