AI companies buy, scan, shred rare and out-of-print books (www.news.com.au)

Artificial intelligence companies are increasingly purchasing and destroying rare and out-of-print books through a process dubbed “destructive scanning,” where books are cut open, scanned, and subsequently pulped. This trend has sparked significant concern in the literary community, particularly among rare booksellers who report a surge in orders from AI labs seeking specialized texts. For example, a Singapore-based company, 2077AI, recently sought to acquire thousands of English-language titles for what appears to be AI training purposes. The practice raises ethical questions, as millions of books that possess historical and cultural significance risk being lost forever to meet the needs of advancing AI models. The significance of this trend extends beyond mere book collection; it reflects a shift in AI training data sources. With existing online datasets increasingly saturated and plagued by low-quality content, companies like Anthropic, backed by major tech players, are prioritizing the extraction of high-quality information from physical texts. The legality of this practice stems from a recent U.S. court ruling that deemed the digital copying and destruction of physical books as “transformative,” thus protected under fair use laws. Critics argue that this method not only disregards the cultural value of books but also compromises the integrity of creative works by stripping them of their original context and meaning. As the market for AI training data evolves, the preservation of rare literary works becomes a growing concern.