The Library Copyright Alliance has released What Does the HathiTrust Decision Mean for Libraries?.
Here's an excerpt:
The decision also demonstrates how the fair use right applies in the context of a specific library activity: mass digitization. The decision clearly indicates that the acts of a library digitizing the works in its collection, and the library's storage of the resulting digital files, are fair uses under section 107 of the Copyright Act. The decision, however, provides less certainty concerning the permissible access to those digital files. The only form of full-text access it addresses directly is access by the disabled. To be sure, this is an incredibly important result for these individuals. But the court provides little specific guidance concerning the permissibility of other forms of access. Nonetheless, the court's more general pronouncements concerning fair use should be helpful to libraries trying to determine the range of permitted access to their mass digitization projects.
Digital Scholarship | "A Quarter-Century as an Open Access Publisher"
