[WEB4LIB] RE: Google Scholar

[Steven Turner]

Yes, I (and my colleagues) are pondering the same
thoughts as Ian; Our provost has already made some
semi-serious references to Google "putting libraries
out of business," so we are a bit concerned about
Scholar's direction as well as the sort of general
confusion among librarians as to Scholar's abilities,
accuracy, marketing circumstances, etc. 

For instance, IS Scholar indexing scholarly data /
private publisher content that is not available on the
general web? IF Scholar is indexing publisher content
(including the full text of articles)  - if so what's
in it for the publishers? 

For instance, if the APA provides access to Google to
the content contained within their indexes or
journals, then what would be the point of APA selling
psychinfo data to indexing resellers like Wilson or
Ebsco? I guess my bottom line is that I don't fully
understand where or how they getting all of their data
and to what extent does this data replicate publisher
data available in indexes that we, and other
libraries, purchase for a great deal of money.

Also, if Scholar intends to be comprehensive scholarly
index, could we see ingenta or infotrieve on the way
out, as Scholar would point users directly to
'pay-for' resource on publisher's site, without having
to burden themselves with the ingenta or infotrieve
purchasing process? 

Also, we don't understand Eric's statement "My
understanding is that the publisher has to make
publicly available at least an abstract" - what is
this in reference to? - is this every academic
publisher? By what guidelines? And if so, then why
hasn't all of this academic content not been indexed
by Mooter et. al., or by Google proper? No
offense,please, it's just that we had not heard this
before....

One promising possibility surrounding Scholar is the
possibilities of localized openURLs and DOIs -
perhaps, in a less nascent stage Scholar may allow
academic users to create an account (much like they do
with the Google free search & search appliance) where
users can provide their openURL resolver address,
using Scholar as a Metasearch, with results pointing
to an individual library's collection and thus solving
the appropriate copy issue.

Steve Turner



> 
> At 3:47 PM -0800 11/22/04, Chan, Ian wrote:
> >How is Google indexing the content within databases
> that require user
> >authentication to access?
> >Does the user still have to pay to view the
> full-text?
> >
> >-----Original Message-----
> >From: Eric Hellman [mailto:eric at openly.com]
> >Sent: Thursday, November 18, 2004 1:14 PM
> >To: Multiple recipients of list
> >Subject: [WEB4LIB] RE: Google Scholar
> >
> >Shirl and Gary get a number of things flat-out
> wrong in their review.
> >
> >1. Google IS crawling full text of publisher sites
> that are not
> >available without subscription, not just to open
> web.
> >2. You CAN use more than just author last name.
> Initials work quite
> >well.
> >
> >
> >>By the way, Shirl Kennedy and Gary Price have a
> review of Google
> >Scholar
> >>from a librarians' perspective:
> >>
>
>>http://www.resourceshelf.com/2004/11/wow-its-google-scholar.html
> >>
> >>Bernie Sloan
> >
> >
> >and YES, OpenURL link servers (such as ours) DO
> work with Google
> >Scholar results where they have managed to capture
> the DOI.
> >
> >Eric
> >--
> 
> 


=====
******************************************************
Steven Turner, M.L.I.S.
Assistant Professor 
Web Manager / Electronic Resources Librarian
The University of Southern Mississippi
email: Steven.Turner at usm.edu / Phone: (601)266-4066


		
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