On Wednesday 16 November, in federal court in Brooklyn, USA, an indictment and a complaint were unsealed charging Russian nationals Anton Napolsky and Valeriia Ermakova with criminal copyright infringement, wire fraud and money laundering for operating Z-Library, an online e-book piracy website.
The International Publishers Association team was delighted to be back at Frankfurt Book Fair with a full week of meetings.
On 16 September, IPA Secretary General, José Borghino spoke via Zoom to delegates at the PEPCon5 Conference on the topic Educational Publishing's Impact on Global Student Ranking. Borghino used the OECD’s PISA rankings to postulate that governments’ textbook policies around the world were a major influence on educational outcomes for students and learners.
In September 2022, the Authors Guild and the Association of American Publishers (AAP) released statements in response to Fight for the Future’s ‘In Solidarity with Libraries’ letter falsely claiming that the lawsuit against Internet Archive’s open library harms public libraries.
Copyright was high on IPA’s and our members’ agenda this September. Our Copyright Committee meeting took place on September 13th and gathered representatives from over 40 countries across IPA’s membership. This was also the month when we launched IPA’s copyright regional meetings, with the support of our members.
IPA will have a full programme of open and invite-only meetings as well as a dedicated Africa Publishing Innovation Fund seminar at Frankfurt Book Fair this year. We are also delighted to see the Frankfurt Book Fair rights platform highlight SDG Publishers Compact signatories.
On 11 August, the IPA, along with other international rightsholder organisations, filed what is known as an ‘Amicus Brief’ in New York in support of four US publishers (Hachette, HarperCollins, Penguin Random House and Wiley) in the case Hachette et al vs Internet Archive. This is a copyright infringement lawsuit against the Internet Archive that began in June 2020.
The World Intellectual Property Organization Assemblies took place in Geneva and online from 14 to 22 July. Member States brought years of negotiations on two issues closer to resolution with agreement on two Diplomatic Conferences. The Assemblies also included a side event on the Marrakesh Treaty.
