Questia Online Library
Encyclopedia
Questia is an online commercial digital library
of books and articles with an academic
orientation. It claims to be "the world's largest online collection of books and journal articles in the humanities
and social sciences
". The great majority of items are under copyright
, for which Questia has paid a fee to the copyright owners. All the text in all the Questia books and articles is available to subscribers. The similar service Google Book Search
has 7 million books scanned in their library, but users can only see small parts of copyrighted books.
Questia offers some information for free, including several public domain
works, publication information, tables of contents, the first page of every chapter, Boolean
searches of the contents of the library, and short bibliographies of available books and articles on some 6500 topics.
Questia does not sell ownership to books or ebooks, but rather sells monthly or annual subscriptions that allows temporary online reading access to all + books, and + journal, magazine, and newspaper articles in their collection. The books have been selected by academic librarians as credible, authoritative works in their respective areas. The librarians have also compiled about 7000 reference bibliographies on frequently researched topics. The library is strongest in books and journal articles in the social sciences and humanities, with many older historical texts. Original pagination has been maintained, critical for those wishing to cite
the materials. The Questia service also features tools to automatically create citations and bibliographies, helping writers to properly cite the materials.
A limitation to the Questia library is that new additions are available in a "beta" version only. Unlike Questia's earlier publications, these prevent the user from copying text directly from the cursor. A page from the publication can be printed for free. A charge is made for printing a range of pages.
Questia has been criticized by The Chronicle of Higher Education
for falsely referring to itself as an academic library. Questia does not employ academic librarians or faculty. Although some of its employees have advanced degrees, they do not work or collaborate with faculty to develop collections that serve distinctive student populations.
Tim Harris
, Questia president and CEO, said in May 2010 that Questia has been purchased by Gale
, part of Cengage Learning
.
Questia launched their Q&A blog on September 21, 2011. Q&A is divided into "Education news," "Student resources" and "Subjects" categories. "Subjects" is further broken down so readers can find specific content based on their academic needs.
Digital library
A digital library is a library in which collections are stored in digital formats and accessible by computers. The digital content may be stored locally, or accessed remotely via computer networks...
of books and articles with an academic
Academia
Academia is the community of students and scholars engaged in higher education and research.-Etymology:The word comes from the akademeia in ancient Greece. Outside the city walls of Athens, the gymnasium was made famous by Plato as a center of learning...
orientation. It claims to be "the world's largest online collection of books and journal articles in the humanities
Humanities
The humanities are academic disciplines that study the human condition, using methods that are primarily analytical, critical, or speculative, as distinguished from the mainly empirical approaches of the natural sciences....
and social sciences
Social sciences
Social science is the field of study concerned with society. "Social science" is commonly used as an umbrella term to refer to a plurality of fields outside of the natural sciences usually exclusive of the administrative or managerial sciences...
". The great majority of items are under copyright
Copyright
Copyright is a legal concept, enacted by most governments, giving the creator of an original work exclusive rights to it, usually for a limited time...
, for which Questia has paid a fee to the copyright owners. All the text in all the Questia books and articles is available to subscribers. The similar service Google Book Search
Google Book Search
Google Books is a service from Google that searches the full text of books that Google has scanned, converted to text using optical character recognition, and stored in its digital database. The service was formerly known as Google Print when it was introduced at the Frankfurt Book Fair in October...
has 7 million books scanned in their library, but users can only see small parts of copyrighted books.
Questia offers some information for free, including several public domain
Public domain
Works are in the public domain if the intellectual property rights have expired, if the intellectual property rights are forfeited, or if they are not covered by intellectual property rights at all...
works, publication information, tables of contents, the first page of every chapter, Boolean
Boolean logic
Boolean algebra is a logical calculus of truth values, developed by George Boole in the 1840s. It resembles the algebra of real numbers, but with the numeric operations of multiplication xy, addition x + y, and negation −x replaced by the respective logical operations of...
searches of the contents of the library, and short bibliographies of available books and articles on some 6500 topics.
Questia does not sell ownership to books or ebooks, but rather sells monthly or annual subscriptions that allows temporary online reading access to all + books, and + journal, magazine, and newspaper articles in their collection. The books have been selected by academic librarians as credible, authoritative works in their respective areas. The librarians have also compiled about 7000 reference bibliographies on frequently researched topics. The library is strongest in books and journal articles in the social sciences and humanities, with many older historical texts. Original pagination has been maintained, critical for those wishing to cite
Citation
Broadly, a citation is a reference to a published or unpublished source . More precisely, a citation is an abbreviated alphanumeric expression Broadly, a citation is a reference to a published or unpublished source (not always the original source). More precisely, a citation is an abbreviated...
the materials. The Questia service also features tools to automatically create citations and bibliographies, helping writers to properly cite the materials.
A limitation to the Questia library is that new additions are available in a "beta" version only. Unlike Questia's earlier publications, these prevent the user from copying text directly from the cursor. A page from the publication can be printed for free. A charge is made for printing a range of pages.
Questia has been criticized by The Chronicle of Higher Education
The Chronicle of Higher Education
The Chronicle of Higher Education is a newspaper and website that presents news, information, and jobs for college and university faculty, staff members and administrators....
for falsely referring to itself as an academic library. Questia does not employ academic librarians or faculty. Although some of its employees have advanced degrees, they do not work or collaborate with faculty to develop collections that serve distinctive student populations.
Tim Harris
Tim Harris
Tim Harris may refer to:* Tim Harris , British football manager* Tim Harris , South African Member of Parliament* Tim Harris , U.S...
, Questia president and CEO, said in May 2010 that Questia has been purchased by Gale
Gale (publisher)
Gale is an educational publishing company based in Farmington Hills, Michigan, the United States, in the western suburbs of Detroit. It was part of the Thomson Learning division of the Thomson Corporation, a Canadian company, but became part of Cengage Learning in 2007.The company, formerly known...
, part of Cengage Learning
Cengage Learning
Cengage Learning is a publisher of print and digital information services for the academic, professional and library markets, and delivers customized learning solutions for colleges, universities, professors, students, libraries, government agencies, corporations and professionals around the...
.
Questia launched their Q&A blog on September 21, 2011. Q&A is divided into "Education news," "Student resources" and "Subjects" categories. "Subjects" is further broken down so readers can find specific content based on their academic needs.