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fenomastoday at 4:13 AM0 repliesview on HN

Not under US copyright law. The Bartz case ruled that if you scan a book and destroy the original it's considered format-shifting and you're likely fine. But not so for keeping the original and using the scan in its place - Internet Archive tried that (in an incredibly limited way), and publishers sued and won.

So companies scanning books already know they'll be sued, successfully, if they don't destroy the originals. So they destroy the originals.