WorldCat — 'Window to the world's libraries'

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"WorldCat is a worldwide union catalog created and maintained collectively by more than 9,000 member institutions. With millions of online records built from the bibliographic and ownership information of contributing libraries, it is the largest and most comprehensive database of its kind."

Margalit Fox wrote in her August 2 New York Times obituary of Frederick G. Kilgour, who created WorldCat, "Based in Dublin, Ohio, the cooperative oversees a vast computerized database that comprises the catalogs of some 10,000 libraries around the world — more than a billion items — available to anyone who walks into a participating library and logs on to a computer terminal. Starting later this month, the database will be available to anyone with an Internet connection."

Can't hardly wait.