[bksvol-discuss] Re: Bookshare & PQ submissions

  • From: Cindy <popularplace@xxxxxxxxx>
  • To: bksvol-discuss@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
  • Date: Thu, 7 Aug 2008 23:51:29 -0700 (PDT)

Thanks for that info and explanation, Pavi (Cindy said sadly).

Some of us do have a list of the books of books that HarperCollins is donating 
(and any one of us will gladly send it to anyone who wants it) so we won't 
waste time scanning and/or validating one of those, unless it's needed ASAP. 
Could we also please have lists of the books coming from Scholastic? I think 
O'Reilly is primarily textbooks, and I don't know if anyone is planning to scan 
any of those, but I've been noticing that the Scholastic books that have been 
added to the collection are children's and juvenile literature and it would be 
very helpful to know not to scan or validate those.

Cindy

--- On Thu, 8/7/08, Pavi Mehta <pavim@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

> From: Pavi Mehta <pavim@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
> Subject: [bksvol-discuss] Bookshare & PQ submissions
> To: bksvol-discuss@xxxxxxxxxxxxx, bksvol-discuss@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
> Cc: "Lisa Friendly" <lisa.f@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
> Date: Thursday, August 7, 2008, 2:20 PM
> Hi All,
> 
> In the light of recent discussions on the list regarding
> Publisher quality submissions we wanted to send an email to
> all of you to clarify Bookshare's position on this.
> 
> While volunteers continue to be our primary source of books
> being put into the collection, upgrading books already in
> the collection continues to be one of Bookshare’s primary
> goals.  Many volunteers have contributed thousands of hours
> in improving books in the collection, and they do a great
> job!  But publishers have resources that allow them to
> create perfect copies of books. Bookshare would like every
> single book in the collection to be absolutely perfect, and
> this goal actually might be achievable if we can convince
> publishers to donate e-book versions of their books. Many of
> the Publisher Quality books that we receive are in perfect
> condition, but not quite all at this point, as the
> technology is evolving in the publishing industry. 
> 
> We need to encourage publishers to donate their books,
> since eventually they will be donating ONLY perfect books.
> And wouldn’t that be wonderful? Imagine every single book
> in the collection being perfect! Currently it’s a goal,
> but someday, maybe not too far away, it might be possible to
> achieve it.
> We know that thousands of volunteers have contributed
> hundreds of thousands of hours of effort in putting books
> into the collection, and we acknowledge that the vast
> majority of our books are in excellent condition.  But
> upgrading our books will always be a primary goal, and to
> that end, we will replace current books with publisher
> quality books. It is also very important for us to let our
> volunteer community know that this replacement policy is in
> fact a requirement of the contracts that we sign with the
> publishing houses.
> 
> To the extent possible, we will also inform the volunteers
> of the books that publishers will be sending us, so as to
> not duplicate efforts. With every batch of books that
> publishers send us, there are software changes required in
> our processing of their books, so the books are currently
> being added to the collection in at a fairly slow trickle.
> But we are pretty optimistic that in the near future, the
> speed of donating books and processing them will increase.
> Our mandate from the US Department of Education is to put
> 100,000 new books into the collection in 5 years. We have no
> doubt that we will meet that goal, especially with all the
> Publisher Quality books that we are being given by the
> forward-thinking publishers who are so generous with their
> time, efforts and books. Huge thanks to O’Reilly,
> HarperCollins, Scholastic, and other publishing houses and
> to all of you as we continue to grow the collection as a
> team. 
> 
> 
> Carrie Karnos and Pavi Mehta
> Bookshare.org


      
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