[Air-L] News sites are locking out the Internet Archive to stop AI crawling. Is the ‘open web’ closing?

[Lilly Irani]

It reminds me of work on the commons and biopolitics / pharmaceuticals from
the early 2000s. Anthropologists Cori Hayden and Kimberly Christen showed
separately two days ago the way "openness" can be exploited by well
equipped companies and governments. Hayden wrote about pharmaceutical
companies exploiting biocommons in drug development in violation of
indegenous rights and protocols. Christen wrote about Aboriginal people in
Australia preventing their photos from being accessed outside of ethical
protocols in museums, a violation of openness but an ethical choice.

I'm still an open access fan for publishing my own scholarly work *for
people* but I do not believe Anthropic should train their AIs without
asking.

In India, Anil Gupta developed a sharing license / patent for openness in
farming where non-profit and small businesses could share intellectual
property but large corporations have to pay the patent owners. This is not
an unsolved problem.

On Fri, Feb 6, 2026 at 11:44 PM Caroline James-Garrod via Air-L <
air-l at listserv.aoir.org> wrote:

> Thanks Tai. Very important to know.
>
> Best wishes to you,
>
> Caroline
>
> Get Outlook for Android<
> https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://aka.ms/AAb9ysg__;!!Mih3wA!C_CoGqIMq2jeSbwHccYEuDlW9KRZODJyQLen-8GV4EBqNbkQhJ9L7Q8WQI98ZiOZpWXiKuINABfQVaOn$
> >
> ________________________________
> From: Air-L <air-l-bounces at listserv.aoir.org> on behalf of Tai Neilson
> via Air-L <air-l at listserv.aoir.org>
> Sent: Thursday, February 5, 2026 7:38:18 PM
> To: air-l at listserv.aoir.org <air-l at listserv.aoir.org>
> Subject: [Air-L] News sites are locking out the Internet Archive to stop
> AI crawling. Is the ‘open web’ closing?
>
> Dear AoIR community,
> Apologies for cross‑posting, but I wanted to share a recent article of
> mine in The Conversation: News sites are locking out the Internet Archive
> to stop AI crawling. Is the ‘open web’ closing?<
> https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://theconversation.com/news-sites-are-locking-out-the-internet-archive-to-stop-ai-crawling-is-the-open-web-closing-274968__;!!Mih3wA!C_CoGqIMq2jeSbwHccYEuDlW9KRZODJyQLen-8GV4EBqNbkQhJ9L7Q8WQI98ZiOZpWXiKuINABW53PCb$
> >
> It addresses the further enclosure of the internet, commodification of
> publishers' archives as AI training data, and the resulting challenges for
> nonprofits and internet research. I hope you find it useful.
> Cheers,
> Tai
>
>
> Tai Neilson, PhD
> Senior Lecturer in Media
> Major Coordinator of Journalism and Nonfiction Writing
> MACQUARIE UNIVERSITY NSW 2109
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