Authors Guild Sues 5 Universities

Authors Guild, Australian Society of Authors, Quebec Writers Union Sue Five U.S. Universities

“The Authors Guild, the Australian Society of Authors, the Union Des Écrivaines et des Écrivains Québécois (UNEQ), and eight individual authors have filed a copyright infringement lawsuit in federal court against HathiTrust, the University of Michigan, the University of California, the University of Wisconsin, Indiana University, and Cornell University.”  The claim is that universities have placed unauthorized scans of an estimated 7 million copyright-protected books in the HathiTrust, a repository organized by the University of Michigan.

According to Angelo Loukakis, executive director of the Australian Society of Authors “this group of American universities has no authority to decide whether, when or how authors forfeit their copyright protection. These aren’t orphaned books, they’re abducted books.”