[A2k] E-book service?

[Manon Ress]

 From Michael Geist BNA's Internet Law News (ILN) - 6/5/2006

E-BOOK PROJECT TO GIVE FREE ACCESS TO 300,000 VOLUMES
Two nonprofits are preparing to provide free access to
300,000 texts online. Project Gutenberg and World eBook
Library plan to make the e-books available free for a month
at the first World eBook Fair. Downloads will be available
at the fair's Web site from July 4, the 35th anniversary of
Project Gutenberg's founding, through Aug. 4.
http://www.siliconvalley.com/mld/siliconvalley/news/editorial/
14727375.htm


http://www.siliconvalley.com/mld/siliconvalley/news/editorial/
14727375.htm

E-book project to give free access to 300,000 volumes
CHICAGO (AP) - Electronic book devotees may want to set aside some
extra screen time this summer, as two nonprofits are preparing to
provide free access to 300,000 texts online.

Project Gutenberg and World eBook Library plan to make ``a third of a
million'' e-books available free for a month at the first World eBook
Fair. Downloads will be available at the fair's Web site from July 4,
the 35th anniversary of Project Gutenberg's founding, through Aug. 4.

The majority of the books will be contributed by the World eBook
Library. It otherwise charges $8.95 a year for access to its database
of more than 250,000 e-books, documents and articles.

But the book fair won't be the last chance for e-bookworms to devour
works ranging from ``Alice's Adventures in Wonderland'' to ``Old
Indian Legends,'' not to mention dictionaries and thesauruses,
without paying for them.

Project Gutenberg founder Michael Hart, who first announced the
ambitious plan a month ago, said Friday the partners are on track to
make 1 million books available for the annual fair's one-month run in
2009, with more appearing in subsequent years. About 100,000, he
said, will be permanently available at the handful of Project
Gutenberg sites on the Internet.

``We want to give the most books to the most people,'' the 59-year-
old Hart said by phone from Urbana, where he established the project
in 1971 after graduating from the University of Illinois. ``It has
been our goal since the dawn of the Internet to break down the bars
of ignorance and illiteracy.''

The Gutenberg books, typed and scanned into computers by thousands of
volunteers, mostly are those that are no longer protected by
copyright. They include fiction, nonfiction and reference books and
will be available for worldwide readers in about 100 languages.

While the commercial e-book market remains tiny, Hart said electronic
books have ``caught on without getting a lot of publicity'' and are
being widely read on handheld computers, cell phones and even special
programs for use on iPods.

``These people that grew up on GameBoys -- to them a GameBoy screen
is the standard size,'' he said. ``To us old folks, it's too small.
But they don't care.''

Based on fast-increasing demand, he predicted there will be 10
million e-books available by 2020.

``I've gotten notes from people who said they would have never, ever
read Shakespeare if I hadn't put it on the Internet,'' Hart said.

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************************************************
Manon Anne Ress
manon.ress@cptech.org,
www.cptech.org

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