I've been following this news quite eagerly the past couple days, and am very excited about Google's recent announcement that they intend to provide a searchable virtual library, starting with Harvard, Stanford, New York Public LIbraries and the Bodleian at Oxford. The latter will be providing a whole slew of books published before 1900. How cool would it be to peruse a PDF of Darwin's Descent of Man? I mean, the original?
Their intent is to scan and make available what appears to be close to 30 million books. It'll take about ten years and at a cost of, like, 200 million bucks. Whoaa!
The information coming available to peoples' fingertips seems to be growing exponentially these days. I remember pulling out small drawers of index cards in the high school library, beginning my search for a particular book I required for a class. Today, I can find ten times the information in one tenth the time. Though to be fair, the verity of the information I can retrieve electronically is a far cry from being anywhere near as reliable as through publications. That being said, methinks that the Dewey Decimal System is on its way out. Eventually.
So here's a contribution of my own in that vein. A site I stumbled upon a short while ago offering classical, spiritual, philosophical, psychology and sci-fi books for free download. Mmmmm, unexpected this is.
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