Overview of OCLC Pilot Projects

OCLC Pilots Traditional Libraries into Web Services
by Barbara Quint
July 5, 2005, Information Today, Inc.

Over the next few months, a series of pilot projects will expand OCLCs Open WorldCat project into a full-featured, Web-integrated library service. In December 2004, OCLC (http://www.oclc.org) opened WorldCat, its master union catalog of library holdings, to Google, Yahoo! Search, and other outlets. Initially, the material accessible to the Web search engines was books and monographs. With the new eSerials pilot project, OCLC will begin expanding content to electronic journal collections. The reference services pilot will link Web searchers to reference librarianssometimes live onesthrough an Ask a Librarian feature. The bookselling pilot connects Open WorldCat searchers directly with book purchasing options made by OCLC with Baker and Taylor.