I have written about the Kirtas Technologies book scanner, which can scan up to 2400 pages per hour. Yes, that device scans one page every one and a third seconds. Place a book into the device, press a button or two, and then walk away. You can return a few minutes later to find the entire book has been scanned and the data stored on the attached Windows PC. You don't even need to cut the bindings of the book as the device turns the pages and makes images as needed. You can see my pictures of this $120,000 book scanner in operation at http://blog.eogn.com/photos/ala2007/kirtasbookscanner1.html and at http://blog.eogn.com/photos/ala2007/kirtasbookscanner2.html.
Kirtas (pronounced KEER-tass) Technologies apparently isn't content to just make the scanners; the company also makes many out-of-print and out-of-copyright books available to customers, including a number of genealogy books. You can download a book to your computer's hard drive and read it there or even print pages from the book on your local printer. Another option is to have the entire book printed "on demand" and have it shipped to you.
Prices vary depending on the length of the book, but this is often the only method of obtaining a desired book without travel to a library that might be thousands of miles away.
I did a search for the word "genealogy" on the Kirtas Books web site and found many such books available, including A biographical history of the Eby family, being a history of their movements in Europe during the reformation, and of their early settlement in America; as also much other unpublished historical information belonging to the family (printed in 1899, 144 pages for $1.95), and A complete record of the John Olin family, the first of that name who came to America in the year A.D. 1678 (printed in 1893, 228 pages, for $1.95). These are but two examples of the many genealogy and family history books available.
Kirtas has an interesting option called "Invest in Knowledge" that can offset the price of digitizing a book for the first time. The program allows anyone to subsidize the digitization of one book and then to receive 5% commission on all future sales of that book through Kirtasbooks.com. You will receive a reprint of that book as well as the ongoing 5% commission.
Assuming that a book has not yet been digitized, you will need to find the book in one of the participating libraries. You can start your search on Kirtas Books' web site, which links to WorldCat, an online catalog of books held at libraries around the world. You then select the book that you want. Kirtas Books' employees or contractors will pull the book from the shelf, scan it, and then deliver it to you as a soft-cover, printed "book on demand." You pay the full price for that one book.
Kirtas Books then retains the electronic image of the book you selected. Kirtas will add it to the company's inventory, and you can (optionally) also promote the same book on your web site or by any other means available to you. Every time someone orders "your book" from Kirtas Books in the future, you receive a 5% commission. You can learn more about Kirtas Books' "Invest in Knowledge" program at http://www.kirtasbooks.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=12&Itemid=11.
All in all, I'd suggest this is a good method of obtaining long out-of-print books. I would probably always start at Google Books, simply because it has hundreds of thousands of books available free of charge. However, if I was unable to find what I wanted on Google Books, I would move on to Kirtas Books and to other online catalogs of old books.
You can learn more about Kirtas Books at http://www.kirtasbooks.com. Frankly, I found the web site to be confusing but the information is there, if you want to hunt for it.
Dick, when I try to access the site for Kirtas Books,I get this message: Database Error: Unable to connect to the database:Could not connect to MySQL.
Posted by: Sandy Coulter | July 08, 2009 at 05:27 AM
We met with them last week for a long time and are considering it. Looks like a good deal for the, for us, and for our users. Costs are involved for the participating library, but what a way to get your collection out to others.
Posted by: LarryN the LibraryN | July 08, 2009 at 06:32 AM
The site worked perfectly a couple of days ago when I wrote that article. After reading your comment this morning about "Could not connect to MySQL," I went back to http://www.kirtasbooks.com and tried again. It worked perfectly. I could access the site, search for books, etc.
I don't know what else I can suggest.
- Dick Eastman
Posted by: Dick Eastman | July 08, 2009 at 10:12 AM
Just tried it again, and it works fine.
Posted by: LarryN the LibraryN | July 08, 2009 at 10:28 AM
It is an excellent business niche, which affects not only historians and genealogists. The area that leaps to my mind is Music! This could easily become a renaissance to melody once again. Perhaps today's artists will find something more to do with their instruments than play rhythm. What a grand concept!
Happy Dae·
http://ShoeStringGenealogy.com
Posted by: Dae Powell | July 09, 2009 at 01:14 AM
I just wanted to pop in and report that based all of the great feedback we have received from folks such as yourselves on blogs, and via email we have made quite a few changes to www.kirtasbooks.com.
First off, we made some upgrades both to hardware and software, and now the search is lightening fast.
We have also made changes to the navigation of the site, hopefully making it easier to navigate.
Please keep your opinions and input coming. Three new partners are coming on board that will push us over 1,000,000 books this summer, and over 2,000,000 by year's end.
In addition, we have just announced 3 new scanners at ALA in Chicago. KABIS III will scan at a rate of 3,000 pages per hour.
Posted by: Todd Whiting | July 14, 2009 at 09:05 AM