The National Academies Press – the US publisher for the National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, Institute of Medicine, and National Research Council – is offering all of its books free in PDF format.
The books cover a range of science topics, but of most interest to you and me are the hundreds of geospatial books.
The list includes almost every book they’ve published – excluding those that were printed before PDF existed; books from the Joseph Henry Press imprint; and in cases where it is contractually prohibited. All future publications will also be available for free online, subject to these conditions.
The complete list runs to more than 4,000 titles. Thankfully, there is a search function available, so you can find exactly the topic you are interested in.
The move to make the books available for free is in line with the company’s mission to disseminate the institutions' content as widely as possible, while maintaining financial sustainability. To that end, NAP began offering free content online in 1994. Before last week’s announcement, all PDFs were free to download in developing countries, and 65 per cent of them were available for free to any user.
"Our business model has evolved so that it is now financially viable to put this content out to the entire world for free," said Barbara Kline Pope, executive director for the National Academies Press. "This is a wonderful opportunity to make a positive impact by more effectively sharing our knowledge and analyses."
You can access and search for the books at http://www.nap.edu/
