Ben Vershbow on The Showtimization of Google's Library Project
Ben from if:book has this to say about the Google plan and its likeness to the evil Showtime/Smithsonian deal:
The parallels to the Google library project are many. Four of the six partner libraries, like the Smithsonian, are publicly funded institutions. And all the agreements, with the exception of U. Michigan, and now UC, are non-disclosure. Brewster Kahle, leader of the rival Open Content Alliance, put the problem clearly and succinctly in a quote in today's Chronicle piece:
We want a public library system in the digital age, but what we are getting is a private library system controlled by a single corporation.
He was referring specifically to sections of this latest contract that greatly limit UC's use of Google copies and would bar them from pooling them in cooperative library systems. I vocalized these concerns rather forcefully in my post yesterday, and may have gotten a couple of details wrong, or slightly overstated the point about librarians ceding their authority to Google's algorithms (some of the pushback in comments and on other blogs has been very helpful). But the basic points still stand, and the revelations today from the UC contract serve to underscore that. This ought to galvanize librarians, educators and the general public to ask tougher questions about what Google and its partners are doing. Of course, all these points could be rendered moot by one or two bad decisions from the courts.
Bravo, Ben. This is what I have been saying for more than a year. Glad more voices are joining me here.
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