mike said:
Despite being out of print (a reprint is planned for later this year by Ess Ess Publications of India <http://www.essessreference.com/servlet/esgetbiblio?n=000313>), Five Laws is arguably the most important work in library science to date.
that's quite a sad commentary, isn't it, that what is arguably _the_ most important work in library science to date is _out_of_print_... so congratulations on bringing it back to life. the .pdf versions you've made are not as useful as they could be, however, because you've just wrapped the scans into a .pdf. that means that the text cannot be searched or copied out of it, and those are two of the big benefits of e-books. so yes, you are right they would be better with digital text. but there's no need to transcribe. instead, o.c.r. the scans, correct the results, and then wrap that digital text into several formats: plain text could be one, .html could be another, and even .pdf (except this time with text that is searchable and could be copied out of the .pdf). further, the scans could also be used themselves. (but you should strive for higher-quality scans.) here's a rough sketch of how to proceed: 1. scan the book's pages. 2. clean up the scans. (straighten, crop, etc.) 3. perform the o.c.r. 4. clean up the text. 5. proofread the text against the scans. 6. auto-convert the text to .html. 7. auto-convert the text to .pdf. i'd be willing to help guide you on any of the steps. (especially the last couple, which some people might try and tell you are "impossible". don't believe them.) distributed proofreaders would probably also help if you could donate the text to project gutenberg. since there will be one copy in cyberspace anyway, tell the publisher there might as well be lots of 'em. (online copies don't really cannibalize print sales; indeed, there are some indications they feed 'em.) besides, _books_are_for_use_, are they not? :+) for some pretty "digital reprint" examples to look at, see:
http://www.ibiblio.org/ebooks/Mabie/Books_Culture.pdf http://www.ibiblio.org/ebooks/Cather/Antonia/Antonia.pdf http://www.ibiblio.org/ebooks/Einstein/Einstein_Relativity.pdf
for a look at a system that enables volunteers to proofread, see:
http://www.greatamericannovel.com/mabie/mabiep001.html http://www.greatamericannovel.com/myant/myantc001.html http://www.greatamericannovel.com/ahmmw/ahmmwc001.html http://www.greatamericannovel.com/sgfhb/sgfhbc001.html
-bowerbird