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Wednesday, August 11, 2010

How Many Books Are There?

I am a book and library nut. A nice piece by Google that takes a cut at the 'N' question about books. Along the way you learn quite a bit about books and how they are classified and counted today. If you have interest in the subject, read this:

"Books of the world, stand up and be counted! All 129,864,880 of you ... When you are part of a company that is trying to digitize all the books in the world, the first question you often get is: “Just how many books are out there?”

Well, it all depends on what exactly you mean by a “book.” We’re not going to count what library scientists call “works,” those elusive "distinct intellectual or artistic creations.” It makes sense to consider all editions of “Hamlet” separately, as we would like to distinguish between -- and scan -- books containing, for example, different forewords and commentaries ... "

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