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David Dillard has asked that we think about comparing Google to commercial databases. I am not a librarian so I am not privy to the most recent developments. I had given the subject some thought, though ; that's why I wrote what I did. Admittedly, I haven't done any research recently, but here are some things I discovered in my last go around: 1. ILL has become more accessible. True. I could see what journals my university subscribed to as well as in the entire California state system. That's how I determined that journals weren't subscribed to or available to me. 2. The library offered EBSCO and other databases that I could access from home. The front ends on some of these were very anemic (particularly EBSCO) and were not as good as Google and scholar.google.com . Time after time, I found what I wanted with Scholar Google when the high-priced databases came cold for "teasing out" the articles that I wanted, despite using strategies like proximity word searches. 3. In the area of language learning and technology, there are now a few peer-reviewed, online journals. Accessing those journals, I was able to determine relevant journal articles that had appeared in print journals. Using Google, I located home pages of researchers. Often researchers had PDF's of their articles on their websites. That's an example of how I used Google and Scholar.Google to succeed where the commercial databases failed me. Occasionally, I could use Google in the other direction, using it to determine what articles were available to me in the commercial databases and track them down. Now I am no longer a graduate student or an instructor at an institution that provides me access to commercial databases. I am hopeful that the move to online, non-subscription peer-reviewed journal might be an idea whose time has come. The journal publishers have done an admirable job for the scholarly community, but maybe it's time for academic journals to broaden their audience and access. Consider it "open source" for the academy. Just as a paradigm shift is occurring in journalism, I am hopeful that there are signs of a paradigm shift in the academic community, with action research and online journals marking perhaps the beginning of "citizen researchers" . Bruce Moon ESL instructor Florin Technology Center Sacramento, CA --- Edtech Archives, posting guidelines and other information are at: http://www.h-net.msu.edu/~edweb Please include your name, email address, and school or professional affiliation in each posting. To unsubscribe send the following command to: LISTSERV@H-NET.MSU.EDU SIGNOFF EDTECH
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