‘More than just objects’: Australian booksellers raise alarm over ‘horrific’ destruction of rare titles to feed AI
Australian secondhand and rare booksellers suspect they have become unwitting participants in AI training pipelines, with old books allegedly being purchased, scanned for content, and then destroyed. The concern centers on the loss of physical artifacts that carry cultural and historical value beyond the text they contain.
Why this matters: Books are being bought, stripped for data, and thrown away. That is not how anyone donating or selling a rare title imagined it ending up. The people harmed here are not just sentimental booksellers. They are communities, researchers, and future readers who lose objects that carry marginalia, provenance, and history no scan captures. AI companies need training data, and that appetite is now reaching into physical archives most people assumed were safe. Nobody agreed to this supply chain. Nobody is clearly responsible for it.
Who should care: General readers · AI governance · Policy
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