Quote:
Originally Posted by MV64
I just recently started using Google heavily for scans of old books. This is amazing. Lots of obscure things that history lovers like me will enjoy. Probably a lot cleaner than Gutenberg texts, too. Not sure how well ePub does on a Sony, though.
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No, the EPubs are not cleaner than Gutenberg texts. Gutenberg stuff has been proofread. Admittedly, the earlier Gutenberg texts have a fair number of errors, but what you get with the Sony/Google ePubs is a straightforward mechanical conversion of their ocr'd texts. Sometimes the result is rather good. Other times it is appalling.
I have converted a number of the Google texts and find that even the good ones take the best part of a day to restore the italics, emdashes and remaining errors.
However, that being said, this is a free resource. Let's not complain. We have more books freely available, and that's a very good thing.