Macmillan takes on Google Print

Macmillan boss Richard Charkin tells IWR why publishers may prefer alliance with Macmillan over search engines

Publishers wary of putting their titles online with Google can now side with publishing giant Macmillan, which, with its parent company Holtzbrinck Group, is developing a book digitisation platform to be called BookStore.

Richard Charkin, chief executive at Macmillan , has called for the publishing industry to collaborate on digitisation and search.

Like Google Print, BookStore will be a searchable repository of digital book content, with e-commerce technology for purchasing titles.

Charkin said BookStore will appeal to publishers that want to take advantage of releasing their content online, but don’t want to surrender control of their copyright or invest in the technology required.

Publishers are unhappy with Google’s strategy of asking publishers to send it opt-out list of titles not to be scanned.

BookStore will give publishers the option of making their content available to search engines such as Google, Yahoo and MSN .

“We need to be able to do deals with people that we can measure, not to hold onto material, but to know who is using it and how,” Charkin said. “Publishers have to get their act together with the entry of Yahoo and Microsoft into the arena alongside Amazon and Google.”

“Digitisation projects like this and Google Print are not that different from distribution. It is a virtual warehouse. I include Amazon, Google and Yahoo as distributors,” he said.

Charkin admits that Google has increased pressure on publishers to make their content available online. But he denied that BookStore was a knee-jerk response to Google Print – he argued that it is an additional choice for the information sector. “I don’t think we or Google will get a monopoly.”

With three major parties digitising books for the web – Google, Macmillan and the Yahoo/Microsoft-led Open Content Alliance – Charkin, who is also president of the Publishers Association, has called for all sides of the industry to collaborate.

“We now need to talk about standards. There are certain ways of structuring the data for book searching – and if there is a correct way to do it, we should all be doing it.”

Charkin also warned that too many search standards will harm the information profession.