The physical to digital conversion of books just got a lot cheaper with the launch of 1DollarScan.com, based in San Jose, California. An offshoot of the immensely successful BookScan in Japan, 1DollarScan does exactly what its name implies: it scans your documents for a dollar. 100 pages of a book, 10 pages of a business document, 10 business card, etc – you just mail the text in and 1DollarScan will email you back a PDF. While the transition away from print media has been proceeding a pace for a while now, a cheap book scanning service in the US means that thousands of personal libraries will be converted to ones and zeroes, pushing us ever closer to a world where all printed books (Gutenberg to Gladwell) belong in a museum.
After the jump is a how it works video from the Japanese site. (The video is in Japanese, but just turn down the volume and the visuals will make sense.)