Information Research Weblog

Google's Book Search, which I admit to using rarely, has a new feature, which has attracted the interest of at least one discussion list - LITA-L. The feature is the capacity to identify library catalogues that hold items. The Book Search Weblog says that the library catalogue search results will be presented if it looks as though there's no record in Google. However, you can choose to search the union catalogues upon which this is based by using the advanced search page. The debate on LITA-L seems not to take account of this point and individuals berate Google for not providing library catalogue links in addition to the normal Book Search output.

Well, if librarians have a grouse about this, I guess it is their own fault: why don't more of them enter into partnership with Google by, say, using Google Search as their Website search engine? I know that a limited number of libraries do have partnerships in relation to the digitization of (mainly) out-of-print books, but the real potential of partnering with Google seems not to have been explored very widely.