World's largest open library calls for volunteers to scan and preserve physical books as AI companies buy, scan, and destroy them — Anna's Archive says ‘time is running out’ as ‘knowledge is permanently monopolized on private servers’
www.tomshardware.com
As AI tech companies increasingly buy and destroy books to feed to their AI models, Anna's Archive is calling for volunteers to help preserve them for the public record.

cross-posted from: https://kbin.earth/m/[email protected]/t/3120649

As AI tech companies increasingly buy and destroy books to feed to their AI models, Anna’s Archive is calling for volunteers to help preserve them for the public record.

  • Test_Tickles@lemmy.worldEnglish
    0·
    28 days ago

    They are literally searching for rare books, paying premium costs for them, then cutting off their spines because it is faster to scan them that way.
    Not only do they not need to destroy the books to scan them, but Google already did this 2 decades ago, and they did it non-destructively.

    • dil@lemmy.zipEnglish
      0·
      27 days ago

      they arent paying extra, they are buying books planned for destruction anyways?

      • Test_Tickles@lemmy.worldEnglish
        0·
        27 days ago

        Independent bookstores all across Europe are seeing a trend like this, where they receive random, relatively large orders that are shipped to local addresses. While orders like these still come through in the digital age, especially from institutional buyers looking to fill out new libraries, they say that most “legitimate” orders often come with coordination and negotiation, not just a straight purchase order.