[gweekly] PT1a Weekly Project Gutenberg Newsletter
Michael Hart
hart at pglaf.org
Wed May 10 09:28:06 PDT 2006
pt1a1.506
Weekly_May_10.txt
***The Project Gutenberg Weekly Newsletter For Wednesday, May 10, 2006 PT1***
*******eBooks Readable By Both Humans And Computers Since July 4, 1971********
Project Gutenberg of Europe Passes the 300 eBook Mark!!!
*
Editor's comments appear in [brackets].
Newsletter editors needed! Please email hart at pobox.com or gbnewby at pglaf.org
Anyone who would care to get advance editions: please email hart at pobox.com
*
TABLE OF CONTENTS
[Search for "*eBook" or "*Intro". . .to jump to that section, etc.]
*eBook Milestones
*Introduction
*Hot Requests, New Sites and Announcements
*Continuing Requests and Announcements
*Progress Report
*Distributed Proofreaders Collection Report
*Project Gutenberg Consortia Center Report
*Permanent Requests For Assistance:
*Donation Information
*Access To The Project Gutenberg Collections
*Mirror Site Information
*Instant Access To Our Latest eBooks
*Have We Given Away A Trillion Yet?
*Flashback
*Weekly eBook update:
This is now in PT2 of the Weekly Newsletter
Also collected in the Monthly Newsletter
Corrections in separate section
3 New This Week From PG Australia [Australian, Canadian Copyright Etc.]
6 New This Week From PGEu [European Copyrights, Life + 50 and 70]
0 New This Week From PG PrePrints
59 New This Week To Public Domain eBooks Under US Copyright
68 New This Week [Including PG Australia, PG Europe and PrePrints]
*Headline News from Edupage, etc.
*Information About the Project Gutenberg Mailing Lists
***
*eBook Milestones*
Project Gutenberg of Europe Passes the 300 eBook Mark!!!
19,356 eBooks As Of Today At These Four PG Sites
644 to go to 20,000!!!
18,893 at www.gutenberg.org[+59]
575 Australian eBooks [+3] [Included in above line]
304 Gutenberg Europe [+6]
156 PG PrePrint Site [+0]
19,356 Grand Total of all four sites
68 New eBooks This Week
~97% of the Way to 20,000
***555 eBooks Averaged Per Year Since July 4, 1971***
16,288 New eBooks Since The Start Of 2001
That's ~257 eBooks per Month for ~63.25 Months
1,208 New eBooks in 2006 at These Four Sites
45 New eBooks From Distributed Proofreaders
8,423 total from Distributed Proofreaders
Since October, 2000 [Details in PT1B]
[Currently over 36,000 DP volunteers]
We Averaged ~339 eBooks Per Month In 2004
We Averaged ~248 eBooks Per Month In 2005
[Including PG Australia]
We Are Averaging ~284 eBooks Per Month This Year
[Including PGAu, PGEu and PrePrints]
All Four Sites Combined Are Averaging 67 eBooks Per Week In 2006
68 This Week
It took ~32 years, from 1971 to 2003 to do our 1st 10,000 eBooks
It took ~32 months, from 2003 to 2006 for our last 10,000 eBooks
It took ~10 years from 1993 to 2003 to grow from 100 eBooks to 10,100
It took ~2.5 years from Oct. 2003 to Mar. 2006 from 10,000 to 19,000
[The above changes due to the opening of Project Gutenberg
sites other than the original one at www.gutenberg.org]
[Now including totals from Australia, Europe and PrePrints]
[Apologies, it will take a while to integrate everything
not all statistics may be totally equalized yet]
[PGEu Statistics Are Counted Monthly Not Weekly]
[Daily PGEu stats at http://dp.rastko.net/default.php]
[Daily DP stats at http://www.pgdp.net]
BTW, we just started a new "PrePrints" site at PG,
so if you come across eBooks that aren't ready for
primetime, but that should be saved for upgrading,
we have a place to put them.
http://preprints.readingroo.ms/ new site
*
~75,000 eBooks at the PG Consortia Center
http://www.gutenberg.cc
*
***Introduction
[The Newsletter is now being sent in two sections, so you can directly
go to the portions you find most interesting: 1. Founder's Comments,
News, Notes & Queries, and 2. Weekly eBook Update Listing. Note bene
that PT1 is now being sent as PT1A and PT1B.
[Since we are between Newsletter editors, these 2 parts may undergo a
few changes while we are finding a new Newsletter editor. Email us:
hart at pobox.com and gbnewby at pglaf.org if you would like to volunteer.]
This is Michael Hart's "Founder's Comments" section of the Newsletter
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*
*Headline News from Edupage
[PG Editor's Comments In Brackets]
JOURNAL PUBLISHERS CRINGE AT ACCESS BILL
A bill introduced by Sens. Joseph Lieberman (D-Conn.) and John Cornyn
(R-Tex.) has prompted an outcry by publishers of scholarly journals,
who argue that their publications would suffer under the bill. The
Federal Research Public Access Act of 2006 would require scholars who
publish articles based on federally funded research to place those
articles on free Web sites within six months of being published in an
academic journal. The sponsors of the bill said it would ensure broad
access to research funded with taxpayer money. A spokesperson for
Lieberman said the bill would "foster information sharing, prevent
duplication of research efforts, and generate new lines of scientific
inquiry." Some scholarly publishers expressed concerns, however, that
the business model of academic journals--both in terms of subscriptions
and of ad revenues--would falter if so much of the content were free
online. The National Institutes of Health last year began encouraging
researchers working on NIH grants to submit their articles to a public
database, but so far fewer than 4 percent have done so.
New York Times, 8 May 2006 (registration req'd)
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/05/08/business/media/08journal.html
PARENTS, CITY COUNCIL CALL FOR END TO CELL-PHONE BAN
Framing it as a "safety issue," City Councilwoman Letitia James has
called on administrators in New York City to lift a ban on cell phones
in public schools. Opponents of the ban, including most students,
many parents, and a small number of city officials, pointed to incidents
such as the September 11, 2001, attacks, saying that cell phones can be
an invaluable lifeline in times of crisis. They said rules requiring
students to turn cell phones off in school are acceptable but that the
technology should be available in an emergency. Administrators
reiterated their belief that phones in school represent nothing so much
as a source of distractions and of mischief, including cheating and
taking photos in restrooms or locker rooms. Joel Klein, chancellor of
schools, said that alternate solutions to the problems of cell phones
are either too expensive or impractical. Mayor Michael Bloomberg also
expressed his support for the continuation of the ban.
Wired News, 6 May 2006
http://www.wired.com/news/wireservice/0,70834-0.html
OCLC AND RLG ANNOUNCE MERGER
The OCLC Online Computer Library Center and the Research Libraries
Group (RLG) have announced plans to merge. If approved, the merger
would combine the two largest resource catalogs for libraries--RLG's
Union Catalog and OCLC's WorldCat. Clifford Lynch, executive director
of the Coalition for Networked Information, welcomed the merger, saying
it will put OCLC's resources "much more in the direct service of
research libraries." Pamela Snelson, president-elect of the Association
of College and Research Libraries and the librarian at Franklin and
Marshall College, agreed that the merger would be good for users.
"One larger database will help the average person be able to find
information in a more effective and timely manner," she said.
The plan must still be approved by two-thirds of RLG's 150 members.
Under the terms of the merger, RLG would become a division of OCLC.
Chronicle of Higher Education, 4 May 2006 (sub. req'd)
http://chronicle.com/daily/2006/05/2006050402t.htm
PHILADELPHIA WI-FI NEARS APPROVAL
[But they had to sell out all the rest of Pennsylvania to get it!]
Philadelphia's long-debated citywide wireless network is on the verge
of having final approval, after which implementation of the network is
expected to begin within a few weeks. The network has raised a range of
objections since it was initially proposed, and supporters of the
effort have had to make a number of changes and concessions. A city
council committee, which was the last step before a vote by the full
city council, demanded that language be added to ensure EarthLink will
use contractors who work with minorities, women, and people with
disabilities. In addition, Wireless Philadelphia, the nonprofit that
will oversee the network, will have a larger board than originally
planned, with broader representation from the city council and from
various municipal offices. The full city council is expected to approve
the deal, at which time EarthLink will begin installing wireless
transmitters on 4,000 utility poles owned by the city. The network,
which will charge a lower rate to poor users, is expected to be
finished in 18 months.
CNET, 3 May 2006
http://news.com.com/2100-7351_3-6068350.html
BUSINESS GROUPS URGE CAUTION IN WTO TALKS WITH RUSSIA
U.S. businesses urged the Office of the United States Trade
Representative to demand more efforts from Russia in addressing
intellectual property crimes before granting approval for the country
to join the World Trade Organization (WTO). Russia, with one of the
largest global economies not represented in the WTO, is in bilateral
talks with the United States over admission to the group. Industry
organizations point to Russia as one of the worst offenders for piracy
of copyrighted music, movies, and software and called on U.S. officials
to take a tough stance. Eric Schwartz, vice president of the
International Intellectual Property Alliance, said, "Enforcement at
present is very, very weak." Businesses calling for renewed pressure on
Russia pointed to proposed legislation in the country that would
actually weaken protections for copyright owners. Christin Baker, a
spokeswoman for the U.S. Trade Representative's office, said, "We made
it very clear to Russia that improvements...are necessary for them to
enter the WTO."
ABC News, 2 May 2006
http://www.abcnews.go.com/Politics/wireStory?id=1914448
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*HEADLINE NEWS AVOIDED BY MOST OF THE MAJOR U.S. MEDIA
[As requested adding sources, etc., when possible.
Remember, the subject is not the article's subject,
the subject is the manipulation of the world news.]
*DOUBLESPEAK OF THE WEEK
See Statistics section below.
*QUOTE OF THE WEEK
"The most important decision we make is whether we
believe we live in a friendly or hostile universe."
Albert Einstein
*PREDICTIONS OF THE WEEK
The political fallout is just beginning.
*ODD STATISTICS OF THE WEEK
New Orleans' local garbage removers want $15/cubic yard to get
the wreckage from Katrina off the streets, while Florida sites
want over $30/cubic yard.
Guess who got the 1/2 billion dollar contract, $100 million of
it as pure profit?
Let's see, is there any connection between Florida politicians
and those who somehow managed to avoid knowing about Katrina's
imminent landfall?
[I'm sure the Democrats will make just as many snafu's when in
office. . .if they ever get back in office. . .hee hee!
Google search says it is even worse:
News: "new orleans" "cubic yard" yields:
"'Profit motive,' Halliburton, government gaffes taint Katrina ..."
Frost Illustrated, IN - 17 hours ago
"Nagin said even debris cleanup is big business, with contracts being
let for $43 per cubic yard and contracted several levels below, with
the actual workers earning only $7 per cubic yard.
*
By the way, for those interested, the official U.S. population
estimates just passed 298 million, though many say estimations
of this nature leave out as much as 5% of the population, with
the obvious exclusion of the 11-12 million immigrant workers
now being mentioned so much in the news.
Still hoping for more statistical updates and additional entries.
[This one is getting a little out of date, as the US population
is obviously no longer 6% of the world. In fact, rounding to the
nearest percent, the US will soon fall from 5% to 4%.]
"If we could shrink the earth's population to a village of precisely
100 people, with all the existing human ratios remaining the same,
it would look something like the following. There would be:
57 Asians
21 Europeans
14 from the Western Hemisphere, both North and South America
8 Africans
52 would be female
48 would be male
70 would be non-white
30 would be white
70 would be non-Christian
30 would be Christian
6 people would possess 59% of the entire world's wealth
and all 6 would be from the United States
80 would live in substandard housing
70 would be unable to read
50 would suffer from malnutrition
1 would be near death; 1 would be near birth
1 (yes, only 1) would have a college education
1 would own a computer [I think this is now much greater]
1 would be 79 years old or more.
Of those born today, the life expectancy is only 63 years,
but no country any longer issues copyrights that are sure
to expire within that 63 year period.
I would like to bring some of these figures more up to date,
as obviously if only 1% of 6 billion people owned a computer
then there would be only 60 million people in the world who
owned a computer, yet we hear that 3/4 + of the United States
households have computers, out of over 100 million households.
Thus obviously that is over 1% of the world population, just in
the United States.
I just called our local reference librarian and got the number
of US households from the 2004-5 U.S. Statistical Abstract at:
111,278,000 as per data from 2003 U.S Census Bureau reports.
If we presume the saturation level of U.S. computer households
is now around 6/7, or 86%, that is a total of 95.4 million,
and that's counting just one computer per household, and not
counting households with more than one, schools, businesses, etc.
I also found some figures that might challenge the literacy rate
given above, and would like some help researching these and other
such figures, if anyone is interested.
BTW, while I was doing this research, I came across a statistic
that said only 10% of the world's population is 60+ years old.
This means that basically 90% of the world's population would
never benefit from Social Security, even if the wealthy nations
offered it to them free of charge. Then I realized that the US
population has the same kind of age disparity, in which the rich
live so much longer than the poor, the whites live so much longer
than the non-whites. Thus Social Security is paid by all, but is
distributed more to the upper class whites, not just because they
can receive more per year, but because they will live more years
to receive Social Security. The average poor non-white may never
receive a dime of Social Security, no matter how much they pay in.
*
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