[Web4lib] Google Books a tease, not a useful tool, for serious research

[Jonathan Gorman]

---- Original message ----
>Date: Fri, 6 Jul 2007 08:22:04 -0400
>From: "Richard Wiggins" <richard.wiggins at gmail.com>  
>Subject: [Web4lib] Google Books a tease, not a useful tool, for serious research  
>To: Web4Lib <web4lib at webjunction.org>
>
>I think we've plumbed these troubled waters before, but my experience over
>the last two days has me shaking my head, wondering if Google really
>considers Google Book a serious research tool.
>


I hate to say it, but after reading your experience it reminded me greatly of a case I knew of a  case where someone found "just the quotation they needed", but forgot to write down what book, any citation information, and so on.  In addition, they couldn't remember much about the quote.  Had they wrote down the citation information and page number of the quote, they wouldn't have had any issues.  However, instead they ended up spending a lot of time trying to track down the same book, only to finally realize that they suspected one of several books on the topic that were checked out was the one they were looking for.  By the time those books were due back that person's paper would be due and ILL wasn't likely to get the books any quicker.  In a similar manner, had you simply bookmarked your findings, it would have made it easier on you.  

So, pulling your URL from the cache and using the "Search in the book" feature pulls up some possibly related information and their page numbers.  Do none of those match?

Yes, the changing search results are annoying, but somewhat understandable.  It's still an acknowledge experimental system and one that's being constantly added too. I can't imagine any IR system that could take in such an influx of new material and not have search results change on a daily basis.

So, do I think Google books is a useful research tool?  Yes, it lets you get books that would be difficult to get at best and scan through them.   Then you can make the effort to retrieve the original if necessary.  I remember when electronic article databases started becoming available.  At first I often used these to find an article, but for a more authoritative seeming citation I would go through the trouble of retrieving the print article.  For the first few years I could see doing the same with Google books.  Is Google Books perfect?  Hardly.  I like to see improvements, but that's true of many things.  For now, it has a use, but like all research tools is not a silver bullet.

If you look at your criteria:
>To me, to be useful, a research tool needs these features:
>
>-- You must be able to cite what you find. You must be able to provide a
>reference that others can follow in order to retrieve exactly what you
>retrieved.

The citation is the same citation you could make for any library, with perhaps it being noted that it's a digital reproduction.  Depends on the citation system how you would do this.  I see no reason why you can't make a citation for a google book.  Heck, even if you can't, I don't see why that should stop you.  It gives you enough information to get your hands on a print copy.  If you have the url, or even just the unique id for the book, others can retrieve exactly what you did.  

>
>-- You must be able to quote it.  That is, you must be able to copy text
>from it and paste that text into an article, an e-mail, whatever.
>

All printed materials fail a narrow reading of this rule.  A broad reading and Google doesn't fail it, since you can certainly type by hand what's in the images.


>-- You must be able to reproduce the search that found the item.
>

I'm not sure about this one.  After all, this assumes a static universe.  If you cannot reproduce the same search in an articles database six months later since newer materials are added, is it no longer a serious research tool?


>-- You must be able to search within the full text.
>

Again, Google books allows this. Narrow reading will make many printed materials fail.  I don't understand why the search within a book failed for you.  Google also has mentioned there will be a text option coming soon.
 
>-- Others must be able to do all of these things.

I fail to see why others can't use Google books.  How does Google fail this?






Jon Gorman