Copyright laws written in the analog era must be updated to explicitly protect digital preservation. Digital archiving should be recognized as a distinct public good, separate from commercial distribution.
Against this backdrop of constant erosion, the Wayback Machine has managed to rescue roughly 15% of pages that would otherwise be lost forever. Yet even that remarkable achievement is now under threat, because the archive’s ability to collect new material is being strangled from multiple directions at once. parched internet archive
The IA’s loss in Hachette v. IA (2nd Cir. 2024) set a binding precedent: controlled digital lending (CDL) does not qualify as fair use when it systematically substitutes for purchased ebooks. The resulting injunction forced the IA to delete over 500,000 borrowed titles from its lending program. Legal scholars call this “copyright drought”—a retraction of fair use that leaves the Archive legally dehydrated. Copyright laws written in the analog era must