This article aims to mention and describe the most practical resources and methods to find literature. I found out that a lot of people, even in academia, do not know how and where to get (read: to pirate) texts. To fix that, I wrote down here (almost) everything I know about getting various texts.
You will probably most of the time use just a few of the resources mentioned here. If you do not found what you look for on LibGen or HathiTrust, there is a doubt that a piece of literature even exists in electronic form. To check that, refer to WorldCat🐈. Still, there is a small chance that someone made a scanned copy of the pages you need, even if you couldn't find an e-book record on WorldCat. In the same way, if there is a WorldCat entry that signifies that an e-book exists, it does not necessarily mean that it is possible to find it in open access on the Internet.
Since you are reading this, I want to kindly ask you to share the knowledge with the public. If you possess or find a piece of literature that could not be easily found on the Internet, take your time to upload it on LibGen.
WorldCat is the world's largest union catalogue and library content network.
To find out if there is an official electronic version of the text you are searching for, you have to find your book on WorldCat. On the profile page of your text, you can see the Edition/Format line. Click View all editions and formats button to see if there exist an official electronic document.
Created by Nexus. Active link to bot should be in the description of the Nexus Telegram channel.
LibGen is the file-sharing service that stores a lot of texts: sci-tech literature, scholarly articles, general-interest literature, fiction, magazines etc. The only official websites are libgen.fun, its Dweb version libgen-crypto.ipns.dweb.link, and its Community forum libgen.life.
The only official website is libgen.fun
LibGen has a bunch of fake for-profit mirrors: basically, the money-gathering pockets built upon the essentially non-profit idea. Some of them are listed below. Avoid them, since they may contain malicious files or are not actively supported or updated. This LibGen's Twitter is fake as well.
Found something that is not on Library Genesis? It takes only a few minutes to upload it. 👍
Another LibGen counterpart (probably created and maintained by a native English speaker, whilst LibGen is Russian) which contains some literature that is not represented on LibGen. FreeBookSpot has a lot of lousy, irritating, and potentially malicious ads, so be careful while browsing it.