I get it now. I was kind if skipping some context. I was saying under legal means sharing books is fine and good(not paying for it). e.g. going to a library. But you can certainly copy books and distribute them. I posit that it’s nearly always ethical to do so. Whether or not it’s legal is a different question and depends on the material in question.

Yes?

Did i say something anti-library or am i reading into this wrong?

Beyond missing the subtext…

I don’t actually read all that much. I’m excruciatingly slow and i don’t currently commute. Most of my reading was on public transit or camping. But the authors i like just happen to either be ok with sharing copies of their work or it’s available for free anyways. That said I’ve bought maybe twenty books in the last decade…

Textbooks from exploitative publishers especially i refuse to pay for. E.g. Wiley, pearson, McGraw-Hill, etc… As well technical publications and journals.

The great Gatsby was provided by school when i read it. All the books were in my k-12. Most the students couldn’t afford them.

The only books I’ve paid for are the ones where the author explicitly allows copy and free distribution.

Well, those and the ones that get bundled with online access way back in uni.

Silently installed device scanning software is spyware whether it sends data or not.

The only reason it wouldn’t report is to avoid legal liability. Protections like this are thin and hinge upon the legal system determining whether the applet’s knowledge is an extension of Google’s.