[WEB4LIB] New Google Beta, Answers.Google.Com

[Robert Tiess]

gprice wrote:
> Here's a question for the library community, will the fee-based resources
> that many public libraries make available see a rapid increase in usage?
> Will virtual reference desk services be flooded with questions from Google
> Researcher's who can then sell the answer or at least a portion of it on
> Google? Several services similar to Google Answers have come and gone. The
> fact that Google is doing it? What do you think will happen? For many
> people RESEARCH=Google.


Hi, Gary.  I find it curious no one has replied yet to your post on the list.  ResPool Research Network, you'll remember, was "one of those services" :-)  It didn't exactly "come and go," so to speak, and I
believe it found a good way to coexist with libraries within the three years it was in operation (2/1999 - 2/2002).  Personally, I learned a lot in creating and managing such a service.

One of the reasons I think ResPool caught on, to some extent, was that it did not try to compete with libraries; its philosophy was overtly pro-library, to the point of urging people to try their local libraries
first before submitting questions.  It was no coincidence most of the members were librarians from around the world.  ResPool harmonized well with libraries.  I have archived the ResPool web site and posted a public letter explaining things at http://rtiess.tripod.com/respool.htm

My concern would be that any commercial research service, however well intentioned, may at some point place higher value on monetary profit rather than informational service.  It makes good business but bad reference.  Such services might even come to consider libraries competitors, not colleagues.  In any event, ethical questions arise in my mind when information is available only to those who can afford it.

Last year I attempted to launch another free service called U.R.L.S. (United Resource Locator Services), which was to be a "virtual alliance" of free information service providers.  The idea was to mutually promote each other's free services in response to the increase in subscription-based Internet services and paid URL placements in search engines.  While U.R.L.S. did not get off the ground, its philosophy had already proliferated through ResPool, which promoted good free resources and urged members to do the same.

Promotion is essential in getting people to consult libraries first.  Commercial reference services certainly have their respective places and values, but people, especially economically challenged patrons, should know the library is usually the best first option.  Researchers also need to be better informed of the perils of relying solely on Internet-based information.  As advocates of vital ideals (like intellectual freedom) we in the library community need to remind patrons more of what libraries will do for them, and not only over the web.

We know what libraries can do, but only a fraction of any given patron population actually understands the full extent of library services available, on or off the web.  It was in this frame of mind I had established The New Athenaeum web site a while back (another "one of those sites," now gone).  The New Athenaeum promoted web guides created by librarians, alerting online researchers to the fact librarians work very hard to locate and make accessible exceptional Internet resources.

The web can indeed link online patrons to physical libraries, but ultimately the value of human, face-to-face, not-for-profit service always wins (for me) over any impersonal commercial entity, the proponents of which, at worst, might look upon a person's desire to know something not as an opportunity for information sharing but instead an exploitable commodity.  This is one of the many dangers of mixing reference with business, and this is why library advocates should continue to raise patron awareness of the many free services and sources already in place at libraries and library web sites.

Robert Tiess
rjtiess at warwick.net
http://rtiess.tripod.com