Comments on: The Gutenberg Singularity

The Gutenberg Singularity

hairyeyeball — Tue, 15 Apr 2003 14:35:21 -0800

Proof of Life After Copyright : An overexcited e-mail from the Gutenbergers:

April 10, 2002 was the day Project Gutenberg reached 5,000 eBooks. By Moore's Law, October 10, 2003 could be the day for number 10,000. We are just over half way — 7,661 as I write this — 2,339 to go! That will take over 300 eBooks per month; we need you to help us push our average up from 268 per month to get to 10,000 by December, 31st.

God help us if the entire universe fails to obey Moore's Law: the IPO of the singularity could be delayed. So pitch in.

By: shadow45

shadow45 — Tue, 15 Apr 2003 14:40:56 -0800

What does Moore's Law have to do with Project Gutenberg?

By: wendell

wendell — Tue, 15 Apr 2003 14:58:58 -0800

I thought we could apply Godwin's Law, y'know, if you make enough public domain e-books, sooner or later you'll get to Mein Kampf...

By: black8

black8 — Tue, 15 Apr 2003 15:07:55 -0800

That was weird. I just wrote about the Singularity on my blog...

By: xmutex

xmutex — Tue, 15 Apr 2003 16:40:37 -0800

Oh man, I thought for a minute that all the Police Academys had been released into the public domain, then I was like, oh, wait, no. Damn.

By: smackfu

smackfu — Tue, 15 Apr 2003 16:43:53 -0800

Given that copyright keeps being extended, it seems like they're going to have to start digging pretty deep to find new stuff to transcribe. Is there actually an audience for some of this stuff?

By: Hildago

Hildago — Tue, 15 Apr 2003 18:01:26 -0800

Is there actually an audience for some of this stuff? [bangs forehead on table]

By: smackfu

smackfu — Tue, 15 Apr 2003 20:21:32 -0800

Thank you for that insightful response. Let me try again... If a file is never downloaded, is it worth scanning in and proofreading?

By: Hildago

Hildago — Tue, 15 Apr 2003 20:35:03 -0800

[bangs table against forehead] Of course. Any sort of archiving effort is almost by definition a marvelous, farsighted, noble endeavor. Only a few days after 170,000 pieces of ancient art were looted from a museum, the necessity of preserving art in a more difficult to destroy format should be self-evident.

By: LeLiLo

LeLiLo — Wed, 16 Apr 2003 00:30:12 -0800

What does Moore's Law have to do with Project Gutenberg? I thought Moore's Law was that every month the booing gets twice as loud.

By: hairyeyeball

hairyeyeball — Wed, 16 Apr 2003 09:45:04 -0800

Heh heh.