U of T has begun scanning out-of-print material for Windows Live Book Search, which will be available for net perusal by the end of the year, according to chief librarian Carole Moore.
“There is more and more demand for out-of-copyright materials,” she said. The university will make its digital copies available, free of charge, she said.
The process has barely begun, however; about 2,000 volumes have been scanned, out of a planned 50,000 volumes. The entire library collection spans around 15 million volumes. However, the only material scanned will be out-of-copyright content and copyrighted, out-of-print content that belongs to faculty at U of T.
Anyone with an Internet connection will have access to previously scarce material. The library would include images and multimedia material, possibly even audio versions of out-of-print books for the hearing impaired. A prototype interface being explored is “Flipbook”, where users click on “pages” to flip them as they would flip through an actual book, and browse through the book by using search-words.
U of T joined up with the Open Content Alliance (OAC) last month. OAC is an organization formed by the Internet Archive and Yahoo in early 2005, which also includes software giant Microsoft.
It takes a different tack from Google Book Search – a similar venture that ran into trouble last fall when several law suits were launched against the company. Instead of requiring publishers to opt out if they don’t want their materials scanned, OAC relies on an opt-in model.
Chief librarian Moore said that U of T has been scanning materials on a limited basis over the past decade. For instance, the digitization of Banting and Best’s insulin research was made possible through federal government funding.
The partnership with OCA is the next step, introducing opportunities for more funding and advanced technology and producing better quality content. The scanning is done on location at U of T, with nine scanners currently in use and four more on the way.
