Z-library founders arrested in Argentina • Hacker News Board

Re: Z-library founders arrested in Argentina

#21

Post by DoingIsLearning » Thu, Nov 17, 2022, 10:29 AM UTC

A small thought experiment:

- Book sales in 2021 were about _9_ billion dollars. [0]

- Wage theft in the US is estimated at _50_ billion dollars. [1]

Can you imagine if the resources of the justice and labour departments would prioritize citizen wage over publishers' revenue?

Would you rather have funds allocated towards social justice or have them spent on intimidating foreign nationals completely outside US jurisdiction?

[0] https://www.statista.com/statistics/197710/annual-book-store...

[1] https://www.epi.org/press/wage-theft-costs-american-workers-...

Re: Z-library founders arrested in Argentina

#22

Post by auggierose » Thu, Nov 17, 2022, 10:29 AM UTC

null_object wrote: post #9

I know this won't be a popular take on HN, but while I can understand and to a certain extent sympathize with pirating movies (the intentional friction and arbitrary geographic limitations on access imposed by the multinational movie-industry conglomerates), I can't see stealing some poor author's work in the same light. Sure, people get hung-up about DRM (which can easily be removed by widely-accessible tools), but…

Many of the books I am interested in have actually been financed by tax payers, because their authors are professors. These days publishers are not adding much value here, actually they often make high quality publishing harder by terrible off-shore handling of LaTeX.

I've bought quite a few ebooks from the AMS (American Mathematical Society), just to get very angry about the annoying small print on the bottom of EVERY FREAKING PAGE stating that I am the owner of this book. I don't feel bad about replacing these damaged goods with the real deal.

Re: Z-library founders arrested in Argentina

#23

Post by theCrowing » Thu, Nov 17, 2022, 10:30 AM UTC

null_object wrote: post #16

sec400 wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Imagine the person who cannot afford a book or paper on a particular topic. Should they not have access to the information? I agree, as always there is nuance, but zlib et al fulfill a need for certain people. In b4 public libraries, they aren't equal around the world, depend on geographic proximity and add latency to the learning process.

> Imagine the person who cannot afford a book or paper on a particular topic. Should they not have access to the information? Imagine I want whatever you do for a living? Should you work for me for free?

I would be on board with you if only we got access to the public founded papers.

Re: Z-library founders arrested in Argentina

#24

Post by trabant00 » Thu, Nov 17, 2022, 10:30 AM UTC

Z-library was not about freeing books, they where pirating for profit. The free account was limited in downloads and they had 2 tiers of premium accounts, don't remember the sums or details. They where profiting on the works of others too, they did not rip the books themselves or anything like that.

Re: Z-library founders arrested in Argentina

#25

Post by noodlesUK » Thu, Nov 17, 2022, 10:31 AM UTC

null_object wrote: post #9

I know this won't be a popular take on HN, but while I can understand and to a certain extent sympathize with pirating movies (the intentional friction and arbitrary geographic limitations on access imposed by the multinational movie-industry conglomerates), I can't see stealing some poor author's work in the same light. Sure, people get hung-up about DRM (which can easily be removed by widely-accessible tools), but…

A lot of the usage I see of these sites is in the academic world. Academic publishing is a nightmare (especially on the journal side).

The books are often not available at all in the region you’re in or if they are, they might be priced differently. It’s especially difficult because you’re going to skim a book to see if it has any relevant material, then move on to the next one. Usually university libraries are the only way of doing this, but not everyone has access to one. No individual is going to buy a dozen books nominally priced at >100 usd each just to write a paper for their masters degree or similar

Re: Z-library founders arrested in Argentina

#26

Post by jliptzin » Thu, Nov 17, 2022, 10:31 AM UTC

null_object wrote: post #16

sec400 wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Imagine the person who cannot afford a book or paper on a particular topic. Should they not have access to the information? I agree, as always there is nuance, but zlib et al fulfill a need for certain people. In b4 public libraries, they aren't equal around the world, depend on geographic proximity and add latency to the learning process.

> Imagine the person who cannot afford a book or paper on a particular topic. Should they not have access to the information? Imagine I want whatever you do for a living? Should you work for me for free?

That analogy doesn’t work when the marginal cost to do that work is literally zero, in fact he wouldn’t even know he’s performing the “work”

Re: Z-library founders arrested in Argentina

#27

Post by cft » Thu, Nov 17, 2022, 10:32 AM UTC

adamors wrote: post #18

reisse wrote: post #12

I guess in 2022 "don't ever travel to countries that have extradition agreements with US" should've already been #0 opsec rule, above everything else. Sad for them. Does anyone know if Z-library provided torrent dumps?

As Russian nationals, their choices are rather limited at this time.

It's intersection of these two sets: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_extradit...

https://visaguide.world/visa-free-countries/russian-passport...

Re: Z-library founders arrested in Argentina

#28

Post by keewee7 » Thu, Nov 17, 2022, 10:33 AM UTC

adamors wrote: post #18

reisse wrote: post #12

I guess in 2022 "don't ever travel to countries that have extradition agreements with US" should've already been #0 opsec rule, above everything else. Sad for them. Does anyone know if Z-library provided torrent dumps?

As Russian nationals, their choices are rather limited at this time.

No? The countries that don't have extradition agreements with the US overlap a lot with countries that have friendly relations with Russia.

China, Cuba, and Russia would be the ideal choices if you're on the run from US authorities.

Re: Z-library founders arrested in Argentina

#29

Post by reisse » Thu, Nov 17, 2022, 10:35 AM UTC

null_object wrote: post #9

I know this won't be a popular take on HN, but while I can understand and to a certain extent sympathize with pirating movies (the intentional friction and arbitrary geographic limitations on access imposed by the multinational movie-industry conglomerates), I can't see stealing some poor author's work in the same light. Sure, people get hung-up about DRM (which can easily be removed by widely-accessible tools), but…

> but e-books can be purchased pretty much anywhere in the world. I'm in Sweden

Sorry, but by "pretty much anywhere in the world" you clearly mean "first world". If you live outside of US/Canada and EU it is much harder to obtain books legally. Publishing agreements usually cover specific countries, and no-one cares about, for example, selling books in English in Central Asia. So even if you have means to pay for the book (which can be challenging - and I'm not talking about "having money" here, I'm talking about "technical possiblity" - Visa and Mastercard are not as universal as they might seem from the first world), most of the time no-one can or wish to sell it to you legally.

Interesting that Steam solved most of that problems for game distribution though. They have worldwide publishing agreements, regional prices AND good support of local payment providers in many countries. I think a lot of people underestimate how these factors allowed Steam to overtake piracy.

Re: Z-library founders arrested in Argentina

#30

Post by smeagull » Thu, Nov 17, 2022, 10:36 AM UTC

null_object wrote: post #9

I know this won't be a popular take on HN, but while I can understand and to a certain extent sympathize with pirating movies (the intentional friction and arbitrary geographic limitations on access imposed by the multinational movie-industry conglomerates), I can't see stealing some poor author's work in the same light. Sure, people get hung-up about DRM (which can easily be removed by widely-accessible tools), but…

It's human culture. The idea that it should be the sole provenance of rich multi-nationals to decide who can afford to read is disgusting. It should all be freely accessible.

Removing money from the equation would also solve other quality issues.