Quote:
Originally Posted by DNSB
What legitimate sources for ebooks combine multiple formats into a single .RAR file? The only place I've seen that has been on pirate sites. Inquiring minds are eager to know.
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Yup, I have a ton of books from .nzb sites (and other) from 2015 to today. However I have gone from maybe 600 books in one year to like 30. I am dealing with old .rars and not new ones. Sometimes I like to download a huge amount is a single folder full of random files to see if there is anything new or good I would otherwise never know about.
However, I have been purchasing or getting Kindle Unlimited and or Library books before I choose to read one of those old books taking up space in my library.
I also have a lot of books from
Beam,
Smashwords
Author Websites
Walmart
Kobo
Bookstrand
Ellora's Cave
Free for signing up to a newsletter
Free internet download (free being truly free for the taking and not pirated)
Individual retail sites
I haven't been reading them as much as using them as a guide to what I do want to read. I can get page counts, and check out the most frequent words, and check the formatting. Those "samples" are never really good enough, and really, I end up not reading them. However, if I am putting it in my Library and formatting it, checking out the metadata, I get a better idea if I would read it or not.
I don't have to pay $3.99 for each book in a serial of 4 books that should only be one book, and I would only read it once. I can find out before I buy any other books in the series if I am going to like it. Reading the first book in a new series that I can't locate anywhere "legit" that is free gives me a good idea if I plan on buying the next books. If I deem a book "good" enough to read more than once, I buy it. If I have a downloaded book in my library but find it in the public Library, or in Kindle Unlimited, I get it there.
Also, I am on Social Security for disablity and live off of $1000 a month. Reading is my only hobby and yeah, glass houses. Do you have pirated tv, movies or music? I don't. The only thing I have is books. I pretty much dont' even read them, I just keep them in my library like a dragon hoards gold. I MAY read them, but mostly they take up space. My previous habits were if I read a single book by a new author and really loved it, I used to go and get EVERY book by them or EVERY book in the series, but what ends up happening is I would get the books and end up not reading them because I ended up not likeing the next book. This is the bulk of my collection. I need to get rid of them.
In the end I try and do what's right. Like I said, I hardly ever use them anymore. It's just when I am trying to read a new author who isn't free, to see if he/she is worth buying, or if they have a bunch of books that are all "full price" and I know that I would only read them once. Reading a standalone that I normally wouldn't buy because it is priced too high, but I really want to read it - but only once. And of course to stick it to those authors who think line heights of 150% and spaces between paragraphs along with exerpts of other books in the end means that the book is 400 pages in length and so charge $4.99, a book that I would only read once (after formatting it of course).
My problem with the .rars is because I have a bunch of old files that I want to reimport into a "pristine" library, not because I am currently downloading billions of books.
Also, I have read here about people whose libaries are in the tens of thousands - are all of their books legit?
Get out the stones y'all.
Also, I wasn't just talking about .rars, I have .zips too with ever format available in a book when I purchased it from some vendors. Or purchased a whole series.