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 permanent

themachinestops@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 1 day ago

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 permanent

artyom@piefed.social · 1 day ago

…why not?

If it hasn’t been printed more than once in a literal century, is that really a loss?

Havatra@lemmy.zip · edit-2 1 day ago

Potentially, yes. Sure, it could just be some smut novel, but it could also provide insight into a certain group or people’s perspective on societal/political events at the time, contributing to a better painted big picture on an event we thought we knew all there is to know about.

A very recent example is the VHS tapes that contained unseen and unpublished footage of Tiananmen Square.

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 permanent

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 permanent

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’