Google to digitize umich
Tuesday, December 14th, 2004This is pretty cool stuff:
ANN ARBOR, Mich.—Google and the University of Michigan today (Tuesday) announced a joint agreement that will add the 7 million volumes in the U-M library to the Google search engine and open the way to universal access to information.
… Google will digitally scan and make searchable virtually the entire collection of the U-M library. A person looking for information will gain the extraordinary capability to use Google to locate and read the full text of printed works that are out of copyright. For works in copyright, a search will point the way to the existence of relevant volumes by returning a snippet of text, along with information that identifies publishers or libraries where the work can be found.
… At its current rate of digital production, however, it would take the University more than a thousand years to digitize the 7 million volumes in the collection. Google plans to do the job in a matter of years.
Google also has entered into agreements with Harvard University, Stanford University, Oxford University and the New York Public Library.
I wonder if that copy of Czechoslovak Forestry I walk past nearly every day will make the cut?
December 14th, 2004 at 3:15 pm
Looks like the School of Information just got a whole lot more interesting.
From the NY Times:
“For their part, libraries themselves will have to rethink their central missions as storehouses of printed, indexed material.
“Our world is about to change in a big, big way,” said Daniel Greenstein, university librarian for the California Digital Library of the University of California, which is a project to organize and retain existing digital materials.
Instead of expending considerable time and money to managing their collections of printed materials, Mr. Greenstein said, libraries in the future can devote more energy to gathering information and making it accessible – and more easily manageable – online.”
December 14th, 2004 at 3:54 pm
It’s kind of funny. My sense is that SI is reacting to this with a bemused smirk since they’ve been out ahead of the curve on so many of these new ways of thinking about libraries and digital repositories. Oh, you say digital technologies are changing the centuries-old conception of libraries? *yawn*
It’s exciting stuff though. I hope Google decides they need to hire a bunch of people.
December 17th, 2004 at 9:41 am
Scanner Jocky I — Work in a fun team environment! SJI’s are teamed up with a google lab scanner as they scan millions upon millions of dusty old texts that even Wolcott isn’t interested in. Must have high school diploma, previous experience with OCR preferred.