Jonathan Rochkind wrote:
<snip>
Weinheimer Jim wrote:
> I have done some thinking about your findings that a small percentage of the German books were available in Google Books. It seems that there are two completely different conclusions one could draw from this:
>
> a) physical libraries need to be nurtured, protected, and expanded;
> b) it's a national emergency that cannot be tolerated and must be fixed as soon as possible.
>
How about BOTH of those, simultaneously?
</snip>
That would be great, but I don't think there will be the funding for everything. Of course, right now libraries are closing, researchers losing their jobs and so on. I mean, why maintain tons of duplicates? Also, just as libraries are cancelling or even getting rid of journals if there is an electronic version, it should not come as a surprise if we see the same thing with monographs.
James L. Weinheimer j.weinheimer_at_aur.edu
Director of Library and Information Services
The American University of Rome
Rome, Italy
Received on Tue Mar 30 2010 - 12:25:56 EDT