A million books to be digitized over six years
By: Courtney Gross
To assure that its collection of materials no longer under copyright is accessible around the world, the Princeton University Library is teaming up with Google to digitize approximately 1 million books over a six-year period.
Calling the move "significant," Princeton University Librarian Karin Trainer said the institution’s participation in the Google Books Library Project will bring its resources into homes far outside of Princeton. A dozen libraries and other entities worldwide are participating in the Google program, digitizing millions of fiction and nonfiction titles.
The university will correspond with company representatives over the course of several months to determine what subjects will be included and what timetable will be used, Ms. Trainer said. Google is paying for the project.
The university librarian said anyone with Internet access will eventually be able to search, print or read thousands upon thousands of titles from the university collection online, regardless of location.
Looking for "Pride and Prejudice"? No problem. Want it at the touch of your fingertips, quite literally you got it.
"They can do it in the middle of the night if that’s what pleases them in their pajamas," Ms. Trainer said. "It really brings our collections into the homes of everybody in Princeton with Internet access."
Ms. Trainer noted the library’s only obligation will be to ship sections of the collection to Google in increments, and Google employees then take care of the rest. University titles will be off the shelves for two to four weeks only, she estimated.
Although the university’s books are available through the interlibrary loan system, inclusion in the Google program will allow anyone in the world to read a significant portion of the library’s collection at books.google.com.
"Research libraries for a decade have been trying to figure out how to digitize collections on their own," Ms. Trainer said. "Nobody has been able to figure out as comprehensive and accurate and high volume a way as Google."
Ms. Trainer said the university had been in discussions with Google over including a portion of the institution’s collection for the past 18 months. Other participants in the program include Harvard University, Oxford University, Complutense University of Madrid and the New York Public Library, among others.
Not only will it be easier for members of the university community to do research, Ms. Trainer said, but it will also make parts of the extensive library collection more easily available to the Princeton community a collection that includes local history and rare texts.
"Having a portion of that collection not covered by copyright available online will make it easier for Princeton students and faculty to do research, and joining the Google partnership allows us to share our collection with researchers worldwide, a step very much in keeping with the university’s official motto of Princeton in the nation’s service and in the service of all nations," Ms. Trainer said in a prepared statement.