Recently, I discovered a cool project on GitHub called zlib-searcher. This project is a great application of IPFS. In simple terms, it indexes the IPFS CID of eBooks on zlib/libgen, allowing you to deploy a local copy of this tool and search for eBooks from these websites, and then jump to download them. The developer provides a Demo that you can try.
I tried it out, and it's incredibly fast with a great user experience.
The developer does not recommend using the Demo directly, but encourages more capable and interested people to get involved, deploy it themselves, and enrich the ecosystem. Of course, if you don't have the ability, you can also use the ones listed in the channel:
This method has been updated in the historical article "How to Find an eBook".
Of course, here I need to reiterate the issue of copyright and my stance. Piracy is illegal and harms the interests of creators, which is beyond doubt.
When I was young, I often downloaded pirated movies and music without any awareness of copyright. In college, I gradually developed this awareness and started by supporting independent developers through donations, then supporting various creators, and eventually spending hundreds or thousands of dollars each year on subscriptions for various audio and video services, books, and more. These are the good habits I have cultivated over the years.
However, in special circumstances, the legitimate experience is not good, and sometimes it is even impossible to experience the legitimate version. At this point, the audience will choose to vote with their feet. If these websites didn't exist, we would lose many good things, such as books. The speed at which you discover good books is much slower than the speed at which they disappear.
Therefore, the existence of Z-Library, just like Sci-Hub, has its legitimacy. To some extent, I believe that what these people are doing is similar to what Aaron Swartz did (see the article "The Internet's Own Boy"), but the prospects are not optimistic.
- On November 16, 2022, two founders of Z-Library were arrested.
- Since 2020, Sci-Hub has been gradually blocked.
- On July 11, 2011, Aaron Swartz was prosecuted, and on January 11, 2013, at the age of only 26, Aaron Swartz committed suicide.
The future of the Internet did not develop into a truly free Internet, but I still appreciate it. It is because of the Internet that I am no longer blind or deaf, and most importantly, my mind is no longer polarized or empty. Of course, I am referring to the real Internet.
The popularity of the Internet and digitization has promoted the improvement of copyright rules, but it has also given rise to piracy. I only hope that before the arrival of a truly open and free Internet, that glimmer of light will not be extinguished.
Note: Some sentence optimizations in this article are powered by Craft AI Assistant. You can try it out if you're interested (free users have limited usage).
