LibreDigital vs. Google Book Search

By Sarah on August 23, 2006 8:27 AM

The headline over at Publishers Weekly reads “Who Needs Google?” It’s born out of a press release earlier this week announcing that LibreDigital, the firm behind HarperCollins’ newly launched Browse-Inside program (which bears similarity to Google’s Book Search) is now offering the same service to all publishers. PW reported that the LibreDigital Warehouse is a service developed by the Texas-based firm LibreDigital that allows publishers to offer their catalogs and titles to online consumers for browsing while maintaining control over the display and access to content.

Craig A. Miller, general manager for LibreDigital, said the company is addressing publishers’ concerns that they will lose control of copyrights and content when companies like Google or Microsoft scan their content and put it online. “Publishers want their content on the Internet, but they don’t want to lose control,” he told The Book Standard. “We are enabling technology and allowing publishers to control copyright.”

Meanwhile, Richard Ekman writes in the Washington Post why it’s a good idea to support Google’s initiative, especially if you’re a university or college: it has the potential to bring an entire world of research together under one virtual roof. “[Google Book Search] is a powerful tool will make less well-known written works or hard-to-find research materials more accessible to students, teachers and others around the world,” he says. “The transition to new technologies can be smooth or rough, depending on the attitudes of the institutional actors. The goal is to make more of the world’s information readily available to users.”