The Million Book Project (or the Universal Library) was a book digitization project led by

Carnegie Mellon University Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) is a private research university in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. One of its predecessors was established in 1900 by Andrew Carnegie as the Carnegie Technical Schools; it became the Carnegie Institute of Technology ...

School of Computer Science and University Libraries from 2007–2008. Working with government and research partners in

India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...

(

Digital Library of India Digital Library of India, initially hosted by Indian Institute of Science, CDAC, Noida, IIIT-Hyderabad during 2000s working in partnership with the Million Book Project, provides free access to many books in English and Indian languages. The s ...

) and

China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's most populous country, with a population exceeding 1.4 billion, slightly ahead of India. China spans the equivalent of five time zones and ...

, the project scanned books in many languages, using OCR to enable full text searching, and providing free-to-read access to the books on the web. , they have completed the scanning of 1 million books and have made the entire catalog accessible online.

Description

The ''Million Book Project'' was a

501(c)3 A 501(c)(3) organization is a United States corporation, trust, unincorporated association or other type of organization exempt from federal income tax under section 501(c)(3) of Title 26 of the United States Code. It is one of the 29 types of 50 ...

charity organization with various scanning centers throughout the world. By December 2007, more than 1.5 million books had been scanned, in 20 languages: 970,000 in Chinese; 360,000 in English; 50,000 in

Telugu Telugu may refer to: * Telugu language, a major Dravidian language of India *Telugu people, an ethno-linguistic group of India * Telugu script, used to write the Telugu language ** Telugu (Unicode block), a block of Telugu characters in Unicode S ...

; and 40,000 in Arabic. Most of the books are in the

public domain The public domain (PD) consists of all the creative work A creative work is a manifestation of creative effort including fine artwork (sculpture, paintings, drawing, sketching, performance art), dance, writing (literature), filmmaking, ...

, but permission has been acquired to include over 60,000 copyrighted books (roughly 53,000 in English and 7,000 in Indian languages). The books are mirrored in part at sites in India, China, Carnegie Mellon, the

Internet Archive The Internet Archive is an American digital library with the stated mission of "universal access to all knowledge". It provides free public access to collections of digitized materials, including websites, software applications/games, music, ...

Bibliotheca Alexandrina The Bibliotheca Alexandrina (Latin for "Library of Alexandria"; arz, مكتبة الإسكندرية ', ) is a major library and cultural center on the shore of the Mediterranean Sea in Alexandria, Egypt. It is a commemoration of the Library ...

. The books that have been scanned to date are not yet all available online, and no single site has copies of all the books that are available online. The million book project was a "proof of concept" that has largely been replaced by

HathiTrust HathiTrust Digital Library is a large-scale collaborative repository of digital content from research libraries including content digitized via Google Books and the Internet Archive digitization initiatives, as well as content digitized locally ...

, Google Book Search and the Internet Archive book scanning projects. The Internet Archive may have some books that Google does not (e.g.: ''The Poems of Robert Frost'' published after the end of 1922). The

National Science Foundation The National Science Foundation (NSF) is an independent agency of the United States government that supports fundamental research and education in all the non-medical fields of science and engineering. Its medical counterpart is the National I ...

(NSF) awarded Carnegie Mellon $3.63M over four years for equipment and administrative travel for the Million Book Project. India provided $25M annually to support language translation research projects. The Ministry of Education in China provided $8.46M over three years. The Internet Archive provided equipment, staff and money. The University of California, Merced Library funded the work to acquire copyright permission from U.S. publishers. The program ended in 2008.

Partner institutions

China

The institutions in China which are participants in this project include: *

Ministry of Education of the People's Republic of China The Ministry of Education of the People's Republic of China is a cabinet-level department under the State Council responsible for basic education, vocational education, higher education, and other educational affairs across the country. The Min ...

Chinese Academy of Science The Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS); ), known by Academia Sinica in English until the 1980s, is the national academy of the People's Republic of China for natural sciences. It has historical origins in the Academia Sinica during the Republic ...

Fudan University Fudan University () is a national public research university in Shanghai, China. Fudan is a member of the C9 League, Project 985, Project 211, and the Double First Class University identified by the Ministry of Education of China. It is als ...

Nanjing University Nanjing University (NJU; ) is a national public research university in Nanjing, Jiangsu. It is a member of C9 League and a Class A Double First Class University designated by the Chinese central government. NJU has two main campuses: the Xianl ...

Peking University Peking University (PKU; ) is a public research university in Beijing, China. The university is funded by the Ministry of Education. Peking University was established as the Imperial University of Peking in 1898 when it received its royal charter ...

Tsinghua University Tsinghua University (; abbreviation, abbr. THU) is a National university, national Public university, public research university in Beijing, China. The university is funded by the Ministry of Education of the People's Republic of China, Minis ...

Zhejiang University Zhejiang University, abbreviated as ZJU or Zheda and formerly romanized as Chekiang University, is a national public research university based in Hangzhou, Zhejiang, China. It is a member of the prestigious C9 League and is selected into the na ...

Northeast Normal University Northeast Normal University (; often abbreviated NENU or ) is one of the six national normal universities in the People's Republic of China, located in Changchun, Jilin province. The university was ranked number 37 in the comprehensive ranki ...

India

The institutions in India which are participants in this project include: *

Indian Institute of Science The Indian Institute of Science (IISc) is a public, deemed, research university for higher education and research in science, engineering, design, and management. It is located in Bengaluru, in the Indian state of Karnataka. The institute wa ...

Bangalore Bangalore (), officially Bengaluru (), is the capital and largest city of the Indian state of Karnataka. It has a population of more than and a metropolitan population of around , making it the third most populous city and fifth most ...

* International Institute of Information Technology,

Hyderabad Hyderabad ( ; , ) is the capital and largest city of the Indian state of Telangana and the ''de jure'' capital of Andhra Pradesh. It occupies on the Deccan Plateau along the banks of the Musi River (India), Musi River, in the northern part ...

Indian Institute of Information Technology Indian Institutes of Information Technology (IIITs) are a group of 26 interdisciplinary technology-based- engineering research institutions in India which are focused on information technology. Five of them are established, funded and managed ...

Allahabad Allahabad (), officially known as Prayagraj, also known as Ilahabad, is a metropolis in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh.The other five cities were: Agra, Kanpur (Cawnpore), Lucknow, Meerut, and Varanasi (Benares). It is the administrat ...

Anna University Anna University is a public state university located in Tamil Nadu, India. The main campus is in Chennai. It was originally established on 4 September 1978 and was named after C. N. Annadurai, the former Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu. History & ...

Chennai Chennai (, ), formerly known as Madras ( the official name until 1996), is the capital city of Tamil Nadu, the southernmost Indian state. The largest city of the state in area and population, Chennai is located on the Coromandel Coast of th ...

Mysore University The University of Mysore is a public state university in Mysore, Karnataka, India. The university was founded during the reign of Krishnaraja Wadiyar IV, the Maharaja of Mysore. The university is recognised by the University Grants Commission ...

Mysore Mysore (), officially Mysuru (), is a city in the southern part of the state of Karnataka, India. Mysore city is geographically located between 12° 18′ 26″ north latitude and 76° 38′ 59″ east longitude. It is located at an altitude of ...

University of Pune Savitribai Phule Pune University (SPPU), formerly the University of Poona, is a collegiate public state university located in the city of Pune, India. It was established in 1949, and is spread over a campus in the neighbourhood of Ganeshk ...

Pune Pune (; ; also known as Poona, (List of renamed Indian cities and states#Maharashtra, the official name from 1818 until 1978) is one of the most important industrial and educational hubs of India, with an estimated population of 7.4 million ...

Goa University Goa University is a public state research university headquartered in the city of Panaji, in the Indian state of Goa. In addition to Panaji ( Taleigão Plateau Campus), it has a campus in Margao, Mapusa, Ponda, Old Goa and Vasco da Gama. Th ...

Goa Goa () is a state on the southwestern coast of India within the Konkan region, geographically separated from the Deccan highlands by the Western Ghats. It is located between the Indian states of Maharashtra to the north and Karnataka to the ...

Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanams Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanams (TTD) is an independent trust which manages the temples including the Tirumala Venkateswara Temple in Andhra Pradesh. The trust oversees the operations and finances of the richest and the most visited religious cent ...

, Tirupathi *

Shanmugha Arts, Science, Technology & Research Academy The Shanmugha Arts, Science, Technology & Research Academy, also known as SASTRA, is a private and deemed university in the town of Thirumalaisamudram, Thanjavur district, Tamil Nadu, India. SASTRA is ranked by global ranking agencies such a ...

Tanjore Thanjavur (), also Tanjore, Pletcher 2010, p. 195 is a city in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu. Thanjavur is the 11th biggest city in Tamil Nadu. Thanjavur is an important center of South Indian religion, art, and architecture. Most of the Gr ...

Kalasalingam Academy of Research and Education Kalasalingam Academy of Research and Education (KARE), formerly Arulmigu Kalasalingam College of Engineering and Kalasalingam University, is a private deemed to be university located in Krishnankoil near Rajapalayam in Tamil Nadu, India. The ca ...

Srivilliputhur Srivilliputhur (), is a Municipality in Virudhunagar district in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu. As of 2011, the town had a population of 75,396. The most important landmark of Srivilliputhur is 11-tiered tower structure dedicated to the Vatapat ...

Maharashtra Industrial Development Corporation Maharashtra Industrial Development Corporation (MIDC) is a project of the government of Maharashtra state in India and is the leading corporation of Maharashtra. It provides businesses with infrastructure such as land (open plot or built-up spa ...

Mumbai Mumbai (, ; also known as Bombay — the official name until 1995) is the capital city of the Indian state of Maharashtra and the ''de facto'' financial centre of India. According to the United Nations, as of 2018, Mumbai is the second- ...

United States

The institutions in the U.S. which are participants include: *

Indiana University Indiana University (IU) is a system of public universities in the U.S. state of Indiana. Campuses Indiana University has two core campuses, five regional campuses, and two regional centers under the administration of IUPUI. *Indiana Universit ...

Pennsylvania State University The Pennsylvania State University (Penn State or PSU) is a Public university, public Commonwealth System of Higher Education, state-related Land-grant university, land-grant research university with campuses and facilities throughout Pennsylvan ...

Stanford University Stanford University, officially Leland Stanford Junior University, is a private research university in Stanford, California. The campus occupies , among the largest in the United States, and enrolls over 17,000 students. Stanford is consider ...

* TriColleges ( Swarthmore, Haverford, Bryn Mawr) *

University of California, Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California) is a public land-grant research university in Berkeley, California. Established in 1868 as the University of California, it is the state's first land-grant u ...

University of California, Merced The University of California, Merced (UC Merced) is a public land-grant research university and Hispanic-serving institution located in Merced, California, and is the tenth and newest of the University of California (UC) campuses. Established ...

University of Pittsburgh The University of Pittsburgh (Pitt) is a public state-related research university in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The university is composed of 17 undergraduate and graduate schools and colleges at its urban Pittsburgh campus, home to the universit ...

University of Washington The University of Washington (UW, simply Washington, or informally U-Dub) is a public research university in Seattle, Washington. Founded in 1861, Washington is one of the oldest universities on the West Coast; it was established in Seattle a ...

Europe

The institutions in the EU which are participants include: *

Copenhagen University The University of Copenhagen ( da, Københavns Universitet, KU) is a prestigious public research university in Copenhagen, Denmark. Founded in 1479, the University of Copenhagen is the second-oldest university in Scandinavia after Uppsala Unive ...

Aarhus University Aarhus University ( da, Aarhus Universitet, abbreviated AU) is a public research university with its main campus located in Aarhus, Denmark. It is the second largest and second oldest university in Denmark. The university is part of the Coimbra Gr ...

Odense University Odense University was a university in Odense, Denmark. It was established in 1966. In 1998, the university was merged with two other institutions to form the University of Southern Denmark. Its campus is now known as University of Southern Denmark ...

Denmark Virtual Library

Description

Partner institutions

China

India

United States

Europe

See also

References

External links