Questia was an online commercial digital repository of books and articles that had an

academic An academy (Attic Greek: Ἀκαδήμεια; Koine Greek Ἀκαδημία) is an institution of tertiary education. The name traces back to Plato's school of philosophy, founded approximately 386 BC at Akademia, a sanctuary of Athena, the go ...

orientation, with a particular emphasis on books and journal articles in the

humanities Humanities are academic disciplines that study aspects of human society and culture, including Philosophy, certain fundamental questions asked by humans. During the Renaissance, the term "humanities" referred to the study of classical literature a ...

and

social sciences Social science (often rendered in the plural as the social sciences) is one of the branches of science, devoted to the study of society, societies and the Social relation, relationships among members within those societies. The term was former ...

. All the text in all the Questia books and articles were available to subscribers; the site also included integrated research tools. It was founded in 1998 and ceased operations in December 2020.

Company history

Questia, based in Chicago, Illinois, was founded in 1998 and purchased by

Gale A gale is a strong wind; the word is typically used as a descriptor in nautical contexts. The U.S. National Weather Service defines a gale as sustained surface wind moving at a speed between .

, part of

Cengage Learning Cengage Group is an American educational content, technology, and services company for higher education, K–12, professional, and library markets. It operates in more than 20 countries around the world.(June 27, 2014Global Publishing Leaders 2 ...

, in January 2010.

Service

Questia offered some information free of charge, including several

public domain The public domain (PD) consists of all the creative work to which no Exclusive exclusive intellectual property rights apply. Those rights may have expired, been forfeited, expressly Waiver, waived, or may be inapplicable. Because no one holds ...

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 6,500 topics. Questia did not sell ownership to books or

ebook An ebook (short for electronic book), also spelled as e-book or eBook, is a book publication made available in electronic form, consisting of text, images, or both, readable on the flat-panel display of computers or other electronic devices. A ...

s, but rather sold monthly or annual subscriptions that allowed temporary online reading access to all 94000+ books, and 14 million + journal, magazine, and newspaper articles in their collection. The books were selected by academic librarians as credible, authoritative works in their respective areas. The librarians also compiled about 7000 reference bibliographies on frequently researched topics. The library was strongest in books and journal articles in the social sciences and humanities, with many older historical texts. Original

pagination Pagination, also known as paging, is the process of dividing a document into discrete page (paper), pages, either electronic pages or printed pages. In reference to books produced without a computer, pagination can mean the consecutive page num ...

was maintained. The Questia service also featured tools to automatically create citations and bibliographies, helping writers to properly cite the materials. A limitation to the Questia library was that new additions were available in a "beta" version only. Unlike Questia's earlier publications, these prevented users from copying text directly from the website, although one page from the publications could be printed free of charge. A charge was made for printing a range of pages. Questia launched their Q&A blog on September 21, 2011. Q&A was divided into "Education news", "Student resources" and "Subjects" categories. "Subjects" was further broken down so readers could find specific content based on their academic needs. Questia released an iPhone app in 2011, which was extended to the iPad the following year. Then in January 2013 Questia launched tutorials, including videos and quizzes, to teach students the research process.

Criticism

Questia was criticized in 2005 by librarian Steven J. Bell for referring to itself as an academic library, when it concentrated on the liberal arts and treated users as customers rather than students. Moreover, Bell argued, Questia did not employ academic librarians or faculty. Although some of its employees had advanced library degrees, they did not work or collaborate with faculty to develop collections that served distinctive student populations.Steven J. Bell
"Electronic libraries can't be academic"
'' Chronicle for Higher Education'' September 30, 2005

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Questia Internet properties established in 1998 Commercial digital libraries Full-text scholarly online databases 1998 establishments in Illinois American digital libraries Defunct websites Internet properties disestablished in 2020 2020 disestablishments in Illinois

Company history

Service

Criticism

See also

References

External links