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Google Considers 'Speciality' Subscriptions

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the get-your-information dept.

jdclucidly writes "C|Net is reporting that Google is considering moving to a subscription based service for educational and commercial entities. The new service will be a specialized spider in addition to their already popular web search." Lexis-Nexis, Google's coming for you.

4 of 226 comments (clear)

  1. Lexis-Nexis, Google's coming for you. by duckbill · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I wish this was the case. Especially for the lexis legal research side.

    I doubt they can replace these types of services in the immediate future. It takes tons of labor to acquire the material needed to put together these services. Especially if you offer a value-added component such as indexing and headnotes.

    The promise of having this information on the internet has disappeared. During the economic boom, there were a lot of great web sites that took the time to digitize subsets of this information. They didn't index the material or offer the value-added features, but the raw content was still available.

    Since we have dipped into a recession, these sites either cease to exist, or they are updated too infrequently to be relied upon.

    To my knowledge the only companies that have these data stores are Lexis and for some legal and business matters, West Publishing. I don't see how Google can get the information without a licensing agreement from either company. If they have to pay for the license, I don't see how I could reap any benefits. Google's subscription couldn't be much lower than Thompson (Lexis) or West. Both services offer reasonable search capabilities in their present incarnation.

  2. Re:How about Usenet? by Masem · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Actually , with regard to stuff before 1995, they're trying. I submitted a story (rejected of course) about 2 months ago that Google was hunting for specific USENET achive CDs, the "NetNews" CD collection from 1992 to 1995. The specifics are here, but basically, they have some, but are missing a lot. They'd rather have the complete collection before they put up pre-1995 articles.

    --
    "Pinky, you've left the lens cap of your mind on again." - P&TB
    "I can see my house from here!" - ST:
  3. Re:How about Usenet? by justletmeinnow · · Score: 2, Interesting

    NOOoooooooo!! No pre-95 stuff. It's bad enough that whenever I search for something with 'linux' or 'RedHat' I end up with non-useful info regarding RedHat 4.0 or some old garbage that doesn't apply anymore. I guess if I was searching for dog grooming threads it might be just as well, but who the hell does that?

    --
    Just because I AM paranoid doesn't mean they're NOT out to get me.
  4. The problem with Charging for Google by (nil) · · Score: 3, Interesting
    I've long held that if Google charged, I'd be in trouble. "How come," you ask? Well--Google is simply the best. There's nobody else there that comes close.

    Think about it: how many times per day do you use Google/Google Groups? As for me, it's a bunch.

    I must conclude that, if Google charged, I'd be forced to pay.

    -(())