Mass-digitization at the Complutense University Library. Access and preservation of its bibliographic heritage

Abstract

IIn the mid-1990’s, the Complutense Library applied the growing body of new technologies to launch, in partnership with the Foundation for the Health Sciences and GlaxoSmithKline Laboratories, a pioneering project: the digitization of a biomedicine valuable collection. The project resulted in the Dioscórides Digital Library. Nevertheless, by 2006, results were rather limited and the digitization rate was very slow. Currently, Dioscórides Digital Library offers free access to 3,000 books from the 14th to the 18th centuries and approximately 50,000 engravings.

In September 2006 the Complutense University of Madrid and Google signed a partnership agreement intended to large-scale digitization of our collections in the public domain.