Produced by Al Haines PROJECT GUTENBERG (1971-2008) MARIE LEBERT NEF, University of Toronto & Project Gutenberg, 2008 Copyright © 2008 Marie Lebert This long article is dated May 2008. With many thanks to the great people who helped me, especially Michael Hart, founder of Project Gutenberg, and Russon Wooldridge, founder of NEF. All the mistakes are mine - my mother tongue is not English, but French. This article is also available in French: Le Projet Gutenberg (1971-2008). TABLE 1. Overview 2. A Bet Since 1971 3. The Method 4. Shared Proofreading 5. Becoming Multingual 6. Public Domain vs. Copyright 7. From the Past to the Future 8. Chronology 9. Stats 10. Links 1. OVERVIEW August 1997: 1,000 books; April 2002: 5,000 books; October 2003: 10,000 books; January 2005: 15,000 books; December 2006: 20,000 books; April 2008: 25,000 books. In July 1971, Michael Hart created Project Gutenberg with the goal of making available for free, and electronically, literary works belonging to public domain. A pioneer site in a number of ways, Project Gutenberg was the first information provider on the internet and is the oldest digital library. When the internet became popular, in the mid-1990s, the project got a boost and an international dimension. The number of electronic books rose from 1,000 (in August 1997) to 5,000 (in April 2002), 10,000 (in October 2003), 15,000 (in January 2005), 20,000 (in December 2006) and 25,000 (in April 2008), with a current production rate of around 340 new books each month. With 55 languages and 40 mirror sites around the world, books are being downloaded by the tens of thousands every day. Project Gutenberg promotes digitization in “text format”, meaning that a book can be copied, indexed, searched, analyzed and compared with other books. Contrary to other formats, the files are accessible for low-bandwidth use. The main source of new Project Gutenberg eBooks is Distributed Proofreaders, launched in October 2000 by Charles Franks to help in the digitizing of books from public domain. 2. A BET SINCE 1971 = In a Few Words If the print book is 5 centuries and a half old, the electronic book is only 37 years old. It is born with Project Gutenberg, created by Michael Hart in July 1971 to make available for free electronic versions of literary books belonging to public domain. A pioneer site in a number of ways, Project Gutenberg was the first information provider on an embryonic internet and is the oldest digital library. Long considered by its critics as impossible on a large scale, Project Gutenberg counted 25,000 books in April 2008, with tens of thousands downloads daily. To this day, nobody has done a better job of putting the world's literature at everyone's disposal. And to create a vast network of volunteers all over the world, without wasting people's skills or energy.