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Z-Library to let users share physical books

torrentfreak.com

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Re: Z-Library to let users share physical books

#11

Post by leobg »

They should just make it easier for people to scan books. Or give incentives. Why mail physical books around when all you need is their content?

Or just get people to upload photos from the backs of the books in their library. Then extract from those the titles. Match them up against books that are missing in the digital library and are being requested by users.

Then send a message to the owner and ask them to scan this particular book.

Give an incentive based on both the number of requests and the speed of uploading the scan.

Could even allow requesters to set their own rewards. “I’d be willing to pay X to get this book scanned before Tuesday”.

Re: Z-Library to let users share physical books

#13

Post by codetrotter »

leobg wrote: post #11

They should just make it easier for people to scan books. Or give incentives. Why mail physical books around when all you need is their content? Or just get people to upload photos from the backs of the books in their library. Then extract from those the titles. Match them up against books that are missing in the digital library and are being requested by users. Then send a message to the owner and ask them to scan t…

> Why mail physical books around when all you need is their content?

Because physically mailing books is not copyright infringement.

Physically mailing books provides a legal way of sharing the contents of books with more people.

Re: Z-Library to let users share physical books

#14

Post by Dalewyn »

HopenHeyHi wrote: post #3

[flagged]

A "library" simply refers to a collection of materials.[1]

For example in the tech world, the second "L" in DLL stands for Dynamic Link Library, a modular collection of code.[2]

There is no implication of lending in the word or concept of a "library" by itself. An explicit example of this are private libraries, libraries held and used by individuals.

A public library is a library owned by and operated for the public, aka the people, and as a library of the people the people can take (and must return) books from the public library. This is where the common concept of "borrowing books from the library" comes from.

[1]: https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/library

[2]: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/troubleshoot/windows-clien...

Re: Z-Library to let users share physical books

#15

Post by codetrotter »

leobg wrote: post #11

They should just make it easier for people to scan books. Or give incentives. Why mail physical books around when all you need is their content? Or just get people to upload photos from the backs of the books in their library. Then extract from those the titles. Match them up against books that are missing in the digital library and are being requested by users. Then send a message to the owner and ask them to scan t…

> send a message to the owner and ask them to scan this particular book.

Scanning books take a lot of time. And making an actual high quality scan of a book is difficult even if you have a good scanner.

Physically sharing books could make it so that important books eventually get it into the hands of people with the right expertise and equipment to efficiently produce stellar quality digital scans of the book.

Re: Z-Library to let users share physical books

#16

Post by leobg »

codetrotter wrote: post #13
leobg wrote: post #11

They should just make it easier for people to scan books. Or give incentives. Why mail physical books around when all you need is their content? Or just get people to upload photos from the backs of the books in their library. Then extract from those the titles. Match them up against books that are missing in the digital library and are being requested by users. Then send a message to the owner and ask them to scan t…

> Why mail physical books around when all you need is their content? Because physically mailing books is not copyright infringement. Physically mailing books provides a legal way of sharing the contents of books with more people.

Sure. But they already run a piracy site, don’t they?

The cost and delay of shipping are what drives many people to piracy in the first place, I would argue. If I can have a book for $5 in two days as a used physical copy from Amazon, for $20 now as ebook from the publisher, or for free right now from a piracy site, the choice is obvious.

Re: Z-Library to let users share physical books

#17

Post by leobg »

codetrotter wrote: post #15
leobg wrote: post #11

They should just make it easier for people to scan books. Or give incentives. Why mail physical books around when all you need is their content? Or just get people to upload photos from the backs of the books in their library. Then extract from those the titles. Match them up against books that are missing in the digital library and are being requested by users. Then send a message to the owner and ask them to scan t…

> send a message to the owner and ask them to scan this particular book. Scanning books take a lot of time. And making an actual high quality scan of a book is difficult even if you have a good scanner. Physically sharing books could make it so that important books eventually get it into the hands of people with the right expertise and equipment to efficiently produce stellar quality digital scans of the book.

You can scan a 500 page book in 20 minutes with you phone, non-destructively. Though it’s not fun and the quality will not be ideal, especially if there are graphics in the text also. For text-only books, quality matters little as long as the OCR can read the text.

Re: Z-Library to let users share physical books

#18

Post by petra »

leobg wrote: post #11

They should just make it easier for people to scan books. Or give incentives. Why mail physical books around when all you need is their content? Or just get people to upload photos from the backs of the books in their library. Then extract from those the titles. Match them up against books that are missing in the digital library and are being requested by users. Then send a message to the owner and ask them to scan t…

Scanning a book is as easy as ordering a second hand copy in Amazon to be sent to a book scanning service.

But at that price, why bother scanning if you can buy it ?

Re: Z-Library to let users share physical books

#19

Post by TMWNN »

HopenHeyHi wrote: post #3

[flagged]

>I think if people feel the need to explain the concept of a library and this is some shadowy samizdat notion now we might as well give up all pretense like we aren't in a dystopia.

The author is being sarcastic. He knows very well that everyone knows what a (book) library is. How can you not tell that by "a few hundred years old already"?

Re: Z-Library to let users share physical books

#20

Post by AlotOfReading »

morsch wrote: post #6
HopenHeyHi wrote: post #3

[flagged]

But everybody knows what a library is and grassroots booksharing (aka drop off your old paperbacks in an agreed upon public place) is already a thing, so maybe not a dystopia? Also, buying books second hand is incredibly easy and cheap. And buying a license for an ebook is incredibly convenient and also tends to be rather cheap.

Why do you think ebook licensing is cheap? The big 5 all have "metered" licensing, where licenses expire and require repurchase after either a certain period of time or a certain number of checkouts. These are usually set up so that every ebook will have to be repurchased every 1-2 years. Furthermore, ebook prices are usually between 1x-3x the physical list price depending on publisher, date of publication, and popularity.
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