On Sat, 13 Feb 2010, don kretz wrote:
Interesting. I hadn't realize the two organizations were so closely interdependent.
Well, yes. There is a lot of interplay and adaption between the two. But I would not say that either is dependant upon the other for its existence. If PG were to somehow disappear or close down, I'm sure that DP would continue, finding another repository for its finished texts--or creating one if needed. And if DP were to disappear, PG would go on just as it always has, only with a much lower volume of texts being posted.
So effectively, PG's release volume is almost directly dependent on DP's posting volume.
The majority of new PG texts for many years have come frome DP, yes. For a quick comparison, I see that DP's 15,000th text was posted on May 12, 2009. They will have done many more since then, and have by now done more than half of the 31,000 odd items in PG. A while ago, I added this to the Wikipedia article on Project Gutenberg, to try to clarify what effect DP had had on it: "This effort greatly increased the number and variety of texts being added to Project Gutenberg, as well as making it easier for new volunteers to start contributing." I could go on describing the hows and wherefores of that in more detail, but this is getting too long already.
And whatever validation requirements PG might have don't have much relevance if they differ from DP's requirements, as long as the WWers don't reject them.
Well, that has been part of the balancing act, if you will. PG has always adapted (albeit, sometimes slowly) according to its contributors. And DP contributors, after conversations back and forth, have helped to shape what direction PG is going in. One example that comes to mind is dropping the requirement that a text be of a certain length, in order to accomodate all the sci-fi short stories. In my own opinion, this can be difficult, becuase there are many parts that make up this process of DP-PG. Sometimes people make suggestions that seem good from their point of view, but very few seem to have an accurate over-all picture, to know how one action can affect other parts of the process.
DP is the publisher, and PG is the distributor (roughly speaking).
I don't know if that metaphor fits perfectly. Project Gutenberg itself seems to fill more of the publishers role, as well as distributor and archiver. DP does what might be compared to the traditional roles of type-setter, proofreader, fact-checker, etc. And don't underestimate the role of the post-processor. It still comes down to one person who has to do a lot of work on the text, and often make descisions about how to deal with many various things, before it is ready for submitting to PG. --Andrew