French deliver response to Google Print
27 June 2005
French authorities have unveiled plans to start digitalising parts of its national collection.
Concerned that the internet is in danger of becoming overwhelmingly dominated by the English language, the French have responded to the announcement that Google plans to put 15 million books and documents online with a smaller Gallic version.
The contents of La Bibliotheque Nationale de France (BNF), the French national library, could be made available online as part of the scheme. The library, which dates from the 15th century, receives copies of all printed French works and now includes more than 12 million books and manuscripts.
French officials believe France's literary treasures are under-represented on the internet and a project started years ago has been expanded to place more on the internet. Gallica has already put some 80,000 works and 70,000 images online, and it is currently working its way through the BNF's basement of 19th century newspapers.
Catherine Lupovici, head of the digital library department at the BNF, says: "It was a project with the new library to create a network that would be available for scholars, representing an encyclopaedic French library of French culture."
Jean-Noel Jeanneney, director of the BNF, proposes a panel of experts to rank works online, as the database of work available grows.
The Google Print project plans to put 4.5 billion pages of English onto the web. The BNF claims that it has not ruled out being part of Google once its own print project is set up. Google is the tope search engine for 74 per cent of French web users.
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