Harvard U. Press to Sell 1,000 Books Online

At this time last year, Harvard University was complaining that Web sites like Scribd, the “social publishing site” to which people can upload their own writing, were becoming venues on which copyrighted material was being published illegally. Scribd said it was receiving at least one request to delete an illegally-uploaded document each day.

But this month, the Harvard University Press created its own Scribd profile, and the press has already posted hundreds of works for download. “We can't spend all of our time chasing down every single pirated copy of a book that's put up, and it's not a good use of our time,” said Daniel Lee, director of digital content for the Harvard University Press. “We'd rather participate voluntarily, I think, in a good-faith effort among our partners and with Scribd and sort of fight against it. We're cognizant of the proliferation of piracy online.”

The university is not the first to begin offering content on the Web site — New York University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology have about a dozen articles on their Scribd pages. What differentiates Harvard from the others, though, is that Harvard is charging for its content — and charging the same price as a hard-copy of the same material would cost.

“I'd be surprised if, with the same pricing model, people will be willing to pay for content that can only be viewed online,” Mr. Lee said. He said interest might increase in publishing the material online if Scribd were to develop a way for the books to become portable. Materials downloaded through Scribd can only be viewed through the site's software, and cannot be printed or replicated. “If we allow the content to be downloaded with no restrictions, it could eat into our print sales.”

Even if it doesn't make many sales through Scribd, there are still several ways in which publishing on the site can help Harvard's press. Scribd can expand the press's audience and give it publicity. And readers interested in purchasing print copies of Harvard books are directed to the press's Web site. Scribd has also created a database that can tell what documents have been published by copyright holders like the university's press, and will delete any illegal copies that have the same title. “Digital technology is really helping us fulfill our mission, rather than a threat in any sense,” Mr. Lee said. “We don't want it to be print versus digital, we think it should be some combination of both.”