I mean guys i get it, you have a bad day just once and you want to rewrite history, we all do, but geez... I guess just I feel destroying books should be classed as unethical. if i was ruler I think id ban it.

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joshstrange 9 hours ago | parent [-]

Yes, let's begin with the trials for all the librarians who have destroyed/trashed books over the year!

Nevermind that they do that because those books aren't being borrowed and no one wants to buy them. Destroying books to destroy knowledge is bad, destroying books because no one wants them or there are ample copies, _especially_ when those books go on to live forever as a digital copy, is a completely different story.

It boggles my mind that of all places, here on HN, people can't understand that. The knowledge is not destroyed, only the physical vessel.

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ionwake 8 hours ago | parent [-]

bro if people on HN of all places are concerned of physical media being destroyed boggles ur mind then u need to read more about the damage caused to society by prior happenings.

I wasn't even making an unusual or particularly strong statement

Im going to try and be patient and explain my position. I just feel that actions that are destructive should always be seen through a lens of suspicion.

IE, lets destroy this wood to reduce the chance of wildfires. Ok, well why that wood? we sure there arent other interests at play? Ie a carpark wanting to be built by a local authority?

As you become older and witness large acts occur due to unclear scheming, you start to become sensitive towards destructive acts, feeling there should be a lens cast over it.

Maybe Im just paranoid.

Sure I can understand there must be tons of books that are not needed, but books, are object that include native function that IN the right context becomes priceless and hence should be treated with a degree of concern.

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joshstrange 8 hours ago | parent [-]

Nothing is destroyed, only transformed. What was a physical book is now a digital book. It's a completely different story from "prior happenings", to which I assume you mean book burning and the like. Pretending they are the same is intellectually lazy.

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ionwake 8 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Thank you for your reply and request for clarification.

Yes destroying a book is in my opinion identical to a book burning.

One day there will be no hard copies, the digital books are hence vulnerable to patches, whether its due to a new political movement or a sudo abled hamster running on a keyboard... and if that occurs information will be permanently lost.

I would have thought a HN user understand well the importance of backups.

I dont want to sound mean, perhaps you also support keeping some hard copies as backups, but Im just explaining my concern.

To be honest I think everything I am saying is just common sense, I was just making a joke earlier about the architects deciding to do this because they had a bad tuesday.

	▲	joshstrange 8 hours ago \| parent [-]
		There are multiple digital ways to preserve exact copies of the original. Both through things like personal backups (I have digital backups of all my physical books) and through collective recordkeeping. For example, Anna's Archive stores them (or at least provides access) via a hash of the book. You can't patch the book and keep the same hash. Yes, hash collision is a thing but there are better hashes or other ways to accomplish the same goal. It pains me to say "blockchain" but that's something we have today that could be leveraged, though I think there are other cryptographic methods we could employ. I'll admit I have less concern with (every) digital copy being altered and if we assume a future where all computing is completely locked down and governments have the ability to reach in a tweak anything then yes, we are screwed. But we are screwed if we allow that to happen even if some of us have squirreled away physical books. In that techno-hell (of completely locked down computing with no open options) then some of use will have "illegal" computers that still do what we want and I see that as no different than keeping physical copies. Put simply: Preserving the original does not require a physical substrate (or at least one made of paper, obviously computers run on physical hardware).

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zahlman 6 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

> Nothing is destroyed, only transformed. What was a physical book is now a digital book.

I genuinely don't understand how it's possible for someone to type that out in all sincerity. Have you ever held a physical book?

	▲	joshstrange 6 hours ago \| parent [-]
		Have you held a kindle? What does that even mean? I vastly prefer digital books to physical ones. I own many physical books (as well as their ebook equivalent) but the physical books on my shelves are nothing more than art to me, I won't read the physical books because the experience is infinitely better when reading on my (jailbroken) kindle.