Libraries and the Future of Digitization

Interesting article in Inside Higher Education, May 30, by Andy Guess, May 30 "Post-Microsoft, Libraries Mull Digitization," about Microsoft's withdrawal from the digitization game.

Here is an excerpt: "Libraries increasingly see digitization as a preservation strategy. While Microsoft’s departure probably won’t cause significant upheaval, it will reinforce for universities the necessity of ensuring that they retain the rights to their scanned materials — or that their digitization projects will be around next semester, let alone forever. One way to do that is to continue pursuing internal, proprietary scanning projects which, for many libraries, existed for years before Google and Microsoft made it possible to vastly increase their scope and scale. Another is to work with nonprofit initiatives. But if there’s one thing libraries agree on, it’s that the competition between the two companies was healthy."

The original story and user comments can be viewed online at http://insidehighered.com/news/2008/05/30/microsoft.