This library has every book ever published.
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The British Library is one of the six legal deposit libraries for the UK — and the only one that doesn't pick and choose, or have to ask for copies. That's a...
  • Brokkr@lemmy.world
    29·
    1 year ago

    *in the UK.

    I like his weekly videos, but this one is missing a fairly important qualifier in the title. Still informative and interesting.

    • ConstipatedWatson@lemmy.world
      4·
      1 year ago

      Right! It would have been stunning if it tried to aquire every book published in every language… Though I suppose if certain books are imported and sold, then they would show up in this library

      • yata@sh.itjust.works
        3·
        1 year ago

        It doesn’t even have every book published in the UK, because there are a lot of books, especially at the beginning of the printing press period, which does not exist in any known copies anymore.

        Not to mention that the policy of collecting ephemera is a relatively new one, so most older ephemera doesn’t exist in its collections either.

    • Nefrayu@lemmy.worldEnglish
      1·
      1 year ago

      * in the UK and Ireland. For historical reasons every book published in Ireland has to send a copy to the British library.

      Similarly, the Trinity College Library in Dublin is entitled to receive a copy of every book published in the UK, on request.

      • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
        1·
        1 year ago

        Borges’ Library of Babel was the size of a planet and had not just every book in every language, but they were interspersed with books full of gibberish and people spend their lives in the library looking for the book that will give them all knowledge but never find it.