fascinating

[Guest guest]

google is currently digitizing the complete contents of several major

libraries (including harvard and NY public) with their permission.

however book publishers are up in arms. books from before 1923 are

public domain and no one can object. and books from after 1923 that

are no licensed to google will only be searchable for passages, but

not viewable in their entirety or downloadable. this is what the

publishers object to. they think that if you can research data in a

book without owning it, then they will lose sales. However, much

like the misguided music industry, those who only need books for

research borrow them from libraries or friends. they don't buy them

anyway. I personally have no money to maintain a large hard copy

library. so there are no lost sales through this digitizing, only

lost trips to the library. Understandably, they don't want entire

texts of popular science or bestseller novels available for complete

viewing online (but again, those who can't afford the books are just

going to borrow them anyway. they are not going to spend cash they

don't have on books. just not a hot item compared to computers and

video games and cars).

 

Regardless, one thing is for sure. In a few years, pretty much every

important work from before the 1930's will be online (every year that

passes a bunch more stuff goes public). Foreign countries are

already lobbying google to make sure the works of their cultures in

their languages are not omitted. this project will lead to a

searchable online database of all the world's classic literature and

philosophy. Granted, there won't be much science, but there will be

all of shakespeare and newton and plato, etc. and if the libraries

get their way, you may be able to search for snippets (but not read

the books in their entirety) of EVERY work ever published in english

and many other languages. The goal of all human knowledge stored on

libraries accessible through a single database will be realized.

This is a project we should all support. The fact is that for the

vast majority of books ever published (as with most music recorded

these days), the artists have never made more than a dime. Having

their works accessible in such an engine would be the best thing

that ever happened to most of them. It might be too late to make

bucks on the book, but there could be job opportunities and speaking

gigs as a result of being " discovered " in this way.

 

 

 

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