Overview and History
The foremost online repository for eBooks, Project Gutenberg is an online non-profit database dedicated to digitizing and distributing access to tens of thousands of books and other pieces of literature. Operated and published by the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation under the mission “To encourage the creation and distribution of eBooks,” this database began with early digitization efforts by founder Michael Hart in 1971 at inputting physical information into electronic text, which progressed over the years into this database. By the late-nineties, Project Gutenberg expanded into a considerable repository of electronic text and has since expanded rapidly. This database encompasses any and all books and texts digitized by its volunteers, so it is not limited to any specific time frame or subject matter; however, English and otherwise Western-oriented literature make up the dominant majority despite the overall large diversity of sources. The database is maintained from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, but the actual physical copies of digitized texts vary based on their individual contributor or digitizer.
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Search Functions
Project Gutenberg provides a simple but effective and highly customizable search engine for its many texts and materials. Because the majority of eBooks in this database are text scans, rather than digitized images or photocopies of pages, full text searches are available, in addition to a myriad of other search options including: sorting by language, author and/or title, non-text formats, about twenty subject areas, and datatypes and filetypes. The original catalogue has since been folded into the overall book search function as it expanded.
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Access and Citation
All eBooks digitized and distributed by Project Gutenberg are free within the public domain of the United States, given its specialty in historical texts; modern works within copyright protection are not yet accepted, although self-publishing processes are available through the World Library Foundation. All eBooks are available for download through various formats, the most common of which being the standard HTML and PDF formats, although other forms of access include through Kindle, EPUB, and others. Exportable images are available as well. Citation and bibliographic information is based on the individual source, which is always listed alongside each entry.
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Conclusions and Review
Overall, Project Gutenberg is a well-structured and easily accessible online database and an important repository for eBooks. Its search functions are simple but thorough and easy to use. Its sources are easily accessible and free to use and download in a variety of formats. Thus, as a database for public domain texts, Project Gutenberg fulfills its role and niche nicely and effectively.