How can I download a story?

Discussion in 'CHYOA General' started by dammnn, May 6, 2023.

  1. dammnn

    dammnn Virgin

    Hey, I'd like to know if there is a way to download stories from here to an EPUB format? Or any other format.

    I'm having a hard time reading stories here because of the layout but I really like them. Does anybody here know how to do download them?
     
  2. gene.sis

    gene.sis CHYOA Guru

    There is no way to download stories.
    If you aren't the author of the content and haven't the author's permission, downloading content might also entail copyright issues.

    If the layout is the problem, you could use a browser extension that allows you to manipulate the loaded page to make it cater to your needs.
     
  3. insertnamehere

    insertnamehere Really Really Experienced

    Well, you already download the content by navigating to it in your browser; the author has uploaded their story specifically for the purposes of others downloading it and have no grounds to object to an individual downloading it locally for private use.

    Many browsers have a "reader" mode that simplifies the website layout to something akin to an ebook. On Firefox, the button is on the right end of the URL bar.
     
    gene.sis likes this.
  4. gene.sis

    gene.sis CHYOA Guru

    You might download it, though that doesn't necessarily mean that you create a copy of the content on your hard drive.
    In general, a copyright owner might have uploaded their content to earn money generated by a reader's view, so it might be in their interest that the reader reads the content on the site. (That might not be the case for CHYOA but for other sites like YT. There might also be issues depending on the terms of service of the site where the content is shown.)
    The copyright owner might also later decide to remove their content from a site for any reason, e.g. to publish the content in a paid format.

    The right to create an offline copy might also vary depending on the jurisdiction the copying person resides.

    I guess it depends on the circumstances whether readers might or might not have the right to legally download (or probably copy) the content for non-commercial private offline use.
     
  5. insertnamehere

    insertnamehere Really Really Experienced

    It does, actually. It's probably not stored specifically as an epub on your file system, but it's still being stored somewhere, and modern browsers can keep that information for a while (caching). It's possible that this does fall afoul of some law in some jurisdiction, since laws worldwide aren't renowned for being congruent with modern technology, but such a law would be utterly unenforceable in practice.
     
  6. TheLowKing

    TheLowKing Really Really Experienced

    That's correct, but only from a strict technical stance. Yes, if your browser caches a page, then it probably stores it to your hard drive. However, the law takes into account intent. The intent of a cache is that the files in it are deleted, and soonish. They aren't meant to be kept, they are just a technical hack to make the system work. On the other hand, if you copy paste stories into your "archive of stories to keep forever and ever", well, it's pretty obvious you mean to keep them. :p Judges pay attention to that kind of distinction, even if under the hood both resolve to "material is stored on hard drive".

    That said, practically speaking, no one is going to come after you for downloading a bunch of stories for your own personal private use.

    P.S. IANAL.
     
    gene.sis likes this.
  7. insertnamehere

    insertnamehere Really Really Experienced

    Right, but the intent of never publishing or distributing the copied content is far more relevant than the intentions that are implied by the format and manner of storage of that content - which, again, laws often fail to care about because lawmakers often aren't even aware that there is a difference. A jurisdiction that actually prosecutes those who download freely available content for private use, complete with judges that take such cases seriously, is not going to have the legal nuance to distinguish between how or why it was downloaded.