Are there some items you just can't find a copy of?

I'm trying to find an audio book of a popular book series. But when I start looking, I only found one of the audio books of a trilogy. (looking through the links in the megathread/wiki)

I'm not sure why the 2nd and 3rd audiobook of the triligy can't be found, it should be popular enough that someone would've share it. It came out like a decade ago.

I found all 3 books (like the text-only book), but I'm kinda annoyed I can't find the audio books.

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Speaking generally, repair/Haynes manuals for vehicles and home appliances (the ones that exist ofc). Some are out there, but I almost never find the one I want.

Have you tried audiobookbay?
- Lol I saw the https error and I just assumed the site was a dead link.
  Why do they not have https? Isn't Let's Encrypt free? 🤔
  But anyways, I think I found them, its torrenting now.
  Thanks!
  
  Uhh they do have https.
  Sure youre downloading from the right place?
  
  Wired when I visit it, it has. Just in case you have the wrong domain, audiobookbay .lu is the official domain.

There's a game demo we got on one of those demo disks that I played for ages, The Flying Doughman, like a puzzle platformer. I would think I imagined it if my brother didn't remember it too, but from my searches it seems like it's become lost media
- Is this what you're looking for?
  
  Ahh no way that's it! I don't strictly trust the exe this site downloads though, and running it sandboxed just brings errors. But my word those screenshots take me right back
- Is this it? https://absolutist.com/windows/flying-doughman/

I'm always struggling to find ebooks and flac albums, sometimes it is fine but sometimes it is impossible. Or they are weird versions.
- Especially for jazz albums. Very difficult to find
  
  Yeah I think streaming services killed this, why download music when you have Spotify, Youtube Music etc, with essentially all songs on it.

Some lost JAV. Specifically some of Kaho Shibuyas. Haven't been able to complete that collection yet. VRs and some older videos that the publisher doesn't even exist anymore. I'd pay even. But until I visit an old DVD shop in Japan they are lost to the Internet.

Yeah, older media (especially audiobooks) can be hard to find. Sometimes Anna’s Archive has it, but other times it feels nearly impossible.
There are also some serial/daily radio drama releases that can be hard to find. There was one in particular that I spent about a week looking for, until I finally found someone who had a compiled version.

Haven't been able to find a copy of Big Shark by Tommy Wiseau.

I want to try WolfQuest but I ain't spending $20 on it unless I can try it to see if I'd play it more than 10 minutes. I can't even find a key for it on something like G2A, let alone a torrent or otherwise illegal method of obtaining it.
- You can refund within 2 hours of gameplay on steam.
  
  They'll even refund after two hours of your reason is good enough (like say a patch broke the game)
- https://rutracker.org/forum/tracker.php?nm=wolfquest

I haven't tried super hard, but season 5 of Tim and Eric's Aweseome Show Great Job is the only one I can't get. I found one torrent, but there are no seeders.
- S01-05 is on BTN.

1994-11-01: Mean Fiddler Club, London by The Black Crowes. Had it forever ago now lost. It bugs me.
- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DX9va95d6IY

I've definitely had trouble finding specific books. There's a popular book about the local climate here which is only available in print. There is a copy uploaded to archive.org, somebody scaned the whole book in, but it's unavailable for download or check out.
Have you checked archive.org? Or your local library systems?
Also, there are some books which don't have audiobooks that I've wanted to listen to. The Microsoft edge browser has a read to me mode which is really good. If you can find a book in text form, you can sometimes listen to it that way. I've actually converted ePub files into text files just for this purpose.
- The Microsoft edge browser has a read to me mode
  Text to speech vs an actual human professional reading it is like night and day.

Yeah, mostly regional content and other non-English content

A full archive of the Japanese TV show Supreme Skills. I can find bits and pieces but I don't think I even have one complete season.
- S02E02 is available on BTN, with a bounty on S01.
  A comment on the bounty links here: https://www.reddit.com/r/NHKWorldFans/s/62WWjARH08

Complete Das Schwarze Auge (role playing system) Adventure compilations. There are individual documents floating about, but most seem not be available.

Can't finish off ancient discoveries nor find Ellie & jools

Thankfully the stuff I'm interested in is very easy for the most part. It's rare for me to struggle with finding something.

Might be more known to Canadians than otherwise but for those who remember Ed the Sock: I have his Fromage specials for 2000/2001/2002/2003/2004, but there's zero trace of 05 (except for a handful of clips on 1 youtube channel which amounts to 30% of the full special), and zero trace of anything pre 2000.
Even Kerzner himself says he doesn't have the earlier ones (iirc), and the 05 one at best was:
A) Posted to his Facebook group once and got DMCA'd by Much within hours, leading to almost no one having ripped it as far as I know. B) Offered up as a reward tier item to those who backed one of he and his wife's crowdfunding campaigns, but they also have a history of not following through on those and I've never seen anyone who got any digital downloads for the old Fromage specials.
So here I sit for year number 18 of my ongoing quest to try and eventually find those remaining specials, remembering the morning of August 14th 2007 when I threw out the fucking VHS tapes I had them taped on while decluttering the week prior to a cross-country move.

There's a channel 4 documentary that sounded interesting from just a couple years ago, like 2022 or something like that, that I can't seem to find where Prue from The Great British Bake-Off is tracking down the family of her adopted child (I watch a lot of GBBO, hence why it sounded interesting). It's so recent and Prue is so famous in the UK, I am surprised how difficult it has been to track down.
- I got curious and had a quick poke around, seems like it's called "Prue Leith: Journey With My Daughter" from 2020, but the only copy I managed to find is in Chinese on the Internet Archive. If I find an English copy though I'll let you know!
  
  Thanks! I would super appreciate that. I found that version, too, and got super hopeful when I did. Imagine my surprise when I played it and it turned out to be Chinese lol.
  It should be in the Channel 4 streaming service you'd think, but it isn't for some reason. It's actually a great example of the role piracy has to play in archiving media and data.

The Hop Harrigan 1946 serial and the Congo Bill 1948 serial. I found a Hop Harrigan torrent that sat at 0% on my list without even downloading metadata for about two years before I gave up. And I couldn't find Congo Bill anywhere. Something tells me that Congo Bill would be pretty problematic and full of insulting stereotypes these days though.

I've been trying to find Deon Cole's Black Box but no luck so far.

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