Book People Archive

Re: Google Books


On Wed, 15 Aug 2007, Lars Aronsson wrote:

> Klaus Graf wrote:
>
>> That's so right (especially the opinion on the 
>> absolutely overestimated PG)!
>
> Lol!  The dogs bark, the caravan keeps moving.  Google 
> (both company, 1998, and scanning effort, 2004) is in its 
> first decade, Project Gutenberg in its fourth.  I was 
> looking for a founding year of Wikisource, and I settled 
> for 2005.  Even if you could say that Project Gutenberg 
> (1971) didn't do so much in its first 15 years, that's 
> still 1986--2007 = 21 years... on the Internet! And still 
> ten years older than the Making of America (1996) 
> website.  Which is where Google gets its inspiration, 
> isn't it?
>
> Now, stop barking and get moving.
>
>
> --
>  Lars Aronsson (lars@[redacted]

I should perhaps, for those who aren't aware,
point out that Lars Aronsson is the founder of
Project Runeberg, the oldest of the Project
Gutenberg Spinoffs, doing Scandinavian eBooks.

I shoud perhaps also point out that only rarely
does anyone challenge Project Gutenberg as the
origin of eBooks and eLibraries, and that those
who do never point out any alternatives, other
than maybe some computer instructions.

I can personally tell you that Google's effort
was inspired by Project Gutenberg, as I met with
them at their headquarters, along with PG CEO,
Greg Newby and our chief cataloger exactly one
year year before their big December 14, 2004
media blitz, and discussed the whole thing,
and they are still implementing my suggestions,
and undoubtedly wish they had done so earlier.

However, Project Gutenberg is not only in high
estimattion as the originator of eBooks, from
which these others have flowed, but that PG's
effort was not only an example, proving that
eBooks were both feasible and viable, but in
the actual work itself, where Google, Yahoo,
and even the Library of Congress have trouble
creating eBooks of equal quality and getting
those eBooks to an equal quantity of people.

You have to do both. . .create readable eBooks
AND get them to the world at large. . .or the
whole thing is a tempest in a teapot.


Michael S. Hart
Founder
Project Gutenberg