5 ms·

Google Opens Up Its EPUB Archive: Download 1 Million Books for Free

93 points by naish 17y ago

Ixiaus 17y ago
So very awesome...
tokenadult 17y ago
That format will be a useful addition to the .PDF format already available for full-access Google Books. Many mobile book-reading devices are adopting the EPUB format. http://www.web-books.com/Publishing/epub.htm http://www.web-books.com/Publishing/epub.htm I use public-domain mathematics textbooks--including classics like Chrystal's book on algebra--to prepare lecture notes for the supplemental math classes I teach. The Google Books are a great resource.
vdoma 17y ago
What's interesting is that not all "full view" books are available for download. I wish there were a filter for just downloadable books.
- tokenadult 17y ago
  What's interesting is that not all "full view" books are available for download. Are most of the examples you have seen been books published recently enough to still be copyrighted? That has been my experience, in the subjects I have searched. A sufficiently old book (one definitely in the public domain) seems to have had a .PDF available for full-text download for a while, and now the new .EPUB format too.
cakeface 17y ago
If you want a nice epub reader I use http://bookworm.oreilly.com/ http://bookworm.oreilly.com/.
- abdelazer 17y ago
  Yeah, we need to ask Google to whitelist Bookworm so that it can do a remote add-from-URL (described in http://labs.oreilly.com/2009/07/new-features-and-bug-fixes-for-bookworm.html http://labs.oreilly.com/2009/07/new-features-and-bug-fixes-f...). Right now they're blocking it (just like if you tried wget)...
  - cakeface 17y ago
    Yeah, I tried to make a bookmarklet for "Add to Bookworm" and ran into that problem.
zhyder 17y ago
"In a world where educational opportunities are often disproportionately allocated, it's exciting to think that today anyone with an Internet connection can download any of over one million free public domain books" I've always thought the OLPC should have pursued a cheap e-reader for public works, rather than a general-purpose $100 ($200 in practice) laptop. You should be able to make an LCD-based e-reader for $50 [1] already. A $20 device doesn't seem far out either. LCDs can also be bistable, so power is only used when the page changes: http://www.nemoptic.com/ http://www.nemoptic.com/ . (They still won't look as good as EInk's electrophoretic displays, but the $ savings are non-trivial.) [1] E.g. datapoint: Coby's portable DVD player with 7" color LCD is $60: http://www.amazon.com/Coby-TFDVD7008-7-Inch-Portable-Player/dp/B001PRKKB6/ref=sr_1_3 http://www.amazon.com/Coby-TFDVD7008-7-Inch-Portable-Player/...
zzzmarcus 17y ago
Stanza is a great, free, iPhone app for reading EPUB books. Right now you have to open the EPUB file with the desktop version of Stanza then download it from the same wireless network on your iPhone. I imagine in the near future you'll be able to search Google Books from directly within Stanza (like you can with several other sites). In fact, the only reason I can think of that you wouldn't be able to do so would be if Amazon were to nix it seeing as how they own Lexcycle now.
sharpn 17y ago
When not hacking, I love investigating the marginalia (doodles in the margins) of medieval Italian, English & Irish manuscripts. Google's book scanning project is awesome for this. Ten years ago I couldn't have imagined having uninterrupted access to this stuff, ever.
- nreece 17y ago
  I love investigating the marginalia (doodles in the margins) of medieval Italian, English & Irish manuscripts. Sounds interesting. Care to share some of your findings, or maybe the methodology you employ for your research.
  - sharpn 17y ago
    My findings would be a bit esoteric for this arena, arcane stuff about when Italian music scholars started using counterpoint, previously unknown ancient Irish nature poems by bored medieval monks etc. And I'm only just evolving my methodology to the google books stuff - it's actually formatted quite badly if you want to read the pages (scans are bigger than my screen) but is still a lot quicker than travelling to a university library & trawling through parchments (when you're allowed).
icey 17y ago
The data nerd in me went straight looking for where I could download a file that had a million books in it... I guess they expect us to just get them one-by-one, eh?
anurag 17y ago
Though epub is nice, scanned PDFs might still be the only feasible option given the current limitations of Google's OCR tech illustrated here: http://ebooktest.blogspot.com/2009/08/googles-one-million-ebooks-of-crap.html http://ebooktest.blogspot.com/2009/08/googles-one-million-eb...
technomancy 17y ago
I'd like to hope that this will light a fire under Amazon to get the Kindle to support epub, but I know that's wishful thinking. =\
pavs 17y ago
Why is President Barrack Obama's book "The Audacity of Hope" available for free (not download but you can read the whole book)? Is it under public domain?
- tokenadult 17y ago
  Possessors of copyright can waive certain rights if they so choose.
  - pavs 17y ago
    Nice. Even though I am avid book collector, I have been finding myself reading more books on my computer (mostly PDF) over paperback books. I hope this catches on and more authors make their books available for everyone to read.
Engine-uity 17y ago
Free is the key to a successful online company. Google, Facebook, Myspace and Youtube are the top web giants that prove this. When giving something away for free that consumers demand equals traffic. High traffic increases the value of ad space on a site. Google understands this very well and this why they have never attempted to sell any software or features they develope. I'm sure google spend a lot of time and money creating and perfect their free software that programers sell for hundreds of dollars. The internet is the only place were one can profit from giving away their product free. This is why old business models and rules do not apply to Online companies.
nalbyuites 17y ago
Maybe they should join hands with Project Gutenberg now and both parties can save substantial duplication of effort.
fno 17y ago
Now if only they'd make it truly free, provide an easy download option (also the possibility to get the whole archive) and use the crowd to improve the quality of the text. I wonder if re-hosting is allowed, then someone could start a plain archive where people can upload the files.
mlLK 17y ago
to cut to the chase, http://books.google.com/googlebooks/agreement/ http://books.google.com/googlebooks/agreement/

93 points by naish 17y ago

So very awesome...

That format will be a useful addition to the .PDF format already available for full-access Google Books. Many mobile book-reading devices are adopting the EPUB format. http://www.web-books.com/Publishing/epub.htm http://www.web-books.com/Publishing/epub.htm I use public-domain mathematics textbooks--including classics like Chrystal's book on algebra--to prepare lecture notes for the supplemental math classes I teach. The Google Books are a great resource.

vdoma 17y ago

What's interesting is that not all "full view" books are available for download. I wish there were a filter for just downloadable books.

tokenadult 17y ago
What's interesting is that not all "full view" books are available for download. Are most of the examples you have seen been books published recently enough to still be copyrighted? That has been my experience, in the subjects I have searched. A sufficiently old book (one definitely in the public domain) seems to have had a .PDF available for full-text download for a while, and now the new .EPUB format too.

cakeface 17y ago

If you want a nice epub reader I use http://bookworm.oreilly.com/ http://bookworm.oreilly.com/.

abdelazer 17y ago
Yeah, we need to ask Google to whitelist Bookworm so that it can do a remote add-from-URL (described in http://labs.oreilly.com/2009/07/new-features-and-bug-fixes-for-bookworm.html http://labs.oreilly.com/2009/07/new-features-and-bug-fixes-f...). Right now they're blocking it (just like if you tried wget)...
- cakeface 17y ago
  Yeah, I tried to make a bookmarklet for "Add to Bookworm" and ran into that problem.

zhyder 17y ago

"In a world where educational opportunities are often disproportionately allocated, it's exciting to think that today anyone with an Internet connection can download any of over one million free public domain books" I've always thought the OLPC should have pursued a cheap e-reader for public works, rather than a general-purpose $100 ($200 in practice) laptop. You should be able to make an LCD-based e-reader for $50 [1] already. A $20 device doesn't seem far out either. LCDs can also be bistable, so power is only used when the page changes: http://www.nemoptic.com/ http://www.nemoptic.com/ . (They still won't look as good as EInk's electrophoretic displays, but the $ savings are non-trivial.) [1] E.g. datapoint: Coby's portable DVD player with 7" color LCD is $60: http://www.amazon.com/Coby-TFDVD7008-7-Inch-Portable-Player/dp/B001PRKKB6/ref=sr_1_3 http://www.amazon.com/Coby-TFDVD7008-7-Inch-Portable-Player/...

zzzmarcus 17y ago

Stanza is a great, free, iPhone app for reading EPUB books. Right now you have to open the EPUB file with the desktop version of Stanza then download it from the same wireless network on your iPhone. I imagine in the near future you'll be able to search Google Books from directly within Stanza (like you can with several other sites). In fact, the only reason I can think of that you wouldn't be able to do so would be if Amazon were to nix it seeing as how they own Lexcycle now.

sharpn 17y ago

When not hacking, I love investigating the marginalia (doodles in the margins) of medieval Italian, English & Irish manuscripts. Google's book scanning project is awesome for this. Ten years ago I couldn't have imagined having uninterrupted access to this stuff, ever.

nreece 17y ago
I love investigating the marginalia (doodles in the margins) of medieval Italian, English & Irish manuscripts. Sounds interesting. Care to share some of your findings, or maybe the methodology you employ for your research.
- sharpn 17y ago
  My findings would be a bit esoteric for this arena, arcane stuff about when Italian music scholars started using counterpoint, previously unknown ancient Irish nature poems by bored medieval monks etc. And I'm only just evolving my methodology to the google books stuff - it's actually formatted quite badly if you want to read the pages (scans are bigger than my screen) but is still a lot quicker than travelling to a university library & trawling through parchments (when you're allowed).

icey 17y ago

The data nerd in me went straight looking for where I could download a file that had a million books in it... I guess they expect us to just get them one-by-one, eh?

anurag 17y ago

Though epub is nice, scanned PDFs might still be the only feasible option given the current limitations of Google's OCR tech illustrated here: http://ebooktest.blogspot.com/2009/08/googles-one-million-ebooks-of-crap.html http://ebooktest.blogspot.com/2009/08/googles-one-million-eb...

technomancy 17y ago

I'd like to hope that this will light a fire under Amazon to get the Kindle to support epub, but I know that's wishful thinking. =\

pavs 17y ago

Why is President Barrack Obama's book "The Audacity of Hope" available for free (not download but you can read the whole book)? Is it under public domain?

tokenadult 17y ago
Possessors of copyright can waive certain rights if they so choose.
- pavs 17y ago
  Nice. Even though I am avid book collector, I have been finding myself reading more books on my computer (mostly PDF) over paperback books. I hope this catches on and more authors make their books available for everyone to read.

Engine-uity 17y ago

Free is the key to a successful online company. Google, Facebook, Myspace and Youtube are the top web giants that prove this. When giving something away for free that consumers demand equals traffic. High traffic increases the value of ad space on a site. Google understands this very well and this why they have never attempted to sell any software or features they develope. I'm sure google spend a lot of time and money creating and perfect their free software that programers sell for hundreds of dollars. The internet is the only place were one can profit from giving away their product free. This is why old business models and rules do not apply to Online companies.

nalbyuites 17y ago

Maybe they should join hands with Project Gutenberg now and both parties can save substantial duplication of effort.

fno 17y ago

Now if only they'd make it truly free, provide an easy download option (also the possibility to get the whole archive) and use the crowd to improve the quality of the text. I wonder if re-hosting is allowed, then someone could start a plain archive where people can upload the files.

mlLK 17y ago

to cut to the chase, http://books.google.com/googlebooks/agreement/ http://books.google.com/googlebooks/agreement/