Technologia del Mundo


by M.V. Greene editors@ccgmag.com


A HISTORIC PARTNERSHIP HISPANIC ENGINEER & IT, GOOGLE BOOKS ON A


DIGITAL MISSION


Can’t find a desired back issue of His- panic Engineer & Information Technology magazine or the specific article where you or your company may have been featured?


Was it one from 1985, 1995, 2005 or even a few editions ago? No worries.


You can find all full back issues of HE&IT through the ambitious, ongoing Google Books digitization project.


In the fall of 1985, smartphones, iPods and super-charged laptops were the personal technology pipedreams of visionaries in the lab. Blogging, tex- ting, searching, and IM’ing were a virtual decade-plus away. Fall 1985 also saw prominent Hispanic technologist Edson D. de Castro riding high as Data General’s founder and president – as chronicled in a cover story profile in the very first edition of HE&IT. And, yes, that is an edition you can find in its totality on Google Books.


Vol. 1, No. 1, Autumn 1985, published jointly by the Society of Hispanic Profes- sional Engineers and Pre-Professional Publications, set out the magazine’s broad mission to publish a magazine with relevancy for “professional engi- neers, aspiring engineers and scientists, adventurous entrepreneurs and corpo- rate members.”


Tyrone Taborn, current Hispanic Engineer & IT publisher and editorial director, led Pre-Professional Publications in 1985 and helped write the de Castro article.


Google Inc. announced its Google Books initiative in December 2004 as part of its objective to make offline information searchable online. The initiative’s focus was to digitally scan books from the large library collections of universities such as Harvard, Stanford, Michigan and Oxford along with the


16 HISPANIC ENGINEER & Information Technology | 2010


New York Public Library. Through the years the project hit some legal snags because authors and publishers claimed that digitization would infringe on their copyrights. Ultimately, Google reached a multi-million dollar settlement and is proceeding with the project – part of its stated mission to organize the world’s information.


As an extension of digitizing books, Google announced in December 2009 that it had expanded the project to include magazines, offering publish- ers like Career Communications Group Inc., publisher of HE&IT, the chance to enter into a partnership that would archive their back issues at no cost. Over time, Google has said that it intends to integrate books and magazine content into the larger Google searchable index for use of online searchers worldwide, including out of print books and titles.


Career Communications Group joined in the digitization soon after the Google announcement as a way to make His- panic Engineer & IT and sister publica- tion U.S. Black Engineer & IT available to readers.


Readers can find the back issues they need by going to http://books.Google. com and searching the magazine’s title. A listing of specific editions comes up, ready for the next click. What is most useful for searchers is the opportunity to search by keywords, such as the names and companies of article subjects.


For instance, search “Edson D. de Cas- tro” and it shows immediately he also was featured in two other editions of HE&IT over the years and one edition of USBE&IT. Additionally, any other publi- cation that joined the partnership and contains de Castro’s name pops up.


Google’s digitization process amounts to the scanning a copy of the maga-


zine in its originally published content and does not rewrite or repurpose the information. Thus, what previously was published remains in that form, includ- ing the photographs, advertisements and headlines.


Taborn says Google Books gives Career Communications Group the opportunity to build an instant archive of its publica- tions. Publishers long have understood the value of digital archiving, but justify- ing the expense of doing so indepen- dently has been difficult.


“This is going to expand our readership in new and exciting ways,” he says. “We’re incredibly grateful for this opportunity.”


As Hispanic Engineer & IT marks its 25th anniversary as a publication, going through the back issues highlights the magazine’s progression over the years.


That initial Autumn 1985 edition contained a special careers section that targeted opportunities for students and graduates in telecommunications along with other useful information directed to Hispanics.


Carmela Mellado, then editor-in-chief, noted the purpose for the new maga- zine. “We believe that by highlighting this Hispanic presence in technology we can influence the lives of our students,” she wrote.


Taborn says the partnership with Google Books continues the magazine’s legacy in the digital archive.


“The achievements of these significant individuals will be preserved for new generations of readers,” he says. “That’s a good feeling.”


www.hispanicengineer.com


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