Anna's Archive

Last updated

Anna's Archive
AnnasArchive Logo.svg
Official logo
Anna's Archive Screenshot 2024-06-30 at 00-35-26.png
Anna's Archive homepage (June 30, 2024)
Type of site
 Search engine, digital library, file sharing
Founder(s) Anna Archivist, Pirate Library Mirror [1]
URL
CommercialNo
RegistrationOptional
LaunchedNovember 10, 2022;23 months ago (2022-11-10) [2]
Current statusActive

Anna's Archive is a search engine for shadow libraries created by the pseudonymous Anna. [3] It was founded in direct response to law enforcement efforts to close down Z-Library in 2022. It describes itself as aiming to "catalog all the books in existence" and to "track humanity's progress toward making all these books easily available in digital form". [2] [4]

Contents

Anna's Archive mirrors Library Genesis, Open Library, Sci-Hub and Z-Library, and has scraped (downloaded the entirety of) the library catalog WorldCat and the scanned book database DuXiu. [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] It claims it does not host copyrighted materials and that it only indexes metadata that is already publicly available.

As of September 21, 2024, Anna's Archive includes 37,666,367 books and 105,835,081 papers. [10]

Website

The code and data for Anna's Archive are fully open source. It preserves its collection in bulk using torrents in order to make the site resilient to failure. It has a two-tiered system of file download options, in which high-speed downloads are only available to users with an active membership, while non-members have to use slower options with browser verification to prevent scraping. They claim that donations and membership fees are mostly spent on infrastructure and that none are personally given to any team members. The website itself does not host copyrighted materials, but it links to places where they can be downloaded. [11] [4]

History

Anna's Archive was created by members of the Pirate Library Mirror project, an anonymous effort to mirror shadow libraries that began in direct response to U.S. law enforcement efforts to close down Z-Library in 2022. It initially displayed results from Library Genesis and Z-Library. [12] [13] [14] [15]

On October 3, 2023, Anna's Archive was reported to have scraped WorldCat, the world's largest book metadata database. Anna's Archive says that the scrape "marks a major milestone in mapping out all the books in the world" and that it allows them to "work on making a to-do list of all the books that still need to be preserved". [16] In response to the scrape, Anna's Archive was sued on January 12, 2024 by OCLC, one of the maintainers of WorldCat. [17] OCLC says that the scrape was the result of cyberattacks on its servers and that Anna's Archive allows public download of scraped data. The only named defendant in the lawsuit denies any involvement with Anna's Archive or in hacking WorldCat. [18]

On November 4, 2023, Anna reported on their blog that they had acquired a copy of DuXiu, a database of scanned Chinese books. [19] The data was released without embargoes on June 16, 2024. [20]

In January 2024, Anna's Archive was blocked in Italy due to a copyright complaint by the Italian Publishers Association. [21] In March 2024, Anna's Archive was blocked by some internet service providers in the Netherlands due to a request by BREIN, an anti-piracy group. [22]

On July 1, 2024, the .org mirror started to redirect to the .gs mirror. [23] On July 11, 2024, Anna reported on their subreddit that the .gs mirror was not functioning, and to use the .se mirror, or the new .li mirror instead; the .org mirror also stopped redirecting. [24] [25]

See also

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References

  1. ↑ Van der Sar, Ernesto (November 19, 2022). ""Anna's Archive" Opens the Door to Z-Library and Other Pirate Libraries". TorrentFreak . Archived from the original on 2022-11-18. Retrieved 2022-11-19.
  2. 1 2 "Home". Anna's Archive. November 10, 2022. Archived from the original on 2022-11-10. Retrieved 2024-06-15.
  3. ↑ "Anna's Blog". annas-archive.org. Retrieved 2024-07-19.
  4. 1 2 Manos, Leda (November 22, 2022). "Free Z-Library E-Book Download Search Engine "Anna's Archive" Launches Amid Arrests". LA Weekly . Archived from the original on 2022-11-23. Retrieved 2022-11-23.
  5. ↑ Iyer, Kavita (November 20, 2022). "Anna's Archive: eBooks Search Engine Emerges After Z-Library Shuts Down". Techworm. Archived from the original on 2022-11-20. Retrieved 2022-11-20.
  6. ↑ Immanni, Manikanta (November 19, 2022). "Anna's Archive: A Search Engine for Finding Pirated Books Online". TechDator. Archived from the original on 2022-11-19. Retrieved 2022-11-19.
  7. ↑ Van der Sar, Ernesto (October 3, 2023). "Anna's Archive Scraped WorldCat to Help Preserve 'All' Books in the World". TorrentFreak . Archived from the original on 2023-10-03. Retrieved 2023-10-05.
  8. ↑ "Kaizokuban kensaku enjin "Anna's Archive" ga sekai saidai no toshokan katarogu kara de-ta o shutoku, "sekaijū no subete no shoseki no hozon o mezasu" shisei" 海賊版検索エンジン「Anna’s Archive」が世界最大の図書館カタログからデータを取得、「世界中のすべての書籍の保存を目指す」姿勢 [Pirated search engine 'Anna's Archive' acquires data from the world's largest library catalog, aiming to 'preserve all the books in the world']. GIGAZINE (in Japanese). October 10, 2023. Archived from the original on 2023-10-10. Retrieved 2024-01-10.
  9. ↑ "Exclusive access for LLM companies to largest Chinese non-fiction book collection in the world". annas-archive.se. Retrieved 2024-07-19.
  10. ↑ "Anna's Archive". annas-archive.org. Retrieved 2024-09-21.
  11. ↑ "Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) - Anna's Archive". annas-archive.org. Retrieved 2024-08-19.
  12. ↑ ""Anna's Archive" Opens the Door to Z-Library and Other Pirate Libraries * TorrentFreak" . Retrieved 2024-08-19.
  13. ↑ Booth, Callum (July 4, 2022). "The Pirate Library Mirror wants to preserve all human knowledge… illegally". TNW | Plugged. Retrieved 2024-10-19.
  14. ↑ Manos, Leda (November 22, 2022). "FREE Z-LIBRARY E-BOOK DOWNLOAD SEARCH ENGINE "ANNA'S ARCHIVE" LAUNCHES AMID ARRESTS" . Retrieved 2024-08-18.
  15. ↑ Immanni, Manikanta (November 19, 2022). "Anna's Archive: A Search Engine for Finding Pirated Books Online". TechDator. Retrieved 2024-08-19.
  16. ↑ "Anna's Archive Scraped WorldCat to Help Preserve 'All' Books in the World * TorrentFreak" . Retrieved 2024-08-19.
  17. ↑ "OCLC Inc. v. Anna's Archive, 2:24-cv-144 | Casetext Search + Citator". casetext.com. Retrieved 2024-08-19.
  18. ↑ "Key Defendant in Anna's Archive Lawsuit Denies Any Involvement With the Site * TorrentFreak" . Retrieved 2024-08-19.
  19. ↑ "Exclusive access for LLM companies to largest Chinese non-fiction book collection in the world". annas-archive.org. Retrieved 2024-07-19.
  20. ↑ AnnaArchivist (June 16, 2024). "We've released (without embargoes) 200TB of the DuXiu collection. We need your help seeding this, to preserve these books forever!". r/Annas_Archive. Retrieved 2024-07-19.
  21. ↑ Maxwell, Andy (January 4, 2024). "Silenzio! 'Anna's Archive' Shadow Library Blocked Following Publishers' Complaint". TorrentFreak . Archived from the original on 2024-01-04. Retrieved 2024-01-04.
  22. ↑ Van der Sar, Ernesto (March 23, 2024). "Dutch Court Orders ISP to Block 'Anna's Archive' and 'LibGen'". TorrentFreak . Archived from the original on 2024-03-22. Retrieved 2024-03-23.
  23. ↑ "Home". Anna's Archive. Archived from the original on 2024-07-01. Retrieved 2024-07-01.
  24. ↑ "We've been having issues with our .gs domain. Please use .se or .li instead. We've also refreshed our search index with new files, enjoy! : Annas_Archive". Reddit . July 11, 2024. Archived from the original on 2024-07-13. Retrieved 2024-07-13.
  25. ↑ Van der Sar, Ernesto (July 18, 2024). "Anna's Archive Loses .GS Domain Name But Remains Resilient". TorrentFreak . Archived from the original on 2024-07-18. Retrieved 2024-07-18.
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