Microsoft Gives Up Scan Plan

Microsoft announced that it will pull the plug on its book and scholarly article scan plans, Live Search Books and Live Search Academic, taking down both sites. “We believe the next generation of search is about the development of an underlying, sustainable business model for the search engine, consumer, and content partner,” wrote Satya Nadella, Microsoft senior VP of search, portal, and advertising, on the Live Search blog on May 23.

Nadella said that books digitized under the programs would now be included in MSN search results. In a somewhat confusing message, Microsoft said it would continue to “reach out” to publishers and libraries and would encourage libraries to “build on the platform” it has developed with its partners—even though that platform is evidently commercially unsustainable. The company also said the libraries and institutions outfitted with Microsoft state-of-the-art Kirtas scanners for the program could keep them.

In a post on the Internet Archive site, Open Content Alliance (OCA) founder Brewster Kahle noted that “funding for the time being is secure,” but he acknowledged that “going forward,” Microsoft’s investment will need to be replaced. The OCA launched in 2005 with initial funds from Microsoft.

Live Search Books debuted in beta in late 2006 with books scanned by library partners at the University of California, British Library, and University of Toronto. Kahle has been a vocal opponent of book scanning practices that make public domain books surface only within the search engines owned by the companies that scanned them, or that prohibit their wide use and reuse—with Google being a main target.

In exiting the book scanning arena, Microsoft suggested the future of public domain books rests on libraries and publishers. Kahle, meanwhile, has long advocated a “public works” approach to scanning public domain books.”