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Google To Digitize Millions of Old Newspaper Pages

hhavensteincw writes "On Monday Google detailed new plans to digitize millions of newspaper pages with articles, photographs, and headlines intact so they can be accessed and searched online. 'Around the globe, we estimate that there are billions of news pages containing every story ever written,' Google said in a blog post. 'It's our goal to help readers find all of them, from the smallest local weekly paper up to the largest national daily.' For example, Google noted the availability of an original article from the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette from 1969 about the landing on the moon." When you search the news archive for, e.g., "Chicago fire" or "Rosenberg trial," a significant fraction of the result pages cost money to view.

28 of 201 comments (clear)

  1. Paydirt! by QuantumG · · Score: 5, Funny

    http://news.google.com/archivesearch?q=%22armadillo+aerospace%22&scoring=t

    Fuck I wish Carmack would stop using his Time Machine to get 1957 publicity.

    --
    How we know is more important than what we know.
    1. Re:Paydirt! by narcberry · · Score: 5, Funny

      I'd like to contribute.

      Where can I mail in newspaper clippings?

      --
      Modding me -1 troll doesn't make me wrong.
    2. Re:Paydirt! by martin-boundary · · Score: 2, Funny

      He's never been the same ever since he bought his new Ferrari. I'm told it goes up to 88mph.

  2. Google by Iamthecheese · · Score: 3, Funny

    From the billions of dollars of public good that is Google Maps to their true lack of evil, from their sucessful attempts to make the world a better place to the way they treat their employees, Google is truly great.

    ALL HAIL GOOGLE. ALL HAIL GOOGLE. ALL HAIL GOOGLE.

    --
    If video games influenced behavior the Pac Man generation would be eating pills and running away from their problems.
    1. Re:Google by rktechhead · · Score: 2, Funny

      Google is going to start digitizing everything, and perhaps people soon enough. Want to find your grandma? Use Google Human.

  3. Re:Great! by telchine · · Score: 3, Funny

    [quote]Who hasn't done something goofy and thought in retrospect wished they hadn't done it (not necessarily something criminal). Google might make their "second chance" disappear.[/quote]

    If only finding out about these youthful misdemeanours could end someone's career...

    http://www.dba-oracle.com/images/bill_gates_albuquerque.jpg

  4. Uh-oh! by zmollusc · · Score: 5, Funny

    I hope to god that they edit out the advertising otherwise all us consumers will be frantic with longing for products that are no longer available, what with advertising not being a huge sham and all!

    --
    They whose government reduces their essential liberties for temporary security, receive neither liberty nor security.
  5. Feeling a bit ill by plen246 · · Score: 5, Funny

    My thirty-year, $50-billion plan to consolidate the microfiche market may well be in the shitter.

    1. Re:Feeling a bit ill by QuantumG · · Score: 4, Funny

      Quick! Run to Congress and buy some laws to protect your ailing business model!

      There's no time to waste!

      --
      How we know is more important than what we know.
    2. Re:Feeling a bit ill by plen246 · · Score: 2, Funny

      If I unroll the tubes, I think I can I make the Internets flat enough to microfiche.

  6. Distributed computing? by AsciiNaut · · Score: 4, Funny

    I've latterly been thinking about the googlization of everything digital. I've latterly also been thinking about the spread of botnets (Storm, Kraken and the like). This has led me to conclude there is a Google Black Ops department intent on replacing Google's vast server farms with users' own PCs - i.e., Google aims covertly to use our computers as its hardware!

    From Google's perspective it makes perfect sense to use idle cycles on Aunt Harriet's aging Dell to serve googlicious applications to an eager populace. Why shouldn't she host your gmail account?

    The whole concept can even be justified from an environmental point of view: scaling is naturally proportional to demand and load-spreading is extremely efficient. In the long term, Google won't need any of its own hardware other than expensive corporate buildings equipped with limitless executive toys and a few dumb terminals. Hell, we're beginning to see that already. Everyone benefits.

    As for the the spam emanating from botnets, this is a mere smoke-screen (or should I say cloud-screen?) designed to keep us off the scent.

    I, for one, salute our new Gotnet overlord.

  7. Awesome by rea1l1 · · Score: 1, Funny

    Now I can find out everyone I knew who's died with Google archiving the obituaries.

  8. As the old saying goes... by PinkyDead · · Score: 3, Funny

    "The Google makes work for idle scanners."

    --
    Genesis 1:32 And God typed :wq!
  9. A cure for seasickness? by WillKemp · · Score: 2, Funny

    I don't care if they take over the world, just so long as i don't have to scroll through years of microfilmed newspapers ever again - it makes me feel seasick!

  10. nail in the coffin by n3tcat · · Score: 3, Funny

    At last, I can finally go back and tell my 3rd grade teacher THIS is why I didn't need to learn how to use a flippin microfiche!!

  11. Re:Great! by n+dot+l · · Score: 4, Funny

    Who hasn't done something goofy and thought in retrospect wished they hadn't done it (not necessarily something criminal).

    Those that didn't get caught?

  12. Re:At last! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Funny

    stardates would go a long way towards fixing this.

  13. Re:Hardly the first... by MrMr · · Score: 5, Funny

    Just checking the 28 september 1776 issue. It appears that parliament has forbidden any dealing with the colonies of New Hampfhire, Maffachufett's Bay, Rhode Ifland, Connecticut, New York, New Jerfey, Penfylvania...
    I am curious about OCR fearch engine refults on this publication.

  14. Re:I've seen that happen by YourExperiment · · Score: 5, Funny

    Oh no! Exec dabbled with left wing ideology in youth! By the way I was a member of the Socialist Worker Student Society when I was a student because I was trying to impress a girl. Why would anybody care?

    I can see why this would be harmful to his career. As soon as word got out that, at some point in his past, he actually cared about people, his reputation as a business executive would be ruined. He might never get another six-figure salaried job again.

  15. So when is google going to..... by Fengpost · · Score: 2, Funny

    So when is google going to start scanning The National Enquirer or other tabloid newspapers, so the slashdotters can look up Natalie Portman's news with grits handy!

    --
    The purpose of writing is to inflate weak ideas, obscure poor reasoning, and inhibit clarity....Calvin
  16. Welcome... by interactive_civilian · · Score: 4, Funny

    Or it might finally make people realize that we are all human, and a stupid act at 18 doesn't equate to judgment post 30. Naaahhh...

    You must be new here. Welcome to Earth. We're a little strange here, but you will find that some of us can be relaxed and groovy. Enjoy your stay.

    P.S. Please take me with you when you leave the planet

    --
    "Empathise with stupidity, and you're halfway to thinking like an idiot." - Iain M. Banks
  17. Re:I've seen that happen by cerberusss · · Score: 3, Funny

    The people that freak me out are Young Conservatives. Those guys are creepy.

    They're in it for the women.

    --
    8 of 13 people found this answer helpful. Did you?
  18. No, I'm New Here by New+Here · · Score: 3, Funny

    No, I'm New Here

  19. Re:Great! by wisty · · Score: 2, Funny

    1. Guy/girl becomes an alcoholic, dodges the draft, gets arrested for DOI, and otherwise acts like a complete no-hoper for the first 30 years of his life. 2. Gets covered by local news (at that time). 3. Google digitises that news. 4. Now President of the United States (then guy/girl) gets elected for a second term.

  20. Re:Hardly the first... by Chris+Mattern · · Score: 2, Funny

    They also reported that the colonists' Declaration included a statement about "Life, Liberty, and the Purfuit of Happineff."

  21. Re:Great! by SatanicPuppy · · Score: 2, Funny

    Just look at it this way, the next time a prospective employer is judging you based on what's on your facebook page, you can whip out a photocopy of his naked hairy hippie ass and say, "What, sorry, didn't hear you?"

    --
    ad logicam Claiming a proposition is false because it was presented as the conclusion of a fallacious argument.
  22. Re:I've seen that happen by Creepy · · Score: 2, Funny

    No - I have a monopoly on creepy - stop stealing my thunder!

  23. Re:At last! by ColdSam · · Score: 2, Funny

    I can't imagine that ever being a serious problem.

    How an online time warp blindsided United Airlines