[Web4lib] Which databases can Google Scholar crawl?

[Thomas Krichel]

  Bill Drew writes

> Noncommittal answer if I ever heard one.  How hard would it be to just
> say here is a list of database providers who let us crawl their sites? 
> That is a simple answer.

  Too simple, I think.

  I am no Google Scholar (GS) insider, so this is not based on information,
  but logical thinking.

  First, if there are providers of toll-gated resources that let a
  part of the resource being indexed by GS, they will presumably
  not like the paying costumer (libraries) know. The customers may
  query the value of the resource when all or part of it has 
  leaked via GS.

  Second, a search service like GS is built in a different way
  than a classic library database. GS follows links on the web.
  Thus it uses the web as a resource. I think this is what 
  Anurag refers to in the quoted interview.

  Third, I think that a part of the failure of GS to provide
  a list of sources lies in the absence of a comprehensive,
  freely available list all of scholarly resources. Such a list
  should have been compiled by librarians, but it has not.
  Pubmed has an island of contents for the biomedical sciences,
  but for other areas the best sources are done by academics
  rather than libarians, and the coverage is patchy because
  it is done by academics for others in their area. ADS,
  DBLP, RePEc come to mind. If such a database where
  to exist, would be freely available and comprehensive
  GS and others could build additional services on it. 

  Cheers,

  Thomas Krichel                    http://openlib.org/home/krichel
                                RePEc:per:1965-06-05:thomas_krichel
  phone: +7 383 330 6813                       skype: thomaskrichel