Library of Congress Gets $3 Million from Google.

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Author: Kniffel, LeonardFlagg, Gordon

U.S. and International

The Library of Congress announced November 22 that a $3-million gift from Google will enable LC to begin building the World Digital Library, a project to digitize significant primary materials from national and other major research libraries around the globe and make them available on the internet.

The November 22 New York Times reported that Googles contribution would he enough to lay the initial groundwork for the project. Librarian of Congress James H. Billington emphasized that the gift was purely philanthropic with "no strings attached and no copyright problems." The copyright issue has prompted lawsuits from authors and publishers groups challenging Google Book Search (formerly called Google Print Library Project) and the Google Print for Publishers program (AL, Nov. 2005, p. 22-23).

In a November 22 article in the Washington Post, Billington explained that Google agreed to be the first donor, but the library will continue to seek other philanthropic contributors to fund the initiative. He noted that the World Digital Library would be modeled after the American Memory Project, which digitized and placed on the Web millions of items, including manuscripts of Abraham Lincoln and Thomas Jefferson and Civil War photographs. Begun in 1994, the ongoing effort has thus far cost $63 million.

"Google supports the World Digital Library because we share a common mission of making the world's information universally accessible and useful," said Google cofounder and President of Technology Sergey Brin. "To create a global digital library is a historic opportunity, and we want to help the Library of Congress in this effort."

No time frame or total cost has been announced for the World Digital Library, but the National Library of Egypt has agreed to he one of the first partners, for digitizing documents of Islamic science from the 10th century. Billington said in the Times that he hoped the project would eventually cover China, India and South Asia, and the Islamic world from Indonesia to Africa. "The whole point is to get a world digital library that will bring, free of charge to anyone with internet access, a series of websites that will seamlessly integrate materials of different cultures as much as possible."

Billington first raised the concept for the World Digital Library in a June 6, 2005, speech to the plenary session of the newly established U.S. National Commission for UNESCO at Georgetown University, in which be proposed that public research institutions and libraries work with private funders to digitize significant primary materials of different cultures from institutions worldwide. He said that the project would bring together online "rare and unique cultural materials held in U.S. and Western repositories with those of other great cultures such as those that lie beyond Europe and involve more than 1 billion people."

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By Leonard Kniffel and Gordon Flagg