[Upd-discuss] Europe vs Google: EU proposes Digital Library to counter Google version

[Zapopan Martin Muela-Meza]

Europe vs Google: EU proposes Digital Library to counter Google version
>From Dana Lubow to Progressive Librarians Guild list.
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from the LATimes business section, 5-10-05

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-google10may10,1,325341.story?coll=la-headlines-business
CALIFORNIA
European Leaders Propose Digital Library to Counter Google Version
The firm's plan to create a collection of world literature triggers fears 
of Anglo-American cultural dominance.
>From Associated Press

May 10, 2005

The world according to Google?

Europeans have long bemoaned the influence of Hollywood movies on their 
culture. Now plans by Mountain View, Calif.-based Google Inc. to create a 
massive digital library have triggered such strong fears in Europe about 
Anglo-American cultural dominance that one critic is warning of a
"unilateral command of the thought of the world."

For Europeans, the fear is that the continent's contribution to the 
pillars of recorded knowledge will be crushed by a profit-oriented
company, and may end up presenting a U.S.-centric version of the world's
literary legacy.

Google's ambitions are grand, if a bit more modest than the hostile
corporate takeover of the tiller of world literature that many critics 
seem to be imagining.

The project, announced in December, involves scanning millions of books at

the libraries of four universities — Oxford, Harvard, Stanford and the 
University of Michigan — as well as the New York Public Library and 
putting them online. It will take years to complete.

So great is the concern that six European leaders have jointly proposed 
creating a "European digital library" to counter the project by Google 
Print, as the new venture is known. Other countries are expected to come 
on board.

Failing to digitalize, declared the heads of state in France, Germany, 
Italy, Spain, Poland and Hungary in an appeal to the European Union, is to

risk that "this heritage could, tomorrow, not fill its just place in the 
future geography of knowledge."

Jean-Noel Jeanneney, who as president of the French National Library 
oversees a collection of 13 million books, presented a vision of Google 
potentially hijacking "the thought of the world" in a book he published 
last week titled "When Google Challenges Europe."

"I think that this could lead to an imbalance to the benefit of a mainly 
Anglo-Saxon view of the world," Jeanneney said. "I think this is a 
danger."

He noted that French cinema thrives only because the government took steps

to ensure its survival against an American onslaught.

Peering into the future, the critics see an age where if you can't be 
found on Google, you're nobody. That may be OK for the likes of Dante and 
Shakespeare, but many fear lesser known authors would suffer.

"There is increasing concern, I think, that something not registered on 
the Net will not be seen as existing," Hungarian Culture Minister Andras 
Bozoki said.

A European project would provide a voice for smaller countries and their 
literature, he added.

Although giants of Hungarian literature, for instance, are most certainly 
on the shelves of the libraries on Google's digitization list, they might
not make the cut in the selection process — or perhaps only do so in 
translation. Or take, for example, the 19th century writer Cyprian Norwid,

a favorite of the late Pope John Paul II. Will Google provide his poetry
in 
the original Polish?

Many works that the French consider sources of cultural inspiration for 
Europe and beyond could also miss the cut in a market-oriented selection 
system, Jeanneney said.

Jeanneney, a historian, envisions a European search engine "at the service

of culture" rather than a simple "juxtaposition" of books.

However, he also raised the possibility of bringing Google into the 
European project, and Google Print representatives met last week in Paris
with French National Library officials.

"We asked an enormous number of questions," said Agnes Sall, the library's

director general. "All of this is part of a very rich debate."

Google said it was eager to work with libraries all over the world so that

even more books could be included in its search engine index.

"We are supportive of all digitization efforts because we believe everyone

benefits when more information is available online," said Susan Wojcicki, 
the company's director of product development.

U.S. libraries already are contributing a significant amount of material 
written in foreign languages, Wojcicki added.

So far, as many as 23 national libraries in the European Union's 25 member

states have said they want a European search engine. However, all the 
governments have not yet signed on — a crucial step toward obtaining the 
enormous funding that would be borne by the EU.


*********
The Universal Declaration of Human Rights of the United Nations 
establishes 
that all people have the right to self-determination and national 
sovereignty.

La Declaración de los Derechos Humanos, de las Naciones Unidas, establece 
los principios de autodeterminación y soberanía nacional.

Dana Lubow
L.A. Valley College Library
Valley Glen, California 91401
(818) 947-2766



--------------------------- * ---------------------------
"Any man who reads a lot and uses a little his own brain
falls into lazy mental habits.” 
--------------------------- * --------------------------- 
"Cualquier hombre que lea demasiado y utilice poco 
su propio cerebro cae en hábitos mentales perezosos.” 
-- Albert Einstein (Thorpe, S. (2001). Como pensar como 
Einstein : How to Think like Einstein. Bogota: Norma, p. 214)


		
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