All Things Considered on NPR has a piece about how initially reluctant publishers are beginning to change their minds about Google’s Book Search feature. I was particularly interested in the statistic that Google has digitized over a million volumes in a couple of years. It is possible to imagine them being able to achieve the goal of digitizing all the world’s books in another five to ten years. Technically speaking, they obviously can do it. Whether or not there will be legal or business orientated roadblocks and objections seem like the potential stumbling blocks.

The other really interesting fact was the representative from Oxford University press who remarked that in the past one and a half to two and a half years “321,000 times” people clicked their books to link to the press’ website and purchase them. The key point, he said, “We spent nothing to do that. That’s why we’re a big fan of this program.”

The complete story on NPR’s website: “Publishers Warm to Google’s Book Search”