A guide on how to pirate e-books using IRC
In this tutorial, I will be using an Ubuntu to demonstrate the process.
While there is a project called Openbooks that can automate this process, I will be showing you how to do it manually because I’ve found Openbooks to be unreliable.
We will be using HexChat for this tutorial, but feel free to use an alternative client if you prefer. The process will remain the same regardless of the client you choose. As a side note, I’ve completed writing this guide and have found that HexChat is no longer supported. Instead, I recommend using Polari (for GNOME), Pidgin, or Konversation (for KDE). In fact, I’ve replaced the screenshots of connecting to the server with instructions on how to do it in Konversation, as it’s the most similar to HexChat. However, Pidgin and Polari are also suitable alternatives that will work just as well.
Launch your IRC client.
Click on “New…”
In the Server field, enter irc.irchighway.net and ensure the port number is set to 6667. Make sure to leave the SSL checkbox unchecked. Once you’ve entered the details, click OK to save the changes. Then, navigate to the Server list interface and click the “Connect” button.
If you’re having trouble connecting, it’s possible that your IP address has been blocked. This is more likely if you’re using a VPN, Tor, or I2P.
Type /join #ebooks in the chat box
To search for a specific eBook, type @search followed by the title or keywords of the book you’re looking for. For example, if you’re interested in finding a book from the Harry Potter series, you can type @search Harry Potter.
Try to find the book with just one search to avoid overwhelming the servers.
A window will appear; simply click the “Accept” button. Once you do, a zip file will be downloaded and saved to your default download folder.
Extract the text file from the zip file, and then open the text file.
Identify the book you want to obtain, and then copy the corresponding line of text. In my case, I want to get “Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets”, so I will copy the line !DeathCookie J K Rowling - Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets.epub and paste it into the chat box.
Click on the file, and then click the “Accept” button. The file will then be downloaded to your default downloads folder, and you’ll have it.
I will maintain and update this guide on both Lemmy and my NotABug repository.
Man, I’m getting flashbacks to my days running omenserve on undernet. I had no idea people were still doing this! How does the content compare to places like Anna’s archive these days?
They’re nowhere close to something like Anna. They have nice collections but it’s mostly English mainstream stuff.
Ah, good to know. Back in my day, when we had to walk a hundred miles to school in the snow, up hill both ways, IRC was the only place to get ebooks. I’m guessing it’s just the old users clinging on now.