Amiga Format scans being removed from archive.org

[Radertified]

According to this post on reddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/amiga/comme...om_archiveorg/

I uploaded some scans of Amiga Format magazine a few years ago to The Internet Archive. But recently I received an email from Archive.org saying they have had a copyright complaint from The Publishers Association about the materials uploaded by my user account to archive.org, and taken down the Amiga Format magazines I had uploaded.

When I went to look on Archive.org I couldn't spot any Amiga Format magazines still uploaded there only disk ISOs. Previously it was nearly a full collection of them on there. And other Amiga mags like CU Amiga are still available to download.

Does this mean Future Publishing have been going after places sharing copies of old magazines like AF? I know technically they are still under copyright but Future aren't going to make much money off 30 year old magazines any more. Even if they made them available as official digital downloads its still quite a small audience who would purchase.

Only 24 items are available at https://archive.org/details/amigaformatmagazine, most of which are the subscriber's newsletter. Several coverdisks and cover CD's are still available by searching for "Amiga Format" https://archive.org/search.php?query=amiga+format but the magazines themselves, no. You've gotta wonder if they'll be removed in time too.

Such a shame. You would think they would have been publically preserved forever at the Internet Archive.

[dreadnought]

Another day, another "Amiga" + "copyright" BS. Sad.

But that's the thing about Internet Archive. As wonderful as it is, it isn't invulnerable to such demands. There's a misconception that they have some sort of immunity, but it's not actually true, they still have to comply. Also, it's just a non-profit organisation, not some "official" internet archive after all.

EDIT: there's a link in that reddit thread to a site with many nice mag collections. Grab'em if you don't have them already.

[redblade]

Damn, It was great being able to flick thru Amiga Format magazine to look at the tutorials, I hope they don't go after amr next. I hope they don't go after the other Amiga magazines with tutorials. Amiga Computing, Amiga Shopper, CU Amiga, AC Tech

[Matt_H]

It’s likely a specific issue with archive.org. They have gotten into a *lot* of hot water recently with regard to their lax attitude toward copyright and various trade associations are starting to pressure them. This action is probably in response to that rather than specific requests by Future and/or targeting Amiga stuff.

Bottom line, archive.org is now under intense scrutiny and is no longer a safe, permanent repository.

[LoadWB]

I took my torrent server down a month or so ago for maintenance and neglected to put it back up. I am pretty certain I have the full torrent, though the Archive.org tracker will no longer work. I will have a look in the morning.

[chip]

Since we are talking of this, why archive.org is allowed to spread some items which are not valid on the eab ftp ?

[dreadnought]

They are not spreading anything, they just allow uploading stuff under a very wide umbrella. The fact that some people exploit it and upload stuff which is blatlantly dangerous, eg Nintendo packs, is just not very wise (to put it mildly).

[redblade]

Any of you copyright experts (minus crackers) know where the tutorials would fall under as it would be less than 10% of the entire magazine (Or one complete chapter) and the tutorials can be considered for educational purposes?

It really is a shame because I believe the tutorials are very important also the reviews on the Amiga being released.

[Matt_H]

From a legal standpoint, there’s no difference between just the tutorials and the entire magazine. It’s all abandonware, which is a made-up concept with no legal standing. It’s technically not legal for them to host any part of the magazine without clearance, which they certainly don’t have. Fair use for education purposes doesn’t mean you’re free to be redistributing educational material, it means you have some leeway in using excerpts from the magazine for your own educational material, e.g., “here’s an example of the design and editorial style of a computer magazine from the late 90s.”

Abandonware is “allowed” to exist because copyright holders either don’t know about unauthorized redistribution or don’t feel like there’s a return on investment for the effort of taking enforcement action. That’s how most/all of the user-uploaded material has been flying under the radar for the past several years. But archive.org kicked the hornet’s nest by *announcing* that they were going to start hosting commercial books. That prompted the publishing industry to launch an army of lawyers against them and now everything is under scrutiny.

I share everyone’s disappointment in losing access to this Amiga material (fortunately it is available elsewhere, I believe). If you need someone to blame for this mess, blame archive.org.

This should also be a reminder that we as a community need to be in charge of our own resources, e.g., Aminet, EAB FTP, etc.

EDIT: Good overview of copyright/fair use: https://fairuse.stanford.edu/overview/

[dreadnought]

Originally Posted by Matt_H

If you need someone to blame for this mess, blame archive.org

Yeah, totally, let's all dump on one of the not many places left on the interwebs still uncorrupted by corporate greed.



Their pandemic book-sharing initiative was a bit naive, but well intentioned. It did cause a backlash, but it was well over a year ago and there is no proof it's connected to this move, which could well be some random whim (similar to everdrive packs disappearing overnight recently...then reappearing elsewhere).



Archive hosts a ton of contentious stuff, taking continuous risks, but at least it allows normal people to have access to a lot of material otherwise accessible only to in-the-know geeks such as ourselves. If you start applying copyright, fair use, and other such legal construct to the stuff they're hosting obviously a fair chunk of it would have to disappear. It was never a great mystery, and I'm not sure why people all of a sudden take it for granted and act as archive.org owes them something.



So, instead of "blaming" them, you should whip out your wallets and donate, if you haven't already this year.

[Mr Creosote]

Originally Posted by dreadnought

Yeah, totally, let's all dump on one of the not many places left on the interwebs still uncorrupted by corporate greed.

Archive hosts a ton of contentious stuff, taking continuous risks, but at least it allows normal people to have access to a lot of material otherwise accessible only to in-the-know geeks such as ourselves. If you start applying copyright, fair use, and other such legal construct to the stuff they're hosting obviously a fair chunk of it would have to disappear. It was never a great mystery, and I'm not sure why people all of a sudden take it for granted and act as archive.org owes them something.

So, instead of "blaming" them, you should whip out your wallets and donate, if you haven't already this year.

Thank you, couldn't agree more!

[Matt_H]

Originally Posted by dreadnought

Their pandemic book-sharing initiative was a bit naive, but well intentioned. It did cause a backlash, but it was well over a year ago and there is no proof it's connected to this move, which could well be some random whim (similar to everdrive packs disappearing overnight recently...then reappearing elsewhere).

Well-intentioned, absolutely. But far more than a bit naive. Extremely naive, perhaps even arrogant, or indulging some egotistical greed. We all know the legend of Icarus and what happens when you fly too close to the sun - that’s what they did. Brick-and-mortar libraries know that you do not mess around when it comes to ebook licensing. Even Google had to capitulate a number of years ago when they pulled a similar book-sharing stunt.

Archive.org somehow thought they were immune to all that. The backlash was enormous. They ended up having to cancel the book-sharing initiative after just days, but by then the damage was done: the lawsuits were filed and are still ongoing. The proverbial eye of Sauron is on them and what was previously considered a cute, harmless little internet culture project is now targeted and under threat.

Archive hosts a ton of contentious stuff, taking continuous risks, but at least it allows normal people to have access to a lot of material otherwise accessible only to in-the-know geeks such as ourselves. If you start applying copyright, fair use, and other such legal construct to the stuff they're hosting obviously a fair chunk of it would have to disappear. It was never a great mystery, and I'm not sure why people all of a sudden take it for granted and act as archive.org owes them something.

Indeed, such is the legal gray area we occupy as a community as the self-appointed guardians of Amiga cultural material that the “proper” owners have no interest in (or awareness of). I certainly don’t take anything on archive.org for granted—it’s merely a convenience—but I had a feeling when the commercial book sharing initiative was first announced that a crackdown was going to be the inevitable result and all the convenient retro computing material would be in jeopardy. That seems to be what’s happening as the lawyers comb through everything.

So, instead of "blaming" them, you should whip out your wallets and donate, if you haven't already this year.

I “blame” them for their lack of foresight in anticipating the legal mess they would land themselves in by essentially announcing their copyright violations of active, commercial products and not having a strategy to deal with the fallout. (Contrast this with Epic Games, who knew exactly what they were doing when they made the change that got their app pulled from Apple’s App Store—they had a legal strategy and a communications strategy ready to go for when Apple moved against them.)

So I’m of two minds on this. Of course what archive.org does is valuable, particularly the wayback machine, and I want to support that. But I also want to know that they’ve learned their lesson and that they’ll be able to go back to being a boring archive instead of trying to be a yet-another disruptive tech company, or neutered like Napster was.

[Charles Littell]

I already download all of them so I guess they were late to the punch!

[Matt_H]

Originally Posted by Charles Littell

I already download all of them so I guess they were late to the punch!

A preservation win

[hitm4n]

https://commodore.bombjack.org/amiga...iga-format.htm
https://commodore.bombjack.org/amiga...upplements.htm
https://commodore.bombjack.org/amiga...rmat-books.htm
https://commodore.bombjack.org/amiga...ial-issues.htm
https://commodore.bombjack.org/amiga...-backstage.htm

https://vintageisthenewold.com/magazines/
http://www.retro-commodore.eu/amiga-format/