Google Book Downloader - Download Books From Google Books

August 18, 2008 · Filed Under How To and Online Tutorials · 6 Comments 

Google Book Downloader - Download Books From Google Books

Stumbled upon this web application, it amazed me with its ability to extract and list down every single page from Google Books. I can’t be certain if this is considered illegal, but I don’t see any difference between viewing it from my browser and viewing it from an image manager.

As the name implies, Google Book Downloader does exactly what it says, it will give you a list of url of the images, what you need next is a download manager such as Download Accelerator Plus or Flashget.

Downloading the images appears to be breeze free, it was not until half way through the process Google Books decided to cut me off, possibility they system detects an ongoing unusual activity or mass bandwidth consumption that does not justify a normal reading behavior. Superman?

Is it illegal? Well, I’m won’t be too concern about that, the million dollar question is, is it worth the trouble? Just have a look at the screen shot below.

It’s like downloading a broken mp3 where it skips a beat or two every 20 seconds. Nothing is more annoying that missing pages in a book, but then again, these missing pages does not apply across the board. Having said that, do you happen to know that copyright laws are meant to last for 50 years only? This means a huge number of books that falls within this copyright free category are copyright free, good old books such as Oliver Twist and many more.

While you’re busy exploring Google Books, why not treat yourself to some free magazines?

Tags: , , , , , , ,

How to Download Books From Google

March 18, 2008 · Filed Under How To and Online Tutorials · 2 Comments 

Up until now, there is no possible way of downloading ebooks from Google Books, Google only allows people to read the out-of-copyright books online (and only snippets of copyrighted works). The Inferno of Dante Alighieri By Dante Alighieri, John Dayman is an example of out-of-copyright books that can be downloaded online for free.

Please note that the copyrighted ebooks from Google Books can never be downloaded for free, personally I believe Google is slowly moving into the affiliate market in the near future and this could be the first step towards it. I have to admit that I bought a few book after going through Google Books and Google would be crazy not to make some money out of it.

On a lighter note, here are two popular online ebook companies, perfectly legal and free - Gutenberg and Scribd (the best).

Tags: , , , , , , , ,

CEO steal property from Google

June 7, 2007 · Filed Under Silicon Valley · Comment 

CEO steal property from Google

Lots of book publisher and writer are against the idea of digitalizing their content, one of the reason given was people might pirate these books in the near future just like how mp3s are traded online without paying any royalty fees.

Seriously, is it that bad? One thing for sure, Google do not publish the entire content of the book, they simply make the content searchable and if you happen to love the book, then purchase the physical copy of the book with one of their partners. Personally I believe this is a great idea.

Now, what happen in BookExpo America in NYC was CEO Richard Charkin went so far as to recruit a colleague and swipe a pair of laptops from a Google Books kiosk at the event. Reason given by him was to let Google taste their own medicine. Read more at TechDirt

Tags: , , ,

Chatter Box