Last Updated on September 12, 2012, 1:20 pm ET
Yesterday the publisher plaintiffs (SAGE, Oxford U Press, and Cambridge U Press) announced that they would appeal the district court’s decision of the GSU electronic reserves case. It looks like the suit will continue to be bankrolled by the Copyright Clearance Center and the Association of American Publishers, and the latter issued its own statement on the appeal. Coverage of the appeal has appeared in the Chronicle, Library Journal, Publishers Weekly and Inside Higher Ed.
Kevin Smith has already pummeled the lame PR statements from the plaintiff publishers and the AAP and CCC who are funding their lawsuit. All I would add to Kevin’s wonderful fact-checking is this brief statement, which we sent to one of the reporters who wrote us asking for ARL’s reaction to the appeal:
It is extraordinarily disappointing that the publishers (and the funders of the lawsuit, the Copyright Clearance Center and the Association of American Publishers) have decided to double down on this wasteful and misguided lawsuit. The district court’s framework created a comfortable safe harbor for Georgia State while preserving a very generous market for publishers willing to license their works for teaching use. Every day that this litigation continues is further proof that the publishers have little understanding or respect for the fair use rights of teachers, students, and libraries.
