Open Library

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Open Library
OpenLibrarypage.jpg
Open Library homepage in September 2011
Type of site
Digital library index
Available inEnglish
Revenuedonation
Websiteopenlibrary.org
Alexa rankPositive decrease 16,427 (April 2014)[1]
Commercialno
Registrationfree
Launched2006; 13 years ago (2006)
Current statusActive
Content license
data: public domain[2]
source code: AGPLv3[3]

Open Library is an online project intended to create "one web page for every book ever published". Created by Aaron Swartz[4][5], Brewster Kahle,[6] Alexis Rossi[7], Anand Chitipothu[7], and Rebecca Malamud[7], Open Library is a project of the non-profit Internet Archive and has been funded in part by a grant from the California State Library and the Kahle/Austin Foundation.

It provides access to many public domain and out-of-print books, which can be read online.

Book database and digital lending library[edit]

Its book information is collected from the Library of Congress, other libraries, and Amazon.com, as well as from user contributions through a Wiki-like interface.[5] If books are available in digital form, a button labelled "Read" appears next to its catalog listing. Links to where books can be purchased or borrowed are also provided.

There are different entities in the database:

  • authors
  • works (which are the aggregate of all books with the same title and text)
  • editions (which are different publications of the corresponding works)

Open Library claims to have 6 million authors and 20 million books (not works), and about one million public domain books available as digitized books.[8] Tens of thousands of modern books were made available from four[9] and then 150 libraries and publishers[10] for ebook digital lending.

Technical[edit]

Open Library began in 2006 with Aaron Swartz as the original engineer and leader of Open the Library's technical team.[4][5] The project was led by George Oates from April 2009 to December 2011.[11] Oates was responsible for a complete site redesign during her tenure.[12] In 2015, the project was continued by Giovanni Damiola and then Brenton Cheng and Mek Karpeles in 2016.

The site was redesigned and relaunched in May 2010. Its codebase is on GitHub.[13] The site uses Infobase, its own database framework based on PostgreSQL, and Infogami, its own Wiki engine written in Python.[14] The source code to the site is published under the GNU Affero General Public License.[15][3]

Books for the blind and dyslexic[edit]

The website was relaunched adding ADA compliance and offering over 1 million modern and older books to the print disabled in May 2010[16] using the DAISY Digital Talking Book.[17] Under certain provisions of United States copyright law, libraries are sometimes able to reproduce copyrighted works in formats accessible to users with disabilities.[18][19]

Copyright Violation[edit]

As of February 2019, the Open Library has been accused of mass copyright violation, via the systematic distribution of in-print, in-copyright books, by the American Authors Guild[20], the British Society of Authors[21], the Australian Society of Authors[22] and the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America[23]. The UK Society of Authors threatened legal action unless the Open Library agreed to cease distribution of copyrighted works by 1-Feb-2019 [24]. Individual authors reported that Open Library had ignored multiple DCMA takedown notices until after they made a fuss on the Internet Archive blog[25]

See also[edit]

References[edit]

  1. ^ "Openlibrary.org Site Info". Alexa Internet. Archived from the original on 2015-02-16. Retrieved 2014-04-01.
  2. ^ Who owns the Open Library catalog? Openlibrary.org
  3. ^ a b "openlibrary/LICENSE at master · internetarchive/openlibrary · GitHub". Github.com. Archived from the original on 2017-01-22. Retrieved 2015-06-26.
  4. ^ a b "A library bigger than any building". BBC News. 2007-07-31. Archived from the original on 2009-11-27. Retrieved 2010-07-06.
  5. ^ a b c Grossman, Wendy M (2009-01-22). "Why you can't find a library book in your search engine". The Guardian. London. Archived from the original on 2014-01-14. Retrieved 2010-07-06.
  6. ^ "Aaron Swartz: howtoget". Aaronsw.jottit.com. Archived from the original on 2015-05-23. Retrieved 2015-06-05.
  7. ^ a b c OpenLibrary.org. "The Open Library Team | Open Library". openlibrary.org. Retrieved 2018-07-16.
  8. ^ "About Us". Openlibrary.org. Archived from the original on 2015-06-27. Retrieved 2015-06-26.
  9. ^ Fowler, Geoffrey A. (2010-06-29). "Libraries Have a Novel Idea - WSJ". Online.wsj.com. Archived from the original on 2016-10-28. Retrieved 2015-06-26.
  10. ^ "Internet Archive Forums: In-Library eBook Lending Program Launched". Archive.org. 2011-02-22. Retrieved 2015-06-26.
  11. ^ "George". Openlibrary.org. Retrieved 2015-06-26.
  12. ^ Oates, George (2010-03-17). "Announcing the Open Library redesign « The Open Library Blog". Blog.openlibrary.org. Archived from the original on 2015-06-27. Retrieved 2015-06-26.
  13. ^ "internetarchive/openlibrary · GitHub". Github.com. Archived from the original on 2015-08-10. Retrieved 2015-06-26.
  14. ^ "About the Technology". Openlibrary.org. Archived from the original on 2015-06-27. Retrieved 2015-06-26.
  15. ^ "Developers / Licensing". Openlibrary.org. Archived from the original on 2015-06-27. Retrieved 2015-06-26.
  16. ^ "Project puts 1M books online for blind, dyslexic | UTSanDiego.com". Signonsandiego.com. 2010-05-05. Archived from the original on 2011-12-17. Retrieved 2015-06-26.
  17. ^ "Welcome to Daisy Books for the Print Disabled". Internet Archive. Retrieved 10 December 2012.
  18. ^ "NLS Factsheets: Copyright Law Amendment, 1996: PL 104-197". Library of Congress NLS Factsheets. Library of Congress. Archived from the original on 2017-05-21.
  19. ^ Scheid, Maria. "Copyright and Accessibility". Copyright Corner. The Ohio State University Libraries. Archived from the original on 2016-06-30.
  20. ^ https://form.jotformeu.com/90131857822356
  21. ^ https://form.jotformeu.com/90131857822356
  22. ^ https://www.asauthors.org/news/open-library-copyright-infringement
  23. ^ https://www.sfwa.org/2018/01/infringement-alert/
  24. ^ https://www.theguardian.com/books/2019/jan/22/internet-archives-ebook-loans-face-uk-copyright-challenge
  25. ^ http://www.victoriastrauss.com/2018/02/22/how-the-internet-archive-infringed-my-copyrights-and-then-kind-of-blew-me-off/

Further reading[edit]

External links[edit]

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