Not a lot of people realize this, but there is actually a resource online which offers people free books. Now, these are not “free” books in the sense where they only going to be free if you buy something, or if you surrender your contact information. These are books that you can just download and read, without there being anything fancy, difficult or privacy violating about it. All you have to do is go to Project Gutenberg’s website, and you can just download books like it is no big deal. It is rather like a library, only you do not have to physically go anywhere or concern yourself with returning the books that you check out. They are just on your computer, without any kind of a hassle.
The sweet things about Project Gutenberg are several. For one thing, they offer a whole lot of books, ranging from self help and reference books all the way to classic stories of various different genres. While it is not quite the same thing as your local Barnes and Noble, you do have the option of finding a few hundred thousand different books. While that is not exactly the Library of Congress, and these are not all of the shiny new titles with attractive covers on them, Treasure Island and Moby Dick still read as well today as they ever did.
What it really comes down to is, Project Gutenberg is a research tool into the human condition. Some people have said that once something has made it onto the Internet, it essentially becomes immortal. The net is way too big for anyone to ever police, and destroying it would be about as easy as destroying an ocean. And truth be known, less people would complain if an ocean suddenly disappeared. But over all, you can learn an awful lot about our past, as well as how to do woodworking and cook neat recipes. And it’s all free!
