The parties in the Authors Guild vs HathiTrust case have reportedly filed motions for summary judgment. While the Authors Guild asserted that it should win because the library defendants had no viable defence for their mass-digitisation programme, the HathiTrust argued that it should win because its programme clearly fell under fair use. A third motion was also filed, in support of the HathiTrust, by the National Federation of the Blind.
In its copyright infringement suit, filed in September of 2011, the Authors Guild alleges that the HathiTrust, a digitisation collective of research libraries, is built with millions of ‘unauthorised’ scans created by Google.
The suit seeks an injunction barring the libraries from future digitisation of copyrighted works; and from providing works to Google for its scanning project. It also seeks to bar Google from proceeding with its plan to allow access to ‘orphan works.’ Additionally, the suit asks the court to ‘impound’ all unauthorised scans and to hold them in escrow ‘pending an appropriate act of Congress.’
The Authors Guild brief argues that libraries have deprived authors of potential sales, exposed their books to ‘potentially catastrophic security risks,’ and undermined the copyright owners’ ability to decide whether, when and under what circumstances to participate in existing or new licensing opportunities.
The HathiTrust motion for summary judgement relies almost entirely on fair use. It asserts that all four factors of the fair use analysis either favour or ‘tilt toward’ the libraries. HathiTrust attorneys also argue that there is no evidence of the market harms the Authors Guild claims.
Opposition briefs are due on July 20, and replies in support of summary judgement are due on July 27.
