On 02/11/2013 02:18 PM, Jon Hurst wrote:
On 2013-02-11, Marcello Perathoner wrote:
Why should PG reorganise itself into a copy of something that already exists elsewhere? See: www.openlibrary.org
Because PG could do it with better focus and higher quality.
I doubt it. I'm not saying impossible, but very improbable. gutenberg.us (also known as the infamous PG II) has been trying to be a meta-catalog for years now, without any success in my eyes. Also, there are hundreds of other meta-catalogs around. People coming to PG want PG, not yet another meta-catalog full of crap.
Why should PG turn itself from a trusted source of books of reliable quality into a repository of every kind of crap somebody wanted to throw in?
"Reliable quality" and "every kind of crap" are highly subjective -- who gets to decide on behalf of our customers which is which? You believe you can do better than the current library using RST; some people will agree your versions are superior, some won't. Those that agree can use your library. Those that don't can avoid it.
I am not suggesting an Internet free for all. It would be easy to approve DP and current solo contributors. For the rest, build a library of a few books and send Greg a link; if he likes what he sees he can approve a new library.
Same question: why do you not submit your better books to openlibrary.org? They already do what you want us to do. You can host them on archive.org.
Who is going to audit the copyright status of submitted works? You'll have to check each book description and every single cover page. You'll also have to check if the book is indeed derived from a PG edition or if there's "value added" in form of copyrighted illustrations, introductions, author biographies etc.
Same as now -- you need a clearance to include a book in a PG library. You can, of course, also do a book that has already had a clearance. For the "value added" issue, have a take-down mechanism and ban repeat offenders.
And who will check that the clearance covers the book? So the WWers will be burdened not only by genuine PG editions but they'll also have to check every `derived´ edition anybody has posted anywhere. Regards -- Marcello Perathoner webmaster@gutenberg.org