Re:Torching the Modern-Day Library of Alexandria: The Traged...
by greglindahl on Saturday April 22, 2017 @03:54PM
(#14174408)
A legitimate business opportunity affects 1 part of the 4-factor fair use test. There are plenty of other cases where things were found to be fair use despite a market existing. I've met a lot of people who have the same gut feeling that you do, but the legal history is much more complicated than that.
If I were to make a bar bet, based on my limited knowledge, I would say that any bolder attempt to use mass digitized books for a "transformative purpose" like a chatbot or AI would not pass scrutiny (which kinda sucks, because that would be awesome). That's what I mean by overturned -- perhaps the current GB usage is fine because of point 2) above.
Of course, like many Court issues, the best solution (as yohui alludes above) seems to be to have Congress fix things with real law, such as to create compulsory licensing scheme like in music.