It's possible for someone to do something socially reprehensible and entirely distasteful and to be perfectly within the letter of the law while doing so. The article doesn't emphasize copyright issues or fair use, because that isn't the point. The post is trying to argue that the act is not sustainable and needlessly destructive, in pursuit of something that many people believe has limited value or unproven value, which is true.

Not the case here, but it's also important to keep in mind that laws too, can be unjust and immoral. Much of humanity's progress has involved the abolishment of immoral laws.

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noosphr 38 minutes ago | parent | next [-]

These are books that no one else wants and would get pulped otherwise. No one has space to save the 1754 edition of "whale blubber cookery on the open seas".

	▲	brunburnburnbur a minute ago \| parent [-]
		Yeah but I unironically would love to have a copy of that on my bookshelf. It likely has fantastic illustrations! This is the whole problem. A lot of people assuming they can speak unilaterally and with authority on what other people value or should find valuable. It's disgraceful. What happens to the old hacker ethos? I'd never thought I'd see the day when, on a site called hacker news the majority of posters are defending the right of a large corporation to destroy public goods permanently just to be able to charge people more for "intelligence as a service".

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ronsor 34 minutes ago | parent | prev [-]

> Much of humanity's progress has involved the abolishment of immoral laws.