Project Gutenberg has selected books intended for the general public. It has not focused on providing authoritative editions. "We do not write for the reader who cares whether a certain phrase in Shakespeare has a ':' or a ';' between its clauses. We put our sights on a goal to release etexts that are 99.9% accurate in the eyes of the general reader. Given the preferences our proofreaders have, and the general lack of reading ability the public is currently reported to have, we probably exceed those requirements by a significant amount. However, for the person who wants an 'authoritative edition' we will have to wait some time until this becomes more feasible. We do, however, intend to release many editions of Shakespeare and the other classics for comparative study on a scholarly level."
In August 1998, Michael Hart wrote in an email interview: "My own personal goal is to put 10,000 etexts on the net [this goal was reached in October 2003] and if I can get some major support, I would like to expand that to 1,000,000 and to also expand our potential audience for the average etext from 1.x% of the world population to over 10%, thus changing our goal from giving away 1,000,000,000,000 etexts to 1,000 times as many, a trillion and a quadrillion in U.S. terminology."
From 1998 to 2000, the "output" was an average of 36 books per month.
Project Gutenberg reached 2,000 ebooks in May 1999. eBook #2000 was "Don Quijote" (1605), by Cervantes, in Spanish, its original language.
Project Gutenberg reached 3,000 ebooks in December 2000. eBook #3000 was "A l'ombre des jeunes filles en fleurs" (In the Shadow of Young Girls in Flower), vol. 3 (1919), by Marcel Proust, in French, its original language.
Project Gutenberg reached 4,000 ebooks in October 2001. eBook #4000 was "The French Immortals Series" (1905), in English. This book is an anthology of short fictions by authors from the French Academy (Académie française): Emile Souvestre, Pierre Loti, Hector Malot, Charles de Bernard, Alphonse Daudet, and others.
Project Gutenberg reached 5,000 ebooks in April 2002. eBook #5000 was "The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci" (early 16th century). Since its release, this ebook has stayed in the Top 100 of downloaded books.