Free Range Librarian

K.G. Schneider’s blog on librarianship, writing, and everything else, since 2003.

Free Range Librarian header image 2
← Lit mag costs: several more reality checks OCLC’s report on privacy and trust: the nut graf →

Libraries, Google, OCA make first page of the New York Times

October 22, 2007 at 7:09 am by K.G. Schneider · No Comments ·

Zowie! The front page of the NYT — above the fold, no less — has a gorgeously long article about research libraries rejecting scanning deals with Google and Microsoft and choosing instead to go with the underdog, crunchy-goodnik Open Content Alliance.

Among other things, it feels gratifying (if a little alternate-universe) to see the national paper of record discuss this issue on the front page. Those of us who have been bleating about this for a while can feel a little less voice-crying-in-the-wilderness.

I’m assuming, or at least hoping, that Siva and other pundits will be all over this today like white on rice.

Several good grafs from the article:

Several major research libraries have rebuffed offers from Google and Microsoft to scan their books into computer databases, saying they are put off by restrictions these companies want to place on the new digital collections.

The research libraries, including a large consortium in the Boston area, are instead signing on with the Open Content Alliance, a nonprofit effort aimed at making their materials broadly available. …

“Scanning the great libraries is a wonderful idea, but if only one corporation controls access to this digital collection, we’ll have handed too much control to a private entity,” Mr. Kahle said.

Funny, I had just written in an internal report that it was a mistake to underestimate Brewster Kahle.

Thank you, NYT! (If I see a purple cow fly by, I will know I’m still dreaming…)

Posted on this day, other years:

Tags: Google · Hot Tech

0 responses so far ↓

  • There are no comments yet. Kick things off by filling out the form below.

    Thanks for posting! If your comment doesn't immediately appear: comments go into the moderation queue if you've never posted before or if your comment has more than two links, and I promise to get to them as quickly as possible -- sometimes within minutes, other times within hours. Comments with lots of links vanish into the spam filter -- I can get them out, but please email or IM me to let me know they're there, as I get hundreds of spams every day.

Leave a Comment