Citing backlash, ISBNdb removed its webpages about training AI, denied ever buying, scanning, or selling a book for AI training, and said the site was a “test of market interest.”
Companies won’t stop doing this; they just won’t be admitting it as openly.
One more for the “sorry they got caught” category.
Article Text:
Following 404 Media’s reporting that book database company ISBNdb claimed to source printed books to then sell to AI companies for AI training, the company deleted the part of its website offering the service and walked back claims that it would train AI models, and instead called it “a test of market interest.”
On July 30, nine days after 404 Media’s reporting, ISBNdb added a note to its homepage and an update on its news page about the change. “We’ve seen the recent coverage about a marketing landing page on our site, and we understand the concern it raised. The facts: ISBNdb has never purchased, scanned, or sold a book — for AI training or anything else,” ISBNdb wrote. “We don’t train AI models, and we never have. The page was a test of market interest; no such service was ever brought to life. We’ve taken the page down. Our job is helping people find books. For more than two decades, ISBNdb has been the card catalog of the book world — the data behind how bookstores, libraries, and reading apps connect readers with titles. Data about books, not the books themselves. That hasn’t changed.”
ISBNdb removed the landing page for “Printed Books Sourcing for Your AI LLMs Dataset Needs” on July 28. “It was part of exploring demand, and we’ve chosen to pivot away from that direction. Our main ISBNdb (book metadata API) services are unaffected and running as usual,” the site says.
ISBNdb has not responded to any requests for comment from 404 Media.
In one now-removed article on its site, ISBNdb said that printed books published before 2022 are ideal for AI training data because they don’t include AI generated text, and ingesting these books could prevent model collapse. The article also suggested that book authors who might be opposed to this use of their work could just write with manipulating and sabotaging AI models in mind.
404 Media spoke to booksellers and saw reports online detailing a sudden uptick in sales recently. “It’s not just the quantity, but the weirdness of the orders,” one bookseller told 404 Media. “The type of books […] there’s no rhyme or reason to it. Also, there’s a total disregard for the price of the book. I’ve had some books that sold through this way that were […] greatly overpriced. That’s kind of a tell for AI because they have just so much money.”
“Purchasing paper books at scale from the secondary market does not deprive any creator of income they would otherwise have received,” one of ISBNdb’s now-removed pages said. “These are books that have already fully discharged their financial obligation to their creators.”
In January, book authors filed a copyright lawsuit against Anthropic, revealing internal documents that showed Anthropic planned to obtain and scan millions of printed books and destroy them in the process. An investigation by the Washington Post found that Anthropic was buying books from a company called Better World Books, one of several marketplaces where libraries, retailers, and individuals sell books.
In ISBNdb’s now-removed marketing materials, it admitted that getting caught destroying printed books during the scanning process would not be a good look. “The optics problem is real,” ISBNdb’s site said. “‘AI company destroys two million books’ is not a headline that generates sympathy.”
Emanuel Maiberg contributed reporting to this story.
The facts: ISBNdb has never purchased, scanned, or sold a book — for AI training or anything else,” ISBNdb wrote. “We don’t train AI models, and we never have."
I found the weasel. “We don’t know why AI companies are buying tons of books from us and have a continuous bonfire out back, we just sell books for people to read”
In ISBNdb’s now-removed marketing materials, it admitted that getting caught destroying printed books during the scanning process would not be a good look. “The optics problem is real,” ISBNdb’s site said. “‘AI company destroys two million books’ is not a headline that generates sympathy.”
So their solution was to do the evil thing secretly?
I am convinced of that. They only feared bad press but they have no reason whatsoever to stop.
AI companies know that the public loves books so they tried to hide their shame. Their next approach will be to make us hate books so destroying them is fine. Stories will be lauded while the book format will be dismissed. Many discussions and comparisons of “book vs (insert media)” will start to pop up. Just watch.
In the corporate world, optics are ethics.
They say we shouldn’t attribute to malice what could be attributed to stupidity, let’s try that :
“Wait, people searching for books don’t like that we help destroy real books en masse to feed the infinite fake book machines? Oh, my bad, we hadn’t realized, we’re not doing that then.”
Yeah, I’m not absolutely convinced.
The “evil thing” is to sell a back catalog of physical books that they can’t move on the retail or wholesale markets.
Idk why people are heavily invested in books moldering in a warehouse. It’s not some kind of virtue that we have this staggering overproduction of physical media that we’ve horded for nobody in particular.
If doing this thing just results in people screaming at them, of course they’re going to take down their advertisements. But of course they’re going to keep doing it. Why would they stop? Who else buys a bunch of first print draft copies of books that never sold?
Illustrating the power of the press. Attention and awareness makes evildoers less bold at least usually
Okay book sellers,
- raise your prices to astronomical amounts
- put the date as before 2022, but sell AI garbage
- if you’re trying to unload trash books, change the title slightly to hide it.
They are still doing this, they’re just not advertising it anymore. They haven’t stopped, the greeds have a hold of this company and they’re not going to let go this easily. Shit, it took 3 weeks for them to take down the page because they used the 404 people as advertising.
raise your prices to astronomical amounts
Prices for Recreational Books, 1997-2026 ($20)).
According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, prices for recreational books are 4.81% lower in 2026 versus 1997 (a $0.96 difference in value
Between 1997 and 2026: Recreational books experienced an average inflation rate of -0.17% per year. In other words, recreational books costing $20 in the year 1997 would cost $19.04 in 2026 for an equivalent purchase.
Now charge $1000. In the article, it says AI randomly pays that.
Scamming AI companies is a virtue
