Well, right. But I imagine that a protracted legal battle with publishers has the potential to drain IA's coffers fairly quickly.
IA reported more than $150 million of revenue in the last ten years, according to publicly available tax filings. As per its 2017 tax filings, it employed 150 employees. IA’s headquarters are located in an exclusive area of San Francisco. Kahle expanded the IA empire in 2019 by purchasing through Better World Libraries, a shell company he controls, the for-profit Better World Books, an online retailer that predominantly sells used books. The bulk of IA’s revenue is derived from contributions from large donors, including tens of millions of dollars from the Kahle/Austin Foundation. The Kahle/Austin Foundation is an entity established by Brewster Kahle and his wife to give money to IA and other favored projects. In 2018, the Kahle/Austin Foundation reported assets of $104,483,456. IA also has reported sizeable donations from other large foundations, some of which are based in New York. IA has an interlocking web of contributions and commercial services that support its Website. In addition to receiving large-dollar donations, IA has made tens of millions of dollars from selling commercial services. One of the services it offers is industrial-scale book scanning and digitization, which has generated more than $25 million in revenue since 2011. I suggest you read the lawsuit. It's in plain language. Brewster Kahle founded Internet Archive in 1996. Internet Archive provides a number of services not at issue in this action, including its Wayback Machine and digitization of public domain materials. At issue here is IA’s scanning of in-copyright books and distribution of digital copies via its Website. Notably, it operates with a surprisingly unsubtle penchant for money-making behind its non-profit 501(c)(3) tax code designation.
Upon information and belief, the system works as follows: first, Better World Books acquires millions of used print edition books (provenance unknown), which it provides to IA to be scanned and added to the Website for widespread downloading and distribution. Second, the webpage for every digital format book on the Website—including the pages for the books provided by Better World Books—includes a prominent link inviting the user to buy a print copy of the book from Better World Books. Upon information and belief, this sale not only benefits Brewster Kahle’s shell corporation, but the traffic that IA drives to Better World Books results in more book sales, which enables IA to acquire more books to scan and upload to the Website. And the cycle repeats. Better World Books also encourages its customers to donate funds to IA by topping off their purchases to a higher dollar amount.
IA’s book sponsorship scheme is breathtakingly brazen. In essence, IA tells its users which copyrighted books it wants to infringe. Then it asks users to pay a “donation” far in excess of the list price of the book for IA to go out and buy a print copy from an undisclosed source, possibly Better World Books. Finally, IA uses the user’s money to scan the book and put it online, where anyone can get a copy for free—completing the copyright infringement process without spending a single dollar of its own money. Tax-deductible donations are not meant to foster piracy.