Google was not the first company to consider scanning printed products for a digital archive, but there has certainly been a rush of initiatives launched since Google gained so much notoriety for its Google Print Libraries program. The latest announcement comes from the Library of Congress, which is seeking to build a so-called World Digital Library, a multilingual project involving the digitization of all kinds of objects and recordings. Google has donated $3MUSD to the project.

So here's the landscape of literature digitization:
The Library of Congress World Digital Library.
The Open Content Alliance is backed by Microsoft, Yahoo!, and the Internet Archive.
Amazon is reportedly building a page-purchase commercial service with publishers.
Random House is building its own book-search and page-purchase system.
Google is pushing forward with its library-scanning project in the face of publisher lawsuits.
Various European countries sulk over Google Print and threaten/promise to build their own systems.