Archiving Woes

Nobody will understand the pain archivists go through because Internet censorship has no respect for fair use, fair dealing and other rights granted by the First Amendment. But I do. Especially when I'm working to archive the past.

While the copyright authorities in some countries consider archiving the works of various artists, musicians and content creators legitimate because it meets the requirements for fair use or fair dealing, in other countries, archiving the works of various artists, musicians and content creators is illegal to the point anybody who violates copyrights could be classified as a domestic terrorist. Therefore, to say that preserving the past is a criminal act and fair use is illegal, I would answer that question by saying "Well yes, but actually no."

Then there's the complications of hostilities with unfriendly countries. For example, in response to sanctions, Russia's copyright authorities had to decriminalize software piracy. Imagine launching a full scale assault on another country, only to get embargoed by other countries. What would you do to circumvent sanctions? I would not encourage intellectual property piracy, but it would be necessary if it is against copyright owners from unfriendly countries. Unfortunately, some countries have weaponized their copyright laws to oppress netizens of various nationalities, including their own netizens. Germany and Japan, two countries that committed terrible war crimes in World War 2, and are still unrepentant of said war crimes to this day, are turning copyright regulations such as the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) into weapons to be used against freedom of expression, artistic freedom, fair dealing, fair use, and the First Amendment of the United States Constitution. No wonder Russia, China, and whoever is on the side of those two countries are so antagonistic towards democratic countries, and that's because the democracies let Germany and Japan off so leniently in spite of the harsh punishments inflicted upon them. Maybe we should study the real history of the main copyright management societies of Germany and Japan, and you will learn that these copyright management societies have troubling history by having roots in darker times. It gets worse when in 1945, the Japanese government ordered classified documents to be burned up. And said burning of documents is why not only is Japan denying war crimes to this day, but the search for Amelia Earhart was made more difficult because it's possible potential clues of Amelia Earhart's whereabouts were among the documents that were destroyed by the burning of classified documents. In other words, if you were an archivist in Japan on the day they formally announced their surrender, you would be saying "Woe is me!" as you helplessly watch documents get burned up because among the documents could be incriminating evidence of your country's war crimes as well as possible whereabouts of Amelia Earhart.