France’s national library has been forced to deny rumours that it has sold out to Google over digitization, and thus ended protracted resistance to perceived cultural imperialism.

“Following a news item published Tuesday 18 August in La Tribune, the [Bibliothèque Nationale de France] wishes to clarify that it has not signed an agreement with Google for the digitization of its collection,” says the library (pdf).

However, it adds that, “The Library has never ruled out a private partnership that would be consistent with the strategy of the Ministry of Culture regarding digital content.”

The BNF has been seen as “spearheading resistance” to Google’s digitisation of books and it championed an alternative European digital library that might be more suitable to non-English speaking countries.

The Tribune claimed yesterday that the BNF had capitulated to the American search engine. Other papers in France and abroad have followed up the story, with Le Figaro saying, the BNF had been “seduced by Google”.

French literary blogger Pierre Assouline declared, “It will thus have taken four years for the library to pass from resistance to collaboration.”

A library spokesperson told the Times the library has not abandoned its own digitization project, but would use Google to do the work faster and cheaper than it would be able to do itself.

Whether this approach will be acceptable to the French public after the sensationalist headlines die down remains to be seen…

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