October 22, 2007 7:40 AM PDT
Opening up libraries with the Open Content Alliance
Slashdot notes that the Internet Archive is bumping up against Google in a new initiative to digitize the United States' libraries. The initiative is called the Open Content Alliance and seems to overcome the libraries' concerns with Google's (and Microsoft's) similar but proprietary efforts:
A number of major library systems, including the Boston Public Library and Smithsonian, have refused to sign up with competing ventures by Microsoft and Google because they do not provide for universal access to digitized books. These commercial ventures prohibit books being accessed by competing search engines. So far, 80 libraries and research institutions have signed on with Open Content Alliance. They must pay for the scanning of their books while Google and Microsoft offset that cost for their participating institutions.
It's understandable that commercial ventures would seek to close off the fruits of their labors. It's better for "open-source" efforts to keep such fruits open, especially when the "fruits" in question are derived from public-domain literature/works.
Guess which book service I'll be using?
Matt Asay brings a decade of in-the-trenches open-source business and legal experience to The Open Road, with an emphasis on emerging open-source business strategies and opportunities. Matt is vice president of business development at Alfresco, a company that develops open-source software for content management. He is a member of the CNET Blog Network and is not an employee of CNET. Disclosure. You can follow Matt on Twitter @mjasay. 
