A National Digital Library that can be stocked by Google Books project brings us much closer to the possibility of unfettered access to digital content. Robert Darnton, the historian who directs the Harvard University Library recently brought together 42 top-level representatives from foundations, cultural institutions, and the library and scholarly worlds to talk about how to build the digital library. In the Chronicle of Higher Education article One Step Closer to a National Digital Library Jennifer Howard reports on the results of this meeting.
There are plans for a follow up meeting this coming spring where the discussion will focus on the more concrete plans of establishing foundations to raise the necessary funds for the project and the need to establish the political and cultural will to move this forward.
We are on the cusp of the shift to a new information age.
