This is true even in a “pre-Google” or “non-Googled” world. All of the time-to-shelf reduction in the world won’t make users’ lives easier if they can’t find the books in the first place; ill-cataloged books can’t be found, either via shelf-browse or via the OPAC.

i think the more popular expression
these days is “deaccessioning”…

it’s kind of a sensitive topic… ;+)

-bowerbird

p.s. seriously, we better scan them
before we trash ‘em, that’s for sure…

Back in the day the project was University Microfilms, not Google, and the promise was of universal access to all of those inconvenient bulky bits of paper on the shiny new microfilm format.

The net result of that was the pulping of many years of historical newspapers (because the microfilm was “preservation” and the storage of said bulky newspapers was too expensive).

I understand that Buhr is full and that all of the libraries are full. Is the Google project an opportunity to get rid of some more books?

paul, your biggest problems are _not_ with google,
they’re right there in front of you in your own shop.

when you’re ready for me to point them out to you,
let me know, and i’ll try to be gentle…

-bowerbird