Google's Throat

Not sure how to feel about this ...

Ashley Belanger: 'Welcome to Google’s Nightmare: US Reveals Plan to Destroy Search Monopoly'; DOJ goes for Google's throat with 'staggering' remedies to end search monopoly', Ars Technica, (11/21/2024)

Google Now Links to Library Holdings

OCLC and Google Now Connect Web Searchers Directly to Library Collections
Google now links search results directly to records of print books in hundreds of libraries using WorldCat data
DUBLIN, Ohio, 13 April 2022—OCLC and Google are working together to link directly from books discovered through Google Search to print book records in the catalogs of hundreds of U.S. libraries. This feature is part of Google’s ongoing effort to connect people to their local libraries through Google Search. [Read more ...]

As OCLC explains: "Partner websites such as Google Books, Wikipedia, and Goodreads add 'find in a library' links to their pages that bring users to WorldCat.org where they can then click to library websites." [source]

Google Redefines Email (& Your Rights) :-(

So Google comes out with a number of changes to its Gmail service including "Confidential Mode". As XDA-Developers explains:

"A new Confidential Mode allows you to remove the option for the recipient to forward, copy, download, or print an email. You can also make the email expire after a set period of time."

Huh? Email that someone sends you that self-destructs? Anyone see a problem here? (Ripe for deception & fraud, lack of privacy on the part of the recipient, etc.) Hello, Google, but if someone sends me a message, it's me who decides what to do with it -- not you. 

Note to Google

 Note to Google: No, we aren't open till 2am tonight. It's intersession.

UPDATE: I contacted Google through the "Feedback" page and they fixed the thing in about a day. Not bad.

Link de Jour : What Google Really Thinks About You

Google Analytics recently added a "Demographics and Interests" feature to its set of tools measuring website traffic. They amass this data basically by what kinds of searches you do, your Google+ account, the sites you click on, etc. To see how accurate a picture it has drawn of you, click the following link (updated):

https://myadcenter.google.com/?hl=en&sasb=true

It's not the People that are Stupid, It's the System!

Okay, I've got way too many things on my plate at the moment to go through this report, "Ethnographic Research in Illinois Academic Libraries (ERIAL) Project" but Sarah Kessler in a write-up for Mashable sums it up thusly:

"Students in a two-year ethnographic study referred to Google more than any database when discussing their research habits. But ironically, say the study’s authors, they weren’t very good at using it."

Now, as a librarian and lifelong user of Google, I know you can limit it (kind of) by date or content type (eg book, article, image) plus a thousand other fancy things using a minus sign ('-') or quotes, etc. but should requiring knowing these things always -- or ideally -- be the ticket of entry? Doesn't sound very Google-ly to me.

Kessler in the Mashable write-up quotes one student:

"I know there are books but I don’t really know how to find them. Really the only thing I know how to do is go to Google and type in what I’m looking for."

My reaction was, I dunno. Sounds more to me like 'system fail' rather than 'people fail'. Ideally all that user should have to do is go to Google and type in what he or she is looking for. That at least is what I'd consider the 'Holy Grail'.

Enough with the Google-bashing

I'm just as happy as the next person to be paranoid about huge corporate entities trying to dominate our lives but this attack on Google by UK Observer columnist Henry Porter is pure insanity.

In it he identifies Google as a "classic monopoly that destroys industries and individual enterprise in its bid for ever greater profits." You either agree with Google, he says, or you feel "the weight of its boot on your windpipe."

He then goes on to blame Google for the demise of newspapers. He hints darkly that in some future time of "profound challenges", Google may decide to cut newspapers off from their audience. The company is "delinquent and sociopathic", a "nightmarish 11-year-old" which "needs to be stopped in its tracks" etc.

How silly can you get? We're talking about a search-engine here. Its bread and butter are links and snippets of content. It's no more illegal or immoral for Google to use content in this way than it would be for you or me.

Indeed the thought of putting a restriction on this use is far more worrisome than anything Porter can come up with.

But the truth is, Porter really doesn't come up with much. Once you sweep away the invective, you're pretty much left with nothing other than Google is big and successful at what it does.

If this is the best a 'journalist' can produce, it explains the plight of newspapers far better than anything Google allegedly has done.

[h/t Keith Teare]

ChillingEffects.org

While googling for pictures of failed technologies for my post on eBooks, I came across a strange note at the bottom of Google's search results. It read:

"In response to a complaint we received under the US Digital Millennium Copyright Act, we have removed 2 result(s) from this page. If you wish, you may read the DMCA complaint that caused the removal(s) at ChillingEffects.org."

Google and Libraries: What’s in Store for Google Print and Google Scholar

Write-up on a presentation given at the 2005 ALA Conference -- originally appeared on the LITA Blog (link) :

Boy, that was a packed program! I thought yesterday's "Top Technology Trends" was packed. Today there were even more people. (see photos…)

Participants

What everyone came to see was the panel discussion featuring Google's Adam Smith along with representatives from the five libraries that have agreed to let Google digitize their books. In order of seating, that was John Price-Wilkin (Michigan), Catherine Tierney (Stanford), Ronald Milne (Oxford), Dale Flecker (Harvard), and John Balow (NYPL). Maurice York (Emory) on the far left was moderator.

Google Print

Although the program was subtitled "What's in Store for Google Print and Google Scholar", most of the attention was paid to Google Print — quite rightly because it involves libraries handing over to Google the very things that make them unique, namely, their collections.

It soon became clear however that some of the libraries appear to be engaged in “Pilot Projects”. Harvard for example, is starting out with 40,000 volumes.

Why Google?

The motivation for doing this was obvious: Google has the kind of deep-pockets (or claims it has) to undertake digitizing entire libraries — at a rate far faster than the libraries themselves could manage. It also has, in the words of Dale Flecker, the “nerve” to do it. When Google told Michigan it wanted to digitize their entire collection, John Price Wilkin called it an “amusing story”.

What the libraries get in return are their books back (natch) plus a digital copy of the material. What the libraries will do with their copy isn’t immediately clear. John Balow conceded that these are still “early days”.

Even Adam Smith admitted that Google is in “research-mode” concerning some aspects of both Scholar and Print. Its technology “continues to evolve”.

Access & Preservation

What isn’t in doubt is the increased access these titles will have once they’re part of Google. “It’s all about access,” Ronald Milne emphasized. For Oxford, the notion is to bring the “Republic of Letters” into the 21st Century.

Not addressed are issues of preservation. Indeed, with the exception of Michigan, most didn’t think this was a “preservation project”. The kind of “industrial” process that Google is using (mum’s the word on what it actually is) can only be used on books that are in good shape.

That said, it would be “more possible”, in the words of Catherine Tierney, for libraries like Stanford to concentrate on their more unique materials — with Google handling its part. Dale Flecker thought it might also make things cheaper.

Copyright

Google intends to scan everything including books not yet in the public domain. The user will only see “snippets” of works where Google has no agreement (read, permission) with the publisher. This naturally raises questions of copyright infringement.

Adam Smith stressed that Google wasn't setting up a “book distribution system but an indexing system”. That said, Smith admitted that copyright is a “complicated issue”. He suggested a public listing of “orphaned” works post-1923 so everyone would know what was in copyright and what wasn't.

Trust Google?

One recurring theme was whether it made sense to put so many (library) eggs in the basket of what ultimately is a profit-driven corporation whose first loyalty is to its stockholders.

None of the representatives seemed disturbed by this. As John Balow explained only half seriously, “We rely on the generosity of strangers. This is just another day of work.”

And what if Google should pull out?

“Time will tell,” John Price Wilkin concluded.

Links:

Google Library Digitization Agreement With University Of Michigan… (Search Engine Watch).
Includes link to the U-Mich/Google Agreement

Michigan Digitization Project
Good information about Michigan’s project plus links to the other Libraries in the Agreement.

Don’t Get Goggle-Eyed Over Google’s Plan to Digitize. (Mark Y. Herring, Chronicle of Higher Ed. March 11, 2005).
Looks at the Agreement with a Grain of Salt.

Review of Google Scholar (Martin Myhill, Charleston Advisor - April 2005)
Balanced — even helpful — review of Google Scholar.