Who Can Get Your Book?

Books hold the vast wealth of human knowledge. While public libraries work to make that knowledge accessible to everyone regardless of disability, literacy, or income level, gaps in access are widening. Many books in the most accessible formats are not available for public libraries, public schools, and indie bookstores to offer at all—or only available at prohibitive cost.

Sign the petition to demand that the public be allowed to own and preserve ALL books—even if they’re an ebook or audiobook!

Watch the Video

Click here to play video

Petition: The public should be allowed to own and preserve ALL books—no matter what format they’re published in!

If a person or a library is forbidden from owning a digital book, there's nothing to stop major publishers from altering or erasing books from existence. In an increasingly digital world, Big Tech, Content, and Media monopolies are trying to end the right to own digital books. Through restrictive licensing schemes on ebooks and audiobooks, they aren’t only price-gouging public schools, libraries, and customers—they’re making a play to control what books exist in the future. 

Monopolistic corporations like Amazon and News Corp are intent on polluting and controlling the information ecosystem in the United States. We have already experienced the disastrous results of a world in which these mega corporations put their thumb on the scales of truth and history, and now they are focusing on a new target: our ability to own and preserve knowledge.

These restrictions harm authors as well. Despite record profits in these industries, author payments are under threat. Digital copies of emerging voices cost so much that many libraries aren’t even licensing them, if they are offered at all. The current system benefits mega-corporations at the expense of taxpayers, authors, and the public good.

Sign the petition to demand that legislators protect the freedom to own and preserve books, whatever format they are released in!

Have you written a book? Take the quiz to learn who can get it.

This website is intended as a thought project on who needs to be considered when we talk about access and availability.

So, who can get your book?

This quiz is anonymous and does not collect data or images from those who use it.

Book Formats & Accessibility

When we talk about accessibility on this page, we are expanding the term to include equity for disabled readers as well as for anyone who faces challenges that alternate formats help them overcome.

  • Paper books are the most widely available format. Public institutions are able to buy and lend paper books with a minimum of restrictions. They best serve readers who have access to the money or transportation required to get them. They also often serve readers without access to technology. For decades librarians and disability service offices at universities have gone to heroic lengths to convert paper books to accessible formats for people with qualifying disabilities, but equitable access isn’t achievable through this work alone.

Learn more about barriers to equity for readers

Accessibility, usability, availability, and affordability are all essential considerations in equitable access to human knowledge. Below are additional resources to learn more about the complex barriers readers face.

About this project

This website was created by digital rights organization Fight for the Future, a group of artists and activists that believes access to human knowledge is a human right and that accessible books should be available and affordable regardless of format. This project aims to make accessibility and availability a bit more tangible by simplifying and generalizing publishing contract language and impacts. Publishing by its nature is extremely complex. The goal of this website is to quantify and present some of the most important and overlooked equity considerations for readers and important institutions, not to be a definitive resource. Should you have any questions or concerns please contact [email protected].