fu-u-u-u-c-k

2. Definitely a drag - just got new notebook two weeks ago and hadn't visited the site since.

I guess I'm glad I've still got the 1944-62 orginals safe in my fireproof closet. But that's a terrible bit of news, since for so many decades The Sporting News was the only one-stop source for baseball information.

How disappointing. Is there any other method/site to get the archived Sporting News?

That's terrible! Terrible. Access to that site helped make my book MUCH better- and much more fun to write. Anyone know why this happened?

WHAT??!?!?!?

Why??? I was relying on that for an essay I was writing. FUDGE! I have to think this is temporary?

I have put in an e-mail to the webmaster, and it hasn't bounced back yet- a good sign. The text of my letter follows.

WHY?????!?!!!!!!!????!!!!!

I actually just discovered this last week too! (see?)

If you click on Google's "Advanced Archive Search", you can type in "Sporting News" into the "Source" search field... even still, it only looks like the archive only goes back to 1999 for now. Try searching for Manny Ramirez or Greg Maddux and then choosing the "Before 2000" link on the left. Or try someone like Mickey Mantle... results only seem to come back from 1999... bummer.

I suspect Google will get this fixed at some point... if they have so much data from so many decades, they're going to get it online eventually... at least there's Baseball Digest and SI Vault still...

Got this nice note back from the webmaster, Bob Huggins:

Howard -- Thanks for your note. It's been re-directed to Google as they acquired our content in 2006. I spoke at length with SABR to no avail. The Sporting News database was not moved over a Google could not come to a deal with TSN. However all the data is there and could be made available if we could find someone to pay for it. It's frustrating, but we've attempted to secure SABR for two years now--Best---Bob Huggins

I wonder what the cost for something like that is.

Got this nice note back from the webmaster, Bob Huggins:

Huggins was actually the Founder/CEO, not just the webmaster.

Is there anything that we could do to help out? I'd be willing to pay for access if I had to. I just hate to see these great archives disappear like this.

I wonder what the cost for something like that is.

Heh. Forman posting that is going to have every other baseball website quoting post #1.

If Sean Forman somehow buys the rights to those archives and posts them, I might have to begin a letter writing campaign to get him inducted into Cooperstown.

Sean is is indeed impressive in getting things done, but if Google couldn't afford the asking price, and SABR allegedly passed, TSN must really be holding them for ransom.

How disappointing. Is there any other method/site to get the archived Sporting News?

St. Louis' main downtown library has them on microfilm all the way back to the start (1886). But that's not much help if you're not near St. Louis.

St. Louis' main downtown library has them on microfilm all the way back to the start (1886). But that's not much help if you're not near St. Louis.

Surely they have a microfiche printer. If Google is charging that much....

I do fail to see why Google doesn't make it available. They own it, they're apparently storing it anyway, and bandwidth costs for them are about how much I would pay to lick the bottoms of hobo feet. Sell Adsense on it and walk away.

I do fail to see why Google doesn't make it available. They own it, they're apparently storing it anyway, and bandwidth costs for them are about how much I would pay to lick the bottoms of hobo feet. Sell Adsense on it and walk away.

Except apparently Google doesn't own the TSN portion of POR.

I wonder what the cost for something like that is.

The number $15,000 was put forth by one of the SABR Directors.

Sorry for resurrecting this thread -- I've been in Taizhong for the past few days, far away from the internet.

My dad, who works for the Desert News, told me that he thinks Google might put the Sporting News archives in its News search engine. He told me that Google has been doing something similar with local newspapers around the country. It's a frustrating process, though. Apparently Google has been uploading bits and pieces at a time. I can find my grandparents' wedding announcement in a Deseret News article from the 1950s on Google, but there are entire years for which there are absolutely no scans from the same newspaper.

Except apparently Google doesn't own the TSN portion of POR.

I keep hearing this, and I keep wondering why the TSN part of POR stayed up after Google acquired POR. Why were these archives freely available for so long?

The number $15,000 was put forth by one of the SABR Directors.

Seems pretty low to me...

Meanwhile, I'm busy downloading pages from the 1908 Chicago Tribune via ProQuest.

Here are some snippets of info

ohn--yes, PaperofRecord.com's content was Sold to Google as part of a deal signed in September 2006 with our parent company Cold North Wind Inc. We attempted on several occasions to enlist TSN to move over our data, but they refused to sign with Google. We also attempted for the data to be purchased and supported by SABR and were unable to come to an agreement that made this financially viable. At this time we are certainly open to a move of the specific TSN data to a site that makes sense. It seems to us that TSN, should be involved, but isn't. We have enjoyed supporting baseball enthusiasts for the past six years and hope we can find a home for this important historical resource,


Sincerely,


R.J.(Bob) Huggins
Founder
Cold North Wind Inc./ PaperofRecord.com
-----------------------------------------------------------
Found another tidbit.

December 8th, 2008: “It is a bittersweet day for PaperofRecord.com. We are very pleased to have our legacy and vision of a 500 year, global, multiple language newspaper historical archive being placed in the stewardship of Google. As a Canadian entrepreneur, it is disappointing to not be able to muster the resources in our country to bring such a digital resource to its fruition at home. However, without the help and vision of a company such as Google, this immense, global, educational resource would not be possible on the scale that is being contemplated,” said R.J (Bob) Huggins, Founder and CEO of PaperofRecord.com, in a statement.

Punit Soni, product manager of Google News Archive, said something appropriately corporate and distantly passionless involving a “robust set of Canadian newspaper content” and “a number of interesting US newspapers.” What else is there to say? Likely there were spreadsheets and presentations to revise, and perhaps some dry toast waiting.
----------------------------------------------------------
Posted By RJ Huggins---9/16/2008 11:30:25 AM


Barbara--
Just to set the record straight--PaperofRecord.com was secretly purchased by Google in 2006. Our first meetings for the vision of a five hundred year historical newspaper universe began in 2004. Most of the initial material on the Google New Archive website originates from Canada and is the legacy created by our team at Cold North Wind. As you may remember Cold North Wind was the first company to digitize an entire history of a newspaper with the Toronto Star from 1892 to the present. We're proud to leave the legacy of our small company in the hands of Google.

Best

Bob Huggins
Founder
Cold North Wind/PaperofRecord.com

For those interested, who for whatever reason don't have access to historical proquest, there is a library that for only $20 will give you the complete historical proquest. That is the one with the Chicago Tribune, New York Times, LA times, Washington Post, Wall STreet Journal, Boston Globe, and several others.

It is the mid continent library

Apparently Bob has convinced Google to allow him to relaunch Paper of Record, but is making it available via academic portals only (colleges, universities, and libraries who subscribe to the service).

Here's Bob's latest message about the relaunch:

"To all POR users-- We have a positive response from Google, giving us permission to re-start PaperofRecord.com. Ah, but here's the rub--- as we have no staff as a result of the purchase, we will attempt to make it available thru academic portals only. This will mean that access will be had by going to universities, colleges and libraries who subscribe. Anyone wishing more details should direct emails to webcredence@gmail.com. As we sign up portals, an updated list will be made available on the site to direct users to portals. This may be clumsy, but will allow us to manage the process with the least amount of people people power at present."

If anyone knows or learns of a portal or portals that are subscribing to PaperofRecord.com, I'd love to get that information, as I'm sure would many of us. In the meantime, I'll see if I can track down more info.

Mike Lynch

If Sean Forman somehow buys the rights to those archives and posts them, I might have to begin a letter writing campaign to get him inducted into Cooperstown.

You mean, there isn't one already underway?

If anyone knows or learns of a portal or portals that are subscribing to PaperofRecord.com, I'd love to get that information, as I'm sure would many of us. In the meantime, I'll see if I can track down more info.

Ditto. I'm more than willing to make some calls, but I don't really know how to ask if a library is subscribing. I'd like to know how much an institutional subscription is, so I can lobby some local institutions.

Sean, you should get an institutional subscription and make it only available to bb-ref subscribers. I mean, since you've done everything else for us . . . .

Next week, Huggins will post rates for institutional subscriptions to the database of $3,600 a year for institutions with full-time enrollment of at least 20,000, and $1,800 for others -- prices that are less than the fees before the Google purchase. Huggins said he didn't know how long Google would let him keep the revived site up. "I don't think particularly that the communication of this was handled very well by Google. I'm very disappointed," he said.

From April 22, 2009 "Inside Higher Ed" http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2009/04/22/record

And this from Bob Huggins on May 1:

PaperofRecord.com is being offered as it was before the Google purchase. All the newspapers that have ever appeared on POR, we own all IP and rights to the digitized material. We are beginning with Colleges and Universities as they have a means of IP authentication. We currently have 12 institutions signed up and ready to go for next week. SABR has been sent details and we are expecting them onboard. We are trying to get this resource back up after being offline, with little resources. I'd be pleased to answer any questions to avoid much of the speculation we're seeing on blogs etc. Elvis is dead.

They expect SABR on board? Awesome.