Google Print is off the the races

Google Print has been launched at http://print.google.com. It's a search engine that allows you to view the entirety of public domain books as well as the Table of Contents of copyright protected works. For example, I was able to view the entire text of:

Before and After Socrates
by Francis M Cornford - Philosophy - 1932 - 144 pages

Note that a free Google Account is required in order to view the full-text of public domain books on the Google Print website. The utility of Google Print may be limited at this point due to the fact that only public domain books are available full-text but I wonder if in the future we will see Google negotiating rights to reproduce some of the copyrighted material. Hmmm. Maybe Google will charge a fee for this service to the end user? Hmm. Time will tell. Check it out and let me know what you think.

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