For a recent comparative literature class paper, Brendan Draper wanted to quote a phrase from a novel he'd read, but he couldn't remember what page it was on.


He typed "nervous condition" into Internet search giant Google's index of books. Within seconds, he found the phrase and page number of the book. "It was extremely helpful," says Draper, 20, a student at the West Chester University of Pennsylvania.

Situations like his are exactly what Google had in mind a year ago when it unveiled the Google Print project at the Frankfurt Book Fair in Germany. Google co-founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin, on hand for the event, told publishers they wanted to scan their books, at no cost, to make them searchable online and to help sell copies to consumers.
Google returns to the fair Tuesday to tout the program — and to announce searches in French, Spanish, Italian and German. But it is no longer reaping the initial positive glow from publishers. Instead, it finds itself in the position of having to defend itself to the industry.

How it works

The Google Print homepage —www.print.google.com— lets users search for a phrase, character or other term to turn up a link to a related book title. Clicking on the book title generates an image of the page of the book, along with other information about it and advertising links to online bookstores. Google splits the revenue from those ads with publishers.


The entire contents of public domain books are available for viewing; for books under copyright, just a few pages or in some cases, only bibliographic data and brief snippets.
Content in Google Print comes from two sources: publishers and libraries. Google infuriated publishers after it announced an alliance last December with five libraries, including Harvard and the University of Michigan, to scan their entire collections. Google said its objective was to build the world's largest online card catalog.

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