The most immediate result of Gutenberg's invention of the printing press was a vast increase in the number of books produced and distributed. This was an information revolution which had vast consequences, but its impact on science and religion were among the most profound and immediate. With regard to science, the movable type allowed systematic scientific knowledge could be more widely and cheaply distritubed, laying to groundwork for increasingly rapid advances. In religion, the innovation spurred the development of literacy among lay people who could now have personal access to the bible and other religious publications, a development which was one of the factors in the develpment of Protestantism.