How Project Gutenberg Does NOT Reflect Anyone's Personal Taste

How Project Gutenberg Does NOT Reflect Anyone's Personal Taste

by Michael S. Hart
Founder, Project Gutenberg



When I started Project Gutenberg and worked through the decade
of the 70's, the entire output of the 70's was dedicated to an
assortment of "History of Democracy" documents:  such as those
on the walls of so many malls, schools, etc., during that time
surrounding the United States Bicentennial year of 1976.

After that I researched the most quoted works in English and I
pursued those with the obvious choices of Shakespeare's works,
and The Bible.

From there we branched out widely to include books read by all
ages such as Alice In Wonderland and Peter Pan, and also those
books commonly called "reference books" with Roget's Thesaurus
in two different editions, and books called "heavy literature"
with two editions of Milton's Paradise Lost, all in the dozen,
or so, books that came after those mentioned above.

Thus, from the very start, Project Gutenberg had no collection
of anyone's personal taste, including, or particularly, tastes
that might be considered that of the founder, yours truly.

For the entire history of Project Gutenberg, when volunteers I
talked with asked me what books they should do, my response is
now, and always has been, that they should choose their own in
their own frames of reference, not to expect me or anyone else
to make the selections for them.  The only exceptions I should
probably add have been when we were very near completing works
of some particular author, and then we would send out messages
asking for help with the few remaining works.



The Fundamental Concepts of Project Gutenberg


Project Gutenberg embodies the most open of open door policies
with the goal of including as many people as possible in books
from all aspects:  production, proofreading, and distribution.

We want to encourage everyone at every level to participate in
Project Gutenberg at every level.

Project Gutenberg differs from nearly every other program that
you have ever heard of in that we work from the bottom up, NOT
from the top down.

We endeavor to make eBooks available in ways that everyone can
own and use them, with no particular requirements for programs
that cost readers, no need to store large files, or any others
of a number of eBook philosophies out there that embody what I
refer to as "Limited Distribution" in a new world that should,
would, and could embody "Unlimited Distribution."

Project Gutenberg's philosophy is to bring as many books to as
wide as possible larger audiences of readers around the world, 

meaning we must include books in a wide range of languages.

The whole idea has been to create a library with works of high
interest to a wider and wider range of readers, including, and
perhaps particularly aimed towards, those who have not had the
greatest opportunities in terms of reading.

In much the same vein, Project Gutenberg does not choose fonts
or formats of any particular kind for the books we produce.

We do not feel we should force our own personal tastes on some
reader out there who has their own taste, or is just now doing
the initial readings that create such a taste.

However, this does not mean we will not accept certain work in
certain formats, certain fonts, margination, pagination, etc.,
but we will also not make it against any rules for our readers
to convert those books into other fonts, margins, etc., though
we will pass on any messages from those who created the books,
including their own personal preferences as to what appearance
they find most suitable for that particular book.