Free Book Download – Google Books
Author: Chris Holgate
Google Books was initially started back in 2002 when a group of Google employees pondered how long it would take to scan and archive every book ever written.
While the first scan was done manually on a 300 page book and took 40 minutes to process, Google now use cameras capable of scanning at a rate of 1,000 pages an hour and also work with 20,000 publisher partners who provide content directly. They have also been able to provide over 1 million books that can be read in full from cover to cover; these unrestricted works are either books that have fallen out of copyright or have been provided with publishers express permission.
As well as simply scanning the books, Google performs OCR (Optical Character Recognition) on the pages, thereby turning them in to pure text which can be entered in to their database. As a result when you do a Google Search you are now not only returned results from relevant websites but also your search terms are checked against a library encompassing millions of books and appropriate matches are suggested for further reading.
The integration in to the Google Search engine means you may have already inadvertently stumbled across Google Books but if you haven’t and are eager to explore then the Google Books can be found by visiting the site http://books.google.co.uk/ directly. Being a Google service, it almost goes without saying that the service is completely free of charge and is instead paid for via a minimal number of sponsored links which are in no way intrusive or detrimental to the service.
From the Google Books site you can perform searches, add books to your virtual library or organise your collection in a logical manner. Searching for a book and then subsequently clicking on it opens an interface which allows you to either view the directly scanned pages from the book or in some instances a ‘plain text’ version. This plain text can then be copied and passed to another application or simply printed out for reading offline.
In order to stay within the law, books under copyright have limits placed on the number of viewable pages. Despite the fact that this is akin to simply flicking through the book in a bookshop there have rather predictably been a number of lawsuits.
The most notable lawsuit would have been the case between the Publishing Industry, the Actors Guild and Google which say Google pay out a total of 5 million. This paid not only for court costs of the plaintiffs but also went on to create a ‘Book Rights Registry’ which collects revenue from sites such as Google and disburses it amongst authors.
On the whole I am again amazed that Google have been able to offer such an incredible gift to the world. Google Books has the potential to preserve centuries of human literacy work for generations to come. It also serves to promote the spread and availability of knowledge amongst all groups and all classes of people.
Article Source: http://www.articlesbase.com/computers-articles/free-book-download-google-books-2060899.html
About the Author
Ink Cartridges
November 30, -0001
12:00 am #comment-1
Google Book Downloader is small utility which allows you to save book as PDF from google to your local filesystem.
This project is purely non-commercial and for educational purpose.
This project does not promote any illegal conduct of any kind.
http://www.codeplex.com/GoogleBookDownloader
Cathy
November 30, -0001
12:00 am #comment-2
Google Books tells you what library a book is in.
November 30, -0001
12:00 am #comment-3
Hmm, I don’t use Google books and don’t know what it is. Try wikipedia to see if you can find the names of some children’s books authors. The Brother’s Grim wrote so-called children’s stories, but you might want to read them to make sure they’re appropriate for your children. Also, look up the author of Alice in Wonderland, which is in the public domain, and that’s by Lewis Carrol (not 100% sure), I think the Carrol title is Through the Looking Glass. Little Red Riding Hood, Snow White, Cinderella, Hansel and Grettel. Whatever book or story you can remember from childhood might be in the public domain and I know these titles are. Look up some of these titles on Wikipedia and it might lead you to other childrens books and children’s books authors.
http://www.gutenberg.org/wiki/Main_Page and http://www.classicbookshelf.com/ are two sites where you can read or download for free books that are in the public domain.
November 30, -0001
12:00 am #comment-4
As for your first part ,one or two sites look promising,
AbeBooks: New & Used Books, Textbooks, Rare & Out of Print BooksSearch 13500 booksellers selling 100 million books … Interact with book lovers just like you. AbeBooks Wiki. Find information about books. …
http://www.abebooks.com/ – 48k – Cached – Similar pages
BookFinder.com: Search for New & Used Books, Textbooks, Out-of …Search engine that finds the best buys from among 150 million new, used, rare, and out-of-print books for sale. Includes textbooks and international titles.
http://www.bookfinder.com/ – 32k – Cached – Similar pages
windows live book searchbooks.live.com/ – Similar pages
Inside Google Book SearchThe official weblog on Google’s Book Search.
booksearch.blogspot.com/ – 62k – Cached – Similar pages
WELCOME TO THE BOOKSEARCH BIG LINKAffiliated with bookstores in USA, Canada, United Kingdom and Japan.
http://www.booksearch.com/ – 2k – Cached – Similar pages
AddALL Used and Out of Print book searchUsed book search and Out of Print book search one stop book search agent which search multiple online used books, out of print books, rare books, …
used.addall.com/ – 13k
AbeBooks: New & Used Books, Textbooks, Rare & Out of Print BooksSearch 13500 booksellers selling 100 million books … Interact with book lovers just like you. AbeBooks Wiki. Find information about books. …
http://www.abebooks.com/ – 48k – Cached – Similar pages
BookFinder.com: Search for New & Used Books, Textbooks, Out-of …Search engine that finds the best buys from among 150 million new, used, rare, and out-of-print books for sale. Includes textbooks and international titles.
http://www.bookfinder.com/ – 32k – Cached – Similar pages
windows live book searchbooks.live.com/ – Similar pages
Inside Google Book SearchThe official weblog on Google’s Book Search.
booksearch.blogspot.com/ – 62k – Cached – Similar pages
WELCOME TO THE BOOKSEARCH BIG LINKAffiliated with bookstores in USA, Canada, United Kingdom and Japan.
http://www.booksearch.com/ – 2k – Cached – Similar pages
AddALL Used and Out of Print book searchUsed book search and Out of Print book search one stop book search agent which search multiple online used books, out of print books, rare books, …
used.addall.com/ – 13k
November 30, -0001
12:00 am #comment-5
hope the following web site answers ur question:
http://books.google.com/support/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=43724
http://books.google.com/
October 20, 2007
8:39 am #comment-6
How do you print a book from Google Books?
I found a text document on Google Books and I need to print it.
March 18, 2008
11:42 am #comment-7
Does anybody know a search website like Google Books that can search for a range of books and show the pages?
Also, could anybody find the pages of the A-Level Product Design: Student Book (by Will Potts and Brian Evans) that are readable? I’ve looked on Google Books but it only gives you 25 pages and the book has 208 pages. Thanks.
October 20, 2008
4:41 pm #comment-8
How does google books work? I ‘ve gone to their site and most books have just a snippet review. How do I find ?
I’ve heard that google is scanning thousands of books and they are available on their book site; I find short reviews but that’s all; where are the full digitized books? Can I save them and read them on an e-book reader? TIA
August 11, 2009
10:04 am #comment-9
Is there a program for downloading the books from google books?
Is there a program for downloading the books from google books, not only viewing the books on the web site on the web browser.
November 14, 2009
10:35 pm #comment-10
How can I find Children’s books in public domain from google book?
When I search books in public domain from google book,
I can only specify the keyword to find what I want to read.
Since they are not categorised it’s really hard to find “some children’s books”
“children’s books” means some kind of easy books to read for low grade Elementary school kids.
Does anybody have an idea the way of finding those kind of books in public domain from google book?