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More than 600k students and teachers use Z-Library
- f0ld 3y agoTime for UBI. It’s time. Can’t stress this enough.
- alwayslikethis 3y agoUBI as an idea has merits but it's not the solution for this problem. The textbooks are outrageously overpriced because it is sold to a captive audience. Giving the captive audience more money just allows the publishers to price gouge even more. The solution is to make public domain or otherwise generously licensed books at least for well known subjects.
- PaulRobinson 3y agoIf you are paid to teach and/or research, you should also be paid to publish, and university presses should be dedicated to the free and public dissemination of that teaching (starting to happen, online courses being free to audit), and publishing artefacts (which is still actively resisted by journals and textbook publishers). Isn’t it strange we can start to see the value of a course being made free to audit, but the books and papers that enhance the learning, are still protected like they’re holy relics that only rich, anointed classes can have access to…
- erur 3y ago[flagged]
- SeattleAltruist 3y agoFor everyone calling publishing a "racket": I'm about to publish a textbook for grad students in the social sciences with a major publisher. It will teach them the business side of social impact: planning, raising money, running a board, etc. It is all very badly needed, and I've spent 20 years of extreme hard work learning the details and another 5 years writing... this one book. My publisher, a top academic house, is giving me extensive editorial and layout help at no charge to me. We are going to charge $50, which even if I sell thousands of copies, will be pennies on the hour for everyone.... This is a rip-off?
- penneallagricia 3y agoWhat you're doing is a public service and society would benefit from it being freely accessibile to everyone. Sounds like you should be compensate by the state.
- Justin_K 3y agoHow much will the book sell for and how many copies do you expect to sell?
- NoMoreNicksLeft 3y agoSo wait, let me get this straight. You're a teacher, and your griping that you aren't getting bonus money for something that is part of the normal duties of teaching? Like, you're not even an adjunct here are you, you're tenure track... and the $200k/yr (average) isn't enough, you want to lock up this book of yours behind paywalls and DRM? I think I have more sympathy for bail bondsmen than I do you.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- djaychela 3y agoYou appear to be making a number of assumptions about the poster, and then holding them accountable for things that you have assumed. Unless they are all true, maybe you should hold back on judgement until you get confirmation of them?
- dghlsakjg 3y agoYou are the extreme exception to the rule. If you are as deep into academia as your experience might indicate then you should know that, and should be asking why other publishers and authors don’t play the game like you. Many, many basic textbooks for required courses sell for hundreds, and use one time use codes for access to required content online. Meaning that the book is useless for future students without paying an additional exorbitant fee. In other words, you aren’t the problem, and no one is pretending that you are. Alternatively, how much would your book cost if it wasn’t sold to a captive audience buying on debt… pretty rare to see a $50 business book off campus. I normally see them at the airport for $19.99. Maybe just be happy that you are selling to a market where the person making the purchasing decision (the profesor) isn’t the one that has to pay for the goods. What is the social impact of your business decisions?
- mydogmuppet 3y agoIt doesn't take too many esoteric texts at $100 plus to make the university library photocopier a very attractive proposition at 5c per A4 page. Copyright law flexibility. Or there's LibGen.
- deafpolygon 3y agoOnly "more than 600k". I would have sworn it's much more than that.
- Alifatisk 3y agoYeah, wasn't it in the millions?
- SomeoneEsle 3y agoThe article says that's how many people have signed up with an academic email address. Think about that...I would never in a million years sign up for a piracy site with such an important email address that's publicly tied to my reputation. So if 600k people have done that, the number in total must be absolutely colossal.
- ohduran 3y agoI love Z-library, it's obvious that once we've found a means of transmitting books as "code/software/bits", the concept of copyright was changed forever, the catalog available in Z-library is superb, and the site is easy to navigate. What I see talked way less is that the quality of new books, in light of this, is very bad. Most books out there that were published in the 21st century serve as business cards. Commoditizing the complement, they call it.
- quinncom 3y agoI suspect bad books have always been written; they’re just less visible because of a survivorship bias.
- f6v 3y agoDon’t be surprised if the founders are going to be used in prisoner exchange between Russia and US. More then anything, this is about catching as many Russians as possible to put pressure to release detained Americans.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- ajsnigrutin 3y agoIf we put actual books aside... paying taxes, so that researchers get grant money and can write an article should be enough... having to pay to access an article about the research you already paid for is.. well.. stupid.
- robertlagrant 3y agoI agree, although I'd rather pay for things that would be useful to me and not pay for the rest than pay for everything through taxes.
- lapetitejort 3y agoThat would be useful if I could prove definitively that something is not useful for me, and will never be useful for me for the rest of my life. I would hate to owe back-taxes on something I scoffed at in a younger time.
- robertlagrant 3y agoIf you really believe that then you should be constantly giving your money to every idea. Just in case!
- actionfromafar 3y agoIs that more from a general reluctance to pay for anyone else's benefit, in general, or more from the conviction that what's not useful to you can't possibly be good for anyone else either? (Or something third or other option I'm missing right now?)
- robertlagrant 3y agoThe third option is the one that would've stopped millions of people starving in China and Russia: centralising decision-making in government does not make for better decisions.
- 3y ago
- skyechurch 3y agoThe textbook industry is on a similar ethical level as the Chinese fentalogue export industry. Not quite as evil as the American health insurance industry, but close. There are definitely situations where the ethics of piracy/file sharing are murky, but the only complaint I have about Z-Library and LibGen sharing textbooks is that it's probably not enough to put them completely out of business. Pirate harder.
- SeattleAltruist 3y ago[flagged]
- akasakahakada 3y agoUS textbook: In this 16th edition we improved all the problems and nothing else is new. By the way what means by "improved", it means that changing exercise 2.11 from "10x+2y" to "11x+2y".
- fxtentacle 3y agoThey usually also randomize the chapter order a bit so that if you have the 15th edition, you will surely not be able to follow along.
- nicoburns 3y agoThe US textbook industry that is. UK univesities often don't have required textbooks for courses at all (instead you get things like PDF notes being provided directly to students, and often with printed copies subsidised too), and where they do older editions are almost always acceptable (unless it's a course in a subject that moves very quickly where the older edition would genuinely be outdated), and there will usually be some copies available in the library too. I believe it is like this everywhere in Europe.
- ano88888 3y agoIt is a shame on US law enforcement. It is an example of how corrupt or bad the system is. There are so many petty crimes law enforecement don't bother to give a shit but when it comes to accessing knowledge (legal or illegal) ,they come in full force. It is just ridiculous on how much priority and impotance they put in these things compared to other crimes. It is because they are corrupted by the influence of the industries or money. Democracy at it's worst.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- tourgen 3y ago[flagged]
- crazygringo 3y agoDidn't it get all the rare books from Library Genesis though? Library Genesis is still going strong.
- tourgen 3y ago[dead]
- denkmoon 3y agoPiracy is a moral imperative.
- charcircuit 3y agoWho signs up for illegal services with a school email? Do people not give even an once of thought to opsec?
- jostiniane 3y ago> illegal in some places
- brucethemoose2 3y agoAs others said, most publishers do not have the high moral ground here. This is Valve's/Netflix's "piracy is a service problem" ethos taken to the opposite extreme.
- smeagull 3y agoIn this case there isn't a service provided.
- brnaftr361 3y agoThey provide slides for disinterested pedagogues to use in lecture with zero effort invested.
- brucethemoose2 3y agoThat is being very generous.
- karaterobot 3y ago> “It should be noted that when compiling statistics, we excluded all data related to the United States due to illegal arrest of two Russian citizens on suspicion of involvement in Z-Library,” the shadow library writes on Telegram. Where does the "illegal arrest" part come from? If the arrest was illegal, that's a big deal. My assumption is that there was nothing illegal about the arrest per se, and calling it an illegal arrest is just a way of getting sympathy or trying to re-frame the situation. But, I could have missed something, so please let me know if this is a serious allegation.
- medo-bear 3y agoThey were arrested in Argentina at the demand of US government for publishing school books. It should be illegal
- plaguepilled 3y ago"Public appreciation doesn't shield the site from prosecution" - serious question though, why not? Sure it infringes on copyright but I would argue at this point, research data should rightfully be classed as a public asset. It appears that's a popular opinion, based on all the piracy. So why don't we just classify it as such?
- garrettgarcia 3y agoBecause theft is immoral.
- PaulRobinson 3y agoTheft is immoral because if I steal your physical property, I have denied you access to, and use of, that property. If I copy your property, you still have access to, and use of, your property. I would argue that is not immoral. As a (recreational part-time), content creator myself, I would of course prefer it if people paid me so I didn’t have to work every day. But I’d rather that be on the basis of somebody wanting me to thrive, and showing their support, rather than me threatening them with legal action because they can’t prioritise giving me money over other demands in their life. If you want a physical copy of some work, you need to pay for it. That’s moral. Digital copies? I think we’ve bought the myths of publishers and the content industry and it’s harming our education as a species.
- wang_li 3y agoOr theft is immoral because of unjust enrichment.
- denkmoon 3y agoImpeding the growth of humanity's knowledge and capability is immoral.
- wang_li 3y agoHow far do you extend this idea? A dollar diverted to a poor person is a dollar that can’t be used to grow humanity’s knowledge and capabilities. Is it immoral to be poor? A dollar spent on beer? Time spent having sex instead of researching the mysteries of the universe? How about low intelligence people reproducing with other low intelligence people to make low intelligence babies (“Three generations of imbeciles is enough.”) that will have to be fed and clothed and sheltered? Should people be allowed to be homeless? Be drug addicts? In the grand scheme of things social programs have done way more harm to the advancement of knowledge than high textbook prices.