Project Gutenberg: a Review

Fall 10

Benjamin Lainhart Short Paper 1 due: 3/Oct/2010

INFO 653:Digital Libraries Lainhart

Project Gutenberg

In 1971 Michael Hart, then a student at the University of Illinois, was given an account on the university’s new mainframe computer. Computer time was expensive then and Hart thought hard about what he wanted to with the computer and what he envisioned computers accomplishing in the future. Hart soon realized that computers represented a new avenue for making books available to people in a way never before imagined. He declared that storage, retrieval and searching were the major advantages of the computer. Thus, he began to type out the Declaration of

Independence, which effectively became the first electronic book. Luckily, he was persuaded from sending this copy of the Declaration to everyone connected to the computer networks and also having the distinction of creating an early version of a

“computer virus.”

Typed in all capital letters, since the computer lacked the ability to display lowercase, the Declaration began another era – that of a grassroots project led by

Hart with a vision of the future where books could be made available for free across many boundaries – economic, political, social and physical. It was the start of what

Hart later termed the “neo‐industrial revolution” (Hane, 2004). It was his mission then and remains his mission today to provide the largest amount of free eBooks in the world for anyone with access to a computer.

After typing the Declaration, which is still available in the original format,

Hart continued to type up books and put them on the computer. In the 1970’s and

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1980’s he added classic texts like Shakespeare and the Bible. While Hart says that he was initially considered the crazy guy (Vara, 2005), he has since gained respect for being a visionary with big ideas ahead of his time. Even his decision to call his emerging project “Project Gutenberg” explains the impact that he was planning to have. As he states in an interview with Sam Vaknin, “the major factor in mind [when choosing the name] was that publishing e‐Books would change the map of literacy and education as much as did the Gutenberg Press.”

Starting around 1991 Project Gutenberg really took off. The goal was to double the amount of books that were made available every year – a goal which was achieved through the hard work and dedication of Hart and his many volunteers.

Today Project Gutenberg has over 33,000 texts available as well as a music and movie library.

The real upsurge in adding texts to Project Gutenberg came when high quality scanning became available. This drastically cut the time it took to add books, though Hart admits that he still has many volunteers who enjoy typing the books by hand instead of scanning them. Rather than encouraging these volunteers to take up the quicker scanning method, Hart leaves them to participate in whatever way they choose because it is essentially the volunteers that fuel the Project today. Hart still remains the visionary at the head of the project, but without the volunteers,

Project Gutenberg would not have nearly the amount of books available.

These volunteers are free to upload any books, music or movies that they are legally allowed to under current copyright laws, which generally means whatever

INFO 653 3 Lainhart goes up must be pre‐1923 or come with the express blessing of the copyright holder.

However, other than the copyright laws, Project Gutenberg does not put any sort of restrictions or rules on what volunteers may upload. All the books and other media are there because the volunteers choose to add them based on their own preferences – making Project Gutenberg truly a collection by the people based on their interests. As such, the collection has a wide array of content, though it is probably not the best place for the user looking for new materials.

Project Gutenberg makes the site easily searchable and interesting to navigate by making available an advanced search option, a bookshelf, recent books added and a Top 100 list. Accessing a particular book is extremely easy. For example, take a look at one of my favorite, yet under‐read, books – Flatland. A bibliographic record is provided on the top of the page followed by several formats a person can choose from when downloading or viewing the book. At the bottom of the page are links for related material. The books all render very well because

Project Gutenberg uses Plain Vanilla ASCII, which can be read by 99% of computers the world over.

Project Gutenberg is more than just a website, but I do not think it can really be considered a Digital Library either. Yes, it makes information available for free; however, a library carefully chooses its content based on user needs. Project

Gutenberg is really just attempting to gather as much as possible, which is not an ignoble goal, just different than what a library (digital or otherwise) does. There is no reference desk, no interaction and no feedback. Project Gutenberg can certainly

INFO 653 4 Lainhart be a wonderful tool for a library to use, though cannot beconsidered a library in itself.

My impressions of Project Gutenberg have been very favorable. In the past I had searched for and read parts of a book from their library; however, I had never examined the project further. While it was useful to me to find the book for which I was looking and read it for free, the real impact of the project will come from both a preservation standpoint and the ability to make available books and media to a much wider audience. What I find both unique and special about the project is the amount of dedication not just by Michael Hart, but also by the many volunteers

(though they do not keep a record, it is estimated that about 2,000 people participate in either adding books or proof‐reading/editing a month).

Hart set out with a noble goal and many others have taken up the cause. I find it interesting that Google gets so much attention for its Google Books project yet

Project Gutenberg gets so little. Especially among librarians and other information professionals, Project Gutenberg should be more highly touted. Here is a truly consumer point‐of‐view project aimed at making information free and widely available – something that I can definitely support.

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Bibliography Boumphrey, F. (2000, July). European Literature and Project Gutenberg. Retrieved September 26, 2010, from http://www.cultivate‐int.org/issue1/gutenberg/ Hane, P. (2004). Project Gutenberg Progresses. Information Today 21 (5). Retrieved September 26, 2010, from http://www.infotoday.com/it/may04/hane1.shtml

Lebert, M. (2004, June). Michael Hart: Changing the world through ebooks. Retrieved September 26, 2010, from http://pge.rastko.net/about/marie_lebert

Vaknin, S. (2004). The Second Gutenberg Interview with Michael Hart. Retreived September 26, 2010, from http://samvak.tripod.com/busiweb29.html

Vari, V. (2005, December). Project Gutenberg Fears No Google. Wall Street Journal. Retrieved September 26, 2010, from http://online.wsj.com/public/article/SB113415403113218620‐ U_OqLOmApoaSvNpy5SjNwvhpW5w_20061209.html

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