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Google Books (or similar) all book scans – $200k bounty (2025)

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Re: Google Books (or similar) all book scans – $200k bounty (2025)

#291

Post by defrost »

vishnugupta wrote: post #288
zerobees wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Knowledge should be free. It was never created in a vacuum. This is a common perspective on HN, but it's so jarring. Someone violates an open-source license and we grab our pitchforks. Someone pirates books and it's fine - really, the authors should be thanking us. Good books are incredibly challenging to write, more so than good software. It's not like you grab Harry Potter and say "I'm just gonna change character…

And yet JK Rowling is a billionaire and movies make hundreds of millions of dollars in profits. So I guess we can have a world in which knowledge can be free without starving knowledge creators?

Not if you account for just how many authors never reach the pinnacle of breaking even.

Rowling is a rare exception and very much not the norm.

Re: Google Books (or similar) all book scans – $200k bounty (2025)

#292

Post by inigyou »

yreg wrote: post #285
jagged-chisel wrote: post #175

> Plead read [this] carefully before working on a bounty. [this] appears as a link to a .li address, and that goes bad places. Should be https://annas-archive.gl/volunteering#bounties

So how did this happen? Is https://software.annas-archive.gl/AnnaArchivist a legitimate staff account? Is this a scam? Or did they lose the domain to scammers and never update the link in the bounty?

Anna's Archive regularly rotates TLDs due to domains getting seized. They did have .li last year.

Re: Google Books (or similar) all book scans – $200k bounty (2025)

#293

Post by inigyou »

OriginalPenguin wrote: post #149
boca_honey wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's just cultural elitism. I hope you meet someone in your life who finds absolute joy in reading young adult romance novels or D&D fantasy books so you can understand how irrelevant "good" literature is. I love Dostoevsky and Verne (and D&D novels, especially those written by R.A. Salvatore), but I would never judge the modern "IPs" that got my daughter into reading. > best literature What does that even mean?

Everyone has their own opinion as to what the best literature is, just like what the best music is. But there is also some consensus. For music it would be Beethoven, Mozart, the Beatles, etc. For literature it would include Tolstoy, Shakespeare, Cervantes, Dickens, Austen, Tolkien, and many more. I would bet it will eventually include Stephen King but it's too early to make that call now.

The best music is Goa trance. What you're referring to as "best" is actually classic music (or as I like to call it, classic plus music :P).

Re: Google Books (or similar) all book scans – $200k bounty (2025)

#294

Post by inigyou »

takipsizad wrote: post #60
0x3f wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If it works as AA seems to theorize, you'd need to: (a) work out how Google books exposes fragments of books, and see if there's a systematic way of using this to get whole books. For example, a naive approach might be to find any fragment of the book by searching some exact phrase. Then, you can search for an exact phrase from the start or end of the fragment it gave you, hoping it will show you the previous or next…

That way definitely will work with the current access google provides however its an extremely inconvenient way to scrape google books

That's why they're paying you $200k for it.

Re: Google Books (or similar) all book scans – $200k bounty (2025)

#295

Post by inigyou »

nextos wrote: post #128
yorwba wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you think Chinese companies always act as a bloc, your mental model needs to get about a billion times more detailed. But in this case just a few details may be enough: There are Chinese AI companies that have released LLMs without publishing the weights. ByteDance is going the direct-to-consumer route with their Doubao chatbot (the most popular in China, probably thanks to their social media prowess). iFlyTek see…

I have never said they always act as a bloc, but their industry has a strong component of long-term strategic government planning behind them.

> China acts like an entire bloc

> I have never said they always act as a bloc

Pick one

Re: Google Books (or similar) all book scans – $200k bounty (2025)

#296

Post by mlrtime »

bruce511 wrote: post #256
Ey7NFZ3P0nzAe wrote: post #245

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I don't think it can happen in the US (for cultural reasons) Cultural reasons are just a matter of spindoctoring/propaganda. Nixon almost implemented a form of UBI: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Family_Assistance_Plan In Alaska there's already a form of UBI: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alaska_Permanent_Fund

The reason I think it is hard in the US is because there is a very strong "work or die" ethic in the US. Everything is driven by money. Even basic things like healthcare are driven by money. Your life after retirement is determined by how much money you accumulated. The word-association between "poor" and "lazy" is strong. Taxation should be light. Each man should keep what he accumulates. BI by contrast values peopl…

Top 10% already pays 70.5% of all federal income taxes. US high income payers are already taxed to pay the poor.

Almost half of US federal tax payers pay 0 income tax.

Re: Google Books (or similar) all book scans – $200k bounty (2025)

#297

Post by Aachen »

mmooss wrote: post #210
Aachen wrote: post #189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sui generis database rights

Is that some sort of real thing, some significance in law?

Yes

You could look it up and see for yourself. It's applicable to all sorts of collections such as map data and I'd presume also a book database but IANAL so best if you see for yourself - my intention was just to point out (what I hope is) the applicable legal principle for anyone curious about this

Re: Google Books (or similar) all book scans – $200k bounty (2025)

#298

Post by unsungNovelty »

zerobees wrote: post #159
whycome wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So you’re saying your entire current life is because of the proceeds of crime?! I’m kidding. Knowledge should be free. It was never created in a vacuum. It belongs to us all

> Knowledge should be free. It was never created in a vacuum. This is a common perspective on HN, but it's so jarring. Someone violates an open-source license and we grab our pitchforks. Someone pirates books and it's fine - really, the authors should be thanking us. Good books are incredibly challenging to write, more so than good software. It's not like you grab Harry Potter and say "I'm just gonna change character…

> Someone violates an open-source license and we grab our pitchforks.

Where do we do that? All LLMs are still doing it. I've not seen any MIT license or BSD license of all the repos LLMs have gone through. That's excluding copy-left licences. Zero pitch-forks in sight.

> Someone pirates books and it's fine - really, the authors should be thanking us.

I agree here with you. And I'll give a better reason to not pirate for most people. In the seas of endless content, If you want to read/learn from a book - try paying for them. You won't read most books. You'll curate/research better before buying. The books you buy will be worth it in your own mind. You re-consume them more which is very important IMO. For most pirates, I think the issue is not unavailability of resources/content. But need to consume in a better way. Buying slows things down. You'll consume better. Quality over quantity. Even then I have a ton of humble bundle books that I've not touched at all.

Re: Google Books (or similar) all book scans – $200k bounty (2025)

#299

Post by jll29 »

MarsIronPI wrote: post #203
NeutralCrane wrote: post #193

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If knowledge is to be free, that means there should be no restrictions on how it is used. Even an open source license misses the point, because the implication is still that one person can dictate how another person can make use of knowledge. It’s still premised on the same dystopian view that a person can own an idea.

Not so. Stallman created copyleft licenses as a defense against the current implementation of copyright. Copyleft uses the existing system of copyright to protect authors of free software from people who want to use copyright to restrict distribution. It wouldn't be necessary if copyright didn't exist.

Stallman wanted to protect the right to fix bugs, he was not against paying for goods and services.

Re: Google Books (or similar) all book scans – $200k bounty (2025)

#300

Post by ChrisMarshallNY »

mikeocool wrote: post #289
ChrisMarshallNY wrote: post #265

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have an Irish friend that got a Ph.D, while on the dole. That would never happen, in the US. We have a strong “Why do they get special treatment?” thing going on.

I think I get your point, but few PhD candidates pay tuition in the US and most actually receive a living stipend. In exchange they act as teaching and/or research assistants.

That would be perceived differently.

I guess we know that Ph.D Research/Teaching Assistants tend to be worked to death, and paid peanuts.

The whiners would be OK with that.

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