Project Gutenberg

The name ‘Gutenberg’ is familiar to many of us. Johannes Gutenberg originated a method of printing from movable type which is considered a history-making invention. This type of mechanised printing created in the 15th century made it possible for the first time in Europe to manufacture large numbers of books for relatively little cost. Books and other printed matter consequently became available to a wide general audience, greatly contributing to the spread of literacy and education in Europe. The making of history continues with Project Gutenberg. Project Gutenberg is a library of over 60,000 free e-books. You will find the world’s great literature, with a focus on older works for which US copyright has expired. Everything to do with the project is free. There are no subscription charges, download charges and thousands of volunteers digitise and proofread all of the material for no payment.

Project Gutenberg celebrated its first e-book only last year but has been delighting readers with its free content and unlimited free distribution for over fifty years. Founded in 1971 by Michael S. Hart, Project Gutenberg continues to offer a vibrant and growing collection of the world’s greatest literature. No special apps are required, just regular web browsers or e-book readers on mobile devices. The impressive collection is truly accessible to everyone.

In an ever-increasing commercial world, Project Gutenberg is a beacon of light attracting talented people prepared to give their time and skills to support such a worthy cause. Distributed Proofreaders are the official collaborator for the project. They provide a web-based method to ease the conversion of public domain books into e-books. By dividing the workload into individual pages, many volunteers can work on a book at the same time, which significantly speeds up the creation process.

During proofreading, volunteers are presented with a scanned page image and the corresponding OCR text on a single web page. This allows the text to be easily compared to the image, proofread, and sent back to the site. A second volunteer is then presented with the first volunteer's work and the same page image, verifies and corrects the work as necessary, and submits it back to the site. The book then similarly progresses through a third proofreading round and two formatting rounds using the same web interface. Once all the pages have completed these steps, a post-processor carefully assembles them into an e-book, optionally makes it available to interested parties for 'smooth reading', and submits it to the Project Gutenberg archive.

To date, Distributed Proofreaders have completed over 45,000 titles and posted them to the Project Gutenberg archive. Founded in 2000 by Charles Franks to support the digitisation of public domain books, it is now the main source of Project Gutenberg e-books. This is accomplished through the efforts of a supportive community of volunteers. Here at Perfect Proofreaders, we have a clear mission: one million words proofread to perfection – for free. We are proud of our association with Project Gutenberg and endeavour to reach our target.

Perfect Proofreaders, in partnership with Distributed Proofreaders – preserving history, one page at a time.