Creating a free to read international digital library - five years later

The Million Book Project was begun in 2003 with the vision of creating a free-to-read, universally accessible, million-book digital resource by 2007 to provide a test bed for developing digital library tools and software. By spring 2007 1.4 million titles were digitized.

The project stemmed from a collaboration of the university library and the school of computer science at Carnegie Mellon University. From the project’s inception partners included libraries, institutions of higher education and research organizations in China, India and the U.S., essentially computer scientists and librarians. Additional partners have been added selectively as the project became more visible in the international community.

This paper will discuss the challenges faced over the last five years through the partnership of organizations, some linked to national digital strategies and some not; highlight lessons learned from this project; and reflect on the future of this and other large scale digitization efforts.