From hart at pglaf.org Wed Nov 15 09:39:14 2006
From: hart at pglaf.org (Michael Hart)
Date: Wed Nov 15 09:39:20 2006
Subject: [gweekly] Project Gutenberg Weekly Newsletter
Message-ID: <Pine.LNX.4.60.0611150938420.14148@pglaf.org>
pt1a2.n06
pt1b2.n06
Weekly_Novemeber_15.txt
The Project Gutenberg Weekly Newsletter For Wednesday, November 15, 2006 PT1
******eBooks Readable By Both Humans And Computers Since July 4, 1971*******
This is possibly my last Newsletter for a while, as I may, all thing
permitting, be on a speaking tour until near the end of the year.
I did a couple presentations over the weekend, but have not left
on the extended tour yet.
Still here, the presentations for this week were not needed, as the
matters were completed at a distance.
We are experimenting with a new format we will try to send shortly.
/
For now I am leaving PT1a and PT1b combined.
Please also let me know if you think these Newsletters are a waste of
time or if you think I/we should keep doing them.
Thanks!
Michael
///
Some Suggestions We Received For The Newsletters
0.
Several people have merely suggested to other readers
that they start from both ends and read to the middle
and thus they will get the highlights first, and then
the regular features, requests, etc. that stay pretty
much the same from issue to issue.
I would agree with this suggestion, and would simply,
for my own edification, also read the "Flashback," as
I find it interesting to see Project Gutenberg eBooks
as they appeared in our catalog x years ago.
1.
Divide the Newsletter in Web page URLs so the readers
could just jump to whatever portions they wanted.
[This would take some additional labor by someone who
was more familiar with writing web pages than I.]
You should already be able to jump to whichever parts
you want to read. . .simply use your search commands,
search for "*" plus the section header as outlined in
The Table of Contents.
2.
Redivide PT1 of the Weekly Newsletter into two parts.
[This would create a lot more work for whomever edits
the Newsletters, which probably wouldn't be so bad if
that were their only responsibility. I work to point
of exhaustion nearly every single day, and I need for
things to become easier rather than harder. Hence my
requests for anyone who would like to be editor: the
format of the Newsletter would be their choice and we
could either turn over the statistics to them, or our
stats people could simply send in that portion, ahead
of the deadline by an hour or two. We would continue
to encourage our readers to send in news items not in
the main regular media coverage.]
*
We are interested in increasing the "SF" available at Project Gutenberg of
Australia. To this end we are happy to receive donations of ebooks to add
to our collection.
SF, in this context can mean: Science, Speculative, Superhero, Swords,
Sorcery, Spies, Supernatural and Scary Fiction.
Of course, we are only able to accept works that are public domain in
Australia.
Generally speaking, this means that the author died in 1954 or earlier.
Please see our WANTED list at http://gutenberg.net.au/wanted.html for
authors and works of interest. If you have suggestions for authors or
works to add to the list, please let us know. Do check first that
they are not already available at Project Gutenberg Australia or
Project Gutenberg, please. Contact details are provided on the WANTED page.
http://gutenberg.net.au/wanted.html
http://gutenberg.net.au/wanted.html
As always, ebooks by Australian authors and of general Australian interest
are always greatly appreciated.
Editor's comments appear in [brackets].
Newsletter editors needed! Please email hart@pobox.com or gbnewby@pglaf.org
Anyone who would care to get advance editions: please email hart@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
Also collected in the Monthly Newsletter
Corrections in separate section
*Headline News from Edupage, etc.
*Information About the Project Gutenberg Mailing Lists
***
***eBook Milestones***
21,901 eBooks As Of Today At These Four PG Sites
19,776 Project Gutenberg US [+ 82 [NOT Including PG Australia]
1,378 Australian eBooks [+ 17] [NOT Included in above line]
376 Gutenberg Europe [+ 3] [NOT Included in above lines]
378 PG PrePrint Site [+ 0] [NOT Inclucded in above lines]
21,897 Grand Total [+102]
21,895 [by hand count] [+102]
21,901 [by programmed count] [+102]
[Please note we have several counting methods,
and they often differ by several book that we
have to hunt down by hand to reconcile.]
[Pleast note there is some duplication between
these various collections. Volunteers needed
to take these duplications into account.]
~19% of the way from 20,000 to 30,000
100,000+ eBooks at the PG Consortia Center
http://www.gutenberg.cc [185,000+ files]
[Please note that the four collections totals are eBooks that originated
as created, edited, proofread, formatted, etc., by Project Gutenberg and
its 50,000 volunteers, while the Project Gutenberg Consortia Center with
100,000+ books contains entire eBook collections from 125+ eLibraries so
the production statistics given here are for some 20,000+ eBooks created
by the various teams of Project Gutenberg volunteers, for which we share
the responsibility of maintaining. The Consortia Center eBooks were and
are the responsibility of the donating eLibraries, and we would be happy
to forward any suggestions for correction to those eLibraries, but those
eBooks must be edited by the donating parties, as per their requests.]
/
18,883 New eBooks Since The Start Of 2001
That's ~268 eBooks per Month for ~70.00 Months
3,753 New eBooks in 2006 at These Four Sites
48 New eBooks From Distributed Proofreaders
9,368 total from Distributed Proofreaders
Since October, 2000 [Details in PT1B]
[Currently over 36,000 DP volunteers]
[Note, PGDP mostly included in US eBooks]
[Note, PGEU has its own Distributed Proofreaders
whose total closely matches their grand total]
We Averaged ~339 eBooks Per Month In 2004
We Averaged ~248 eBooks Per Month In 2005
[Including PG Australia]
We Are Averaging ~366 eBooks Per Month This Year!!!
[Including PGAu, PGEu and PrePrints]
Enough Each Month To Read A Book A Day For A Whole Year!!!
All Four Sites Combined Are Averaging 83 eBooks Per Week In 2006
102 This Week
95 Last Week
197 This Month [Nov]
It took ~32 years, from 1971 to 2003 to do our first 10,000 eBooks
It took ~10 years from 1993 to 2003 to grow from 100 eBooks to 10,100
It took ~12.5 years from Jan. 1994 to Jun. 2006 to go from 100 to 20,100
It took ~2.8 years from Oct. 2003 to Jun. 2006 from 10,000 to 20,000
Not counting the addition of The Project Gutenberg Consortia Center's
Receipt of ~100,000 eBooks from 125+ Other eLibraries Worldwide which
started in March, 2003.
*
[Daily PrePrints stats at http://preprints.readingroo.ms/]
Please note that sometimes it takes a few weeks for entire
collections to fully appear in the PrePrints Section, thus
the count sometimes jumps by a large number when the files
are eventually completed and added in. Also note that the
PrePrint files are just that, PrePrints, and thus may move
later to other locations, including the main collection or
The Project Gutenberg Consortia Center, etc. For example,
on June 14, 200 WAP compatible cell phone eBooks appeared,
and will likely be moved to other collection points later.
The entire process of working out the details just to send
them to the PrePrints Section took well over a month.
Even with the speeded up process of the PrePrints Section,
it still takes a certain amount of time to collect and put
such a large collection online in a proper manner.
*
***Introduction
[Ignore for the moment]
[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@pobox.com and gbnewby@pglaf.org if you would like to volunteer.]
This is Michael Hart's "Founder's Comments" section of the Newsletter
FREE INTERNET REFERENCE SITE
LivingInternet.com provides a 700-odd page reference about the Internet
"to provide living context and perspective to this most technological
of human inventions", and has received input from many people that helped
build the Internet. It currently receives about 3 thousand visitors a day,
many from educational institutions. Now in its 7th year of operation.
http://www.livinginternet.com/
TEXT TO SPEECH
Dolphin Producer is a new software package which will convert a text
document into a fully synchronized text and audio DTB at the push of a
single button. The DTB can then be played back using Dolphin's
EaseReader software player - which is included in Dolphin Producer.
The DTB can also be played back on any other DAISY DTB software or
hardware player, as well as any MP3 player - The choice is yours.
http://www.dolphinuk.co.uk or http://www.dolphinusa.com
***BREAK FOR PT1A AND PT1B***
pt1a2.n06
pt1b2.n06
Weekly_Novemeber_15.txt
The Project Gutenberg Weekly Newsletter For Wednesday, November 15, 2006 PT1
******eBooks Readable By Both Humans And Computers Since July 4, 1971*******
This is possibly my last Newsletter for a while, as I may, all thing
permitting, be on a speaking tour until near the end of the year.
Still up in the air, sorry.
We are experimenting with a new format we will try to send shortly.
***Continuing Requests New Sites and Announcements
General Catalog of Old Books and Authors
http://www.kingkong.demon.co.uk/ngcoba/ngcoba.htm
which now indexes 24,000 books available free online, including all
PG(US) & PG(Aus)'s books, along with some basic date information
about them and their authors where you can find more.
Plus many books not available on line, a good place to search
for books by specific authors who you are interested in.
For information please contact Philip Harper
<webmaster AT kingkong.demon.co.uk>
*
We have been invited to peruse the various eBook collections
of the Internet Archive for potential Project Gutenberg eBooks.
http://www.archive.org
Don't worry, many of the numbers listed are out of date,
but you should get all the files when you pass through
to the original sites.
Click on "texts" to get started, feel free to pick up any
of the eBooks you would like to work on.
Many Thanks To Brewster Kahle and the Internet Archive!
*
Please visit and test our newest site:
"PROJECT GUTENBERG EUROPE"
http://pge.rastko.net [Project Gutenberg Europe]
http://dp.rastko.net [Distributed Proofreaders Europe]
*
There is an experimental online reader available.
Start from any bibliographic record page, e.g.
http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/4300
Basically this paginates the .txt file and remembers your last position
in a cookie so you can later resume reading where you left off.
Please test it. It should work with any book that has a text file
where the encoding is known.
*
MACHINE TRANSLATION
We are seeking as much information as possible on the various
approaches to Machine Translation. Any brand names or contact
information would be greatly appreciated.
***
Please use our new site for downloading DVD and CD images, etc.
http://www.gutenberg.org/cdproject
and
The PG bittorrent tracker is up and running.
Aaron Cannon has placed the CD and DVD there if anyone wants to test.
You can access it by visiting
http://snowy.arsc.alaska.edu:6969
***
Please check out the various Project Gutenberg FAQs, etc. at:
http://www.gutenberg.org/about
*
We're building a team to read our eBooks into MP3 files
for the visually impaired and other audio book users.
Let us know if you'd like to join this group.
More information at http://www.gutenberg.org/audio
***
Project Gutenberg Needs DVD Burners
So far we have sent out 15 million eBooks via snailmail!!!
We currently have access to a dozen DVD burners. If you have a DVD burner
and are interested in lending a hand, please email Aaron Cannon
<cannona@fireantproductions.com>
We can set you up with images, or snail you these DVDs
for you to copy. You can either snail them directly
to readers whose addresses we can send you, or you can
do a stack of these and send the whole box back for reshipping.
We can also reimburse you for supplies and postage if you wish.
Please note that we can only use DVDs which are burnt in the dvd-r format,
as we have had some compatibility issues with the dvd+r format.
***
Project Gutenberg is seeking graphics we can use for our Web
pages and publicity materials. If you have original graphics
depicting Project Gutenberg themes, please contribute them!
To see some of what we have now, please see:
ftp://ibiblio.org/pub/docs/books/gutenberg/images
*** PROJECT GUTENBERG IS SEEKING LEGAL BEAGLES
Project Gutenberg is seeking (volunteer) lawyers.
We have regular need for intellectual property legal advice
(both US and international) and other areas. Please email
Project Gutenberg's CEO, Greg Newby <gbnewby AT pglaf.org> ,
if you can help.
This is much more important than many of us realize!
***Progress Report, including Distributed Proofreaders
In the first 10.25 months of this year, PG produced 3,753 new eBooks.
It took us from Jul 1971 to Jan 2003 to produce our first 3,753 eBooks!
That's 45 WEEKS as Compared to ~32 Years!!!
102 New eBooks This Week
95 New eBooks Last Week
197 New eBooks This Month [Nov]
366 Average Per Month in 2006
266 Average Per Month in 2005 Counting 216 PGEu
248 Average Per Month in 2005 Not Counting PGEu
336 Average Per Month in 2004
355 Average Per Month in 2003
203 Average Per Month in 2002
103 Average Per Month in 2001
3753 New eBooks in 2006 Passed 2005 total in 3/4 year
3186 New eBooks in 2005 Counting 216 PGeu
> 2970 New eBooks in 2005 Not Counting PGEu
4049 New eBooks in 2004
4164 New eBooks in 2003
2441 New eBooks in 2002
1240 New eBooks in 2001
====
18,833 New eBooks Since Start Of 2001
That's Only 70.25 Months!
~268 books per month!
21,833 Total Project Gutenberg eBooks
17,527 eBooks This Week Last Year
====
4,374 New eBooks In Last 12 Months
[Incl. PGAu, PGEu & PrePrints]
1,378 eBooks From Project Gutenberg of Australia
[This does NOT include PGAu eBooks posted
at the U.S. site: www.gutenberg.org ]
376 eBooks From Project Gutenberg of Europe
378 Items in Project Gutenberg PrePrints
~100,000 Project Gutenberg Consortia Center
http://www.gutenberg.cc
[~185,000 files at about 2 files pers book]
You may also want to look at Project Runeberg [Scandinavian eBooks]
http://runeberg.org
*
Project Gutenberg began operation on July 4, 1971
Project Runeberg began operation on December 13, 1992
Distributed Proofreaders began October 22, 2000
[Became an official PG-US site in 2002]
Project Gutenberg of Australia began in August, 2001
The Project Gutenberg Consortia Center started in 1997]
[Became an official PG-US site in 2003]
Project Gutenberg of Europe started January 12, 2004
[Posted first books February 26, when we met in Brussels
to address people at the European Union Parliament.
Project Gutenberg PrePrints Started January 25, 2006
http://preprints.readingroo.ms
*
PROJECT GUTENBERG DISTRIBUTED PROOFREADERS UPDATE:
Since starting production in October 2000,
Distributed Proofreaders has contributed
9,368 Books to Project Gutenberg.
48 added this week.
For more complete DP statistics, visit:
http://www.pgdp.net/c/stats/stats_central.php
*
Check out our website at www.gutenberg.org, and see below to learn how
you can get INSTANT access to our eBooks via FTP servers even before
the new eBooks listed below appear in our catalog.
eBooks are posted throughout the week. You can even get daily lists.
Info on subscribing to daily, weekly, monthly Newsletters, listservs:
http://www.gutenberg.org/howto/subscribe-howto
or
http://www.gutenberg.org/subs.shtml
***
*Project Gutenberg Consortia Center Report
The PGCC collection at http://www.gutenberg.cc has doubled
in size from the listings below, but we don't have exactly
matching collection sizes yet for a new breakdown.
There are ~185,000 separate downloadable files,
and presuming 45% are reduntant or are required
at the level of more than one file per book:
The number of individual eBooks now is about 100,000.
Thus the grand total of eBooks at Project Gutenberg
is 21,000+ created by Project Gutenberg volunteers,
and 100,000 donated from over 125 other eLibraries,
to create a downloadble library of 100,000+ eBooks
plus 80,000 donated from over 100 other eLibraries,
to create a downloadble library of 100,000+ eBooks
*
PGCC's current eBook and eDocument Collections listings
of 18 collections. . .with this week's listing as:
[This list is being updated as the moment, you can get
the entire list on the collections pages at gutenberg.cc]
Alex-Wire Tap Collection, 2,036 HTML eBook Files
Black Mask Collection, 12,000 HTML eBook Files
The Coradella Bookshelf Collection, 141 eBook Files
DjVu Collection, 272 PDF and DJVU eBook Files
eBooks@Adelaide Collection, 27,709 eBook Files
Himalayan Academy, 3,400 HTML eBook Files
Internet Archive ~30,000 eBook Files [In Progress] <<<
Literal Systems Collection, 68 MP3 eBook Files
Logos Group Collection, ~34,000 TXT eBook Files
Poet's Corner Poetry Collection, 6,700 Poetry Files
Project Gutenberg Collection, 15,035 eBook Files
PGCC Chinese eBook Collection ~300 eBook files <<< Note Name Change
Renascence Editions Collection, 561 HTML eBook Files
Swami Center Collection, 78 HTML eBook Files
Tony Kline Collection, 223 HTML eBook Files
Widger Library, 2,600 HTML eBook Files
CIA's Electronic Reading Room, 2,019 Reference Files
=======Grand Total Files=========~137,142 Total Files=====
Average Size of the Collections 8,067.18 Total Files
***
Please also note that over 25,000 eBooks are listed via
The Online Books Page, of which over 6,300 are from PG.
http://onlinebooks.library.upenn.edu/
In addition: The Internet Public Library had a similar
listing which is now in limbo. If anyone knows what is
happening with the IPL, please let us know. Inquiries,
made months ago, and again recently, have not turned up
any current information.
You can try a new IPL service at:
http://www.ipl.org/div/subject/browse/hum60.60.00/
It would appear that The Internet Public Library ended
its first incarnation with about 22,284 entries, which
has now been surpassed by the Online Books Page.
Still looking for more Internet Public Library info.
***
Today Is Day #315 of 2006
This Completes Week #45 and Month #10.25 [364 days this year]
49 Days/08 Weeks To Go [We get 52 Wednesdays this year]
8,099 Books To Go To #30,000
We are 19.0% of the way from 20,000 to 30,000
[Our production year begins/ends
1st Wednesday of the month/year]
83 Weekly Average in 2006
61 Weekly Average in 2005 [Counting 216 PGEu]
57 Weekly Average in 2005 [Not Counting PGEu]
78 Weekly Average in 2004
79 Weekly Average in 2003
47 Weekly Average in 2002
24 Weekly Average in 2001
43 Only ~42 Numbers Left On Our Reserved Numbers List
[Used to be well over 100]
[This listing usually from the previous week]
*** Permanent Requests For Assistance:
DISTRIBUTED PROOFREADERS NEEDS CONTENT, PROOFERS AND SCANNER TYPES
Please visit the site:
http://www.pgdp.net
for more information about how you can help a lot by
simply proofreading just a few pages per day, or more.
If you have a book that has been scanned, but not yet run
through OCR (optical character recognition) or proofed,
and you would like the Distributed Proofreaders to work on it,
please email dphelp@pgdp.net and we will get things started.
Also, DP is seeking public domain books not already in the
Project Gutenberg collection. To see what is already online,
visit http://ibiblio.org/gutenberg/GUTINDEX.ALL (a text file)
listing Project Gutenberg eBooks and is available for downloading.
Do you have Public Domain books you would like to see in the archive?
Can they be destructively scanned? If so send them to the Distributed
Proofreading Team! Please email dphelp@pgdp.net with your geographic
location. You will be given the address of the nearest high-speed scanner.
[Note that the high-speed scanner requires destruction of the book(s) which
will not be returned.] We have high-speed scanners currently located in
the east, west and central portions of the US to make shipping easier.
Please make sure that any books you send are _not_ already in the archive
and please check them against David's "In Progress" list at:
http://www.dprice48.freeserve.co.uk/GutIP.html
to ensure no one is currently working on them. It would also be helpful if
you obtain copyright clearance before mailing the books, and send the 'OK'
lines to
dphelp@pgdp.net
Do you like to work on an entire book at once but don't have the time
or technology to do the scanning, OCR, and initial proofing yourself?
Distributed Proofreaders has the perfect solution! Just send us email
telling us that you are interested in post-processing and we will help
find a project you would like to work on.
Please contact us at:
dphelp@pgdp.net
if you would like to know more about the Distributed Proofreaders.
***Donation Information
We Have Included Quick and Easy Ways to Donate. . .As Per Your Requests!
We Are Looking For Volunteers To Add eBooks In More Languages,
as well as in more formats, including music, artwork, movies, etc.
***
QUICK WAYS TO MAKE A DONATION TO PROJECT GUTENBERG
A. Send a check or money order to:
Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation
809 North 1500 West
Salt Lake City, UT 84116
USA
B. Donate by credit card online:
NetworkForGood:
http://www.guidestar.org/partners/networkforgood/donate.jsp?ein=64-6221541
or
PayPal to "donate@gutenberg.org":
http://www.paypal.com
/xclick/business=donate%40gutenberg.org&item_name=Donate+to+Gutenberg
Project Gutenberg's success is due to the hard work of thousands of
volunteers over more than 35 years. Your donations make it possible
to support these volunteers, and pay our few employees to continue the
creation of free electronic texts. We accept credit cards, checks and
transfers from any country, in any currency.
Donations are made to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation
(PGLAF). PGLAF is approved as a charitable 501(c)(3) organization by
the US Internal Revenue Service, and has the Federal Employee Information
Number (EIN) 64-6221541.
For more information, including several other ways to donate, go to
http://www.gutenberg.org/donation.html or email donate@gutenberg.org
*Access To The Project Gutenberg Collections
*Mirror Site Information
Mirrors (copies) of the complete collection are available around the world.
To find the sites nearest you, go to:
Mirrors (copies) of the complete collection are available around the world.
To find the sites nearest you, go to:
http://www.gutenberg.org/MIRRORS.ALL
*Instant Access To Our Latest eBooks
http://www.gutenberg.org/find
allows searching by title, author, language and subject.
Use your Web browser or FTP program to visit our master download
site (or a mirror) if you know the file's name you want. Try:
http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs
or
ftp://ibiblio.org/pub/docs/books/gutenberg/
and then navigate to the appropriate directory and look for the first
five characters of the file's name. Note that updated eBooks usually
go in their original directory (e.g., etext99, etext00, etc.)
***
Statistical Review
In the 45 weeks of this year, we have produced 3753 new eBooks.
It took us from 07/71 to 02/03 to produce our FIRST 3753 eBooks!!!
That's 45 WEEKS as Compared to ~32 YEARS!!!
FLASHBACK!
Here's a sample of what books we were doing around eBook #3753
Mon Year Title and Author [filename.ext] ###
A "C" Following The eText # Indicates That This eText Is Under Copyright
[Note: books without month and year entries are now in new catalog format]
Feb 2003 Peacock Pie, A Book of Rhymes by Walter de la Mare[pcockxxx.xxx] 3753
Feb 2003 Voyager's Tales, by Richard Hakluyt [Hakluyt #2] [vgrtlxxx.xxx] 3752
Feb 2003 The Psychology of Beauty, by Ethel D. Puffer [psbtyxxx.xxx] 3751
Feb 2003 Letters of Franz Liszt Vol 2, From Rome to the End[2loflxxx.xxx] 3750
(Also see: Volume 1, Paris To Rome #3689)
Feb 2003 Quotations of Rousseau's Confessions, David Widger[dwqjjxxx.xxx] 3749
Feb 2003 Journey to Interior of Earth, by Verne [Verne #17][?jrnyxxx.xxx] 3748
[Author: Jules Verne]
[Title: A Journey to the Interior of the Earth]
Feb 2003 Orlando Furioso, by Ludovico Ariosto in Italian [?ofurxxx.xxx] 3747
[Language: Italian]
Feb 2003 The Judgment House, by Sir Gilbert Parker [jhousxxx.xxx] 3746
Feb 2003 The Road To Providence, by Maria Thompson Davies [r2prvxxx.xxx] 3745
Feb 2003 The Trial, by Charlotte M. Yonge [C. M. Yonge #13][trialxxx.xxx] 3744
Feb 2003 The Age Of Reason, by Thomas Paine [Tom Paine #4][twtp4xxx.xxx] 3743
Feb 2003 The Rights Of Man, by Thomas Paine [Tom Paine #3][twtp2xxx.xxx] 3742
Feb 2003 The American Crisis, by Thomas Paine[Tom Paine #2][twtp1xxx.xxx] 3741
Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte, by Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton 3740
/
Have We Given Away A Trillion eBooks/Trillion Dollars Yet???
If our average eBook has reached just 1% of the world population of
6,557,127,950 that would be 21,901 x 65,571,271 = ~1.44 Trillion !!!
With 21,901 eBooks online as of November 15, 2006 it now takes an average
of ~1% of the world gaining a nominal value of ~$.70 from each book from
Project Gutenberg to have yielded $1 trillion.
[1% world population x #eBooks] R65,571,271x 21,901 x $.70 = ~$1 Trillion
[Google "world population" "popclock" to get the most current figures.]
A Trillion Dollars Given Away At Just $.46 Value Per Book To 100 Million
With 21,901 eBooks online as of November 15, 2006 it now takes an average
of 100,000,000 readers gaining a nominal value of $0.46 from each book.
This "cost" is down from about $.57 when we had 17,527 eBooks a year ago.
[This is not counting the 100,000 eBooks at http://gutenberg.cc which are
counted and maintained separately by their donating electronic libraries]
Our Target Audience Is 1.5% Of The World Population = ~100 million people.
Next Decade's Target: 15% Of The world Population = 1 billion !!! people.
At 21,901 eBooks in 35 Years and 04.25 Months We Averaged
619 Per Year
52 Per Month
1.70 Per Day
At 3753 eBooks Done In The 315 Days Of 2006 We Averaged
12 Per Day
83 per Week
366 Per Month
If you are interested in the population of the world or of the U.S.
you might want to know that these numbers, official as they appear,
are just just estimates, and perhaps not as accurate as we hope.
However, for those keeping track of how quickly the U.S. reaches a
300 million population level, and who noticed the passing of 299M,
just two weeks ago. . .the U.S. is already 80% the way to 300M, so
it will probably be 2 more weeks to 300M.
Recently the U.S. Congress, pertaining to district reapportionment,
who gets to vote for which Congresspeople, decided that many of the
districts were undercounted by 5%, perhaps then later deciding that
all districts had been undercounted by 5% [can't recall details].
*
The production statistics are calculated based on full weeks'
production; each production-week starts/ends Wednesday noon,
starts with the first Wednesday of January. January 4th was
the first Wednesday of 2006, and thus ended PG's production
year of 2005 and began the production year of 2006 at noon.
This year there will be 52 Wednesdays, thus no extra week.
***BREAK FOR PT1A AND PT1B***
*Headline News from Edupage
[PG Editor's Comments In Brackets]
2006 NSSE LOOKS AT DISTANCE EDUCATION
Results from the 2006 National Survey of Student Engagement (NSSE)
indicate high levels of student engagement in online and distance
programs. The survey, which began in 1999, this year added questions
designed to shed light on the habits of nontraditional students,
including adult and distance learners. Among its results, the NSSE
found that these students were more likely to be prepared for class, to
ask questions, and to rewrite papers before submitting them. Students
in distance-education programs reported being more academically
challenged than on-campus students, also noting that they saw larger
developmental gains. Distance students also reported comparable levels
of interaction with faculty as did on-campus students. George Kuh,
director of the NSSE and a professor of higher education at Indiana
University at Bloomington, said, "This is a group that spends more time
on academic matters, is highly focused, serious, more motivated perhaps
than the typical-aged student." Kuh said it was "gratifying" to learn
that online students are at least as engaged as traditional students.
Chronicle of Higher Education, 13 November 2006 (sub. req'd)
http://chronicle.com/weekly/v53/i13/13a03901.htm
[On A Similar Note]
SLOAN REPORT FINDS GROWTH IN ONLINE STUDENTS
The latest survey of online learning by the Sloan Consortium reported
that about 3.2 million students took at least one online course from a
degree-granting institution in fall 2005, double the number who did in
2002. The report, issued jointly by the Sloan Consortium and the
College Board, defines an online course as one in which at least 80
percent of the content is delivered over the Internet. The rate of
growth of online students slowed from 2003 to 2004 despite a continuing
upward trend. In contrast, only one in four academic leaders said their
faculty have embraced online education, a number that has persisted
through four surveys.
Inside Higher Ed, 10 November 2006
http://insidehighered.com/news/2006/11/10/online
JAVA GOES OPEN SOURCE
Sun Microsystems announced plans to release Java as open source
software in an effort to draw more developers to the language. Java,
which is more than 10 years old, is widely used in cell phones and
other handheld devices and in servers and personal computers. As an
open source application, Java will be accessible to developers to make
changes and share those changes with others. Rich Green, executive vice
president of software at Sun, said the decision to release Java as open
source will result in "more richness of offerings, more capability,
more applications that consumers will get to use." Java, he said, "will
become a place for innovation." Analysts agreed that a healthy
community of Java developers would be beneficial to Sun. Michael Cote,
an analyst with RedMonk, noted, "Sun profits from the Java ecosystem
thriving." Green said that all of the Java source code should be
available by March 2007.
BBC, 13 November 2006
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/6144748.stm
MICROSOFT PAYS ROYALTIES TO UNIVERSAL MUSIC GROUP
[But only half of that money goes to the actual artists,
the other half gets eaten up by these UMG "agents."]
[And you thought royalties went to real people.]
Microsoft has agreed to pay royalties based on sales of its Zune
portable media player to the Universal Music Group, a unit of Vivendi.
Under the deal, Universal will receive a percentage of both download
revenue and digital player sales. In exhange, Universal Music will
license its musical recordings for Microsoft's digital music service.
Universal said it will pay half of what it receives in royalties to its
artists.
New York Times, 9 November 2006 (registration req'd)
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/09/technology/09music.html
LOWER PHONE PRICES BOOST NUMBER OF MOBILE USERS
[People in these countries pay only 2c per minute]
[Internet prices are comparably low]
Market researcher iSuppli claims that the number of mobile phone
subscribers worlwide will hit 2.6 billion this year and 4 billion by
2010, largely because of ultra-low-cost handsets. The growth in users
is driven by new subscribers in developing nations like India and
China, along with Africa and the Middle East, said Dale Ford, vice
president of market intelligence for iSuppli.
PCWorld, 10 November 2006
http://www.pcworld.com/article/id,127820-c,researchreports/article.html
[and in a related story]
BIG U.S. WEB SITES SEE MOSTLY INTERNATIONAL VISITORS
More than three-fourths of Web visitors to large U.S. Web sites such as
Google, Microsoft, and Yahoo come from overseas. The three companies
are among 14 of the top 25 U.S. Web sites that draw more foreign
traffic than U.S.-based traffic, according to market research company
ComScore Networks. In 10 years, the U.S. share of the world's online
population reportedly has fallen from 64 percent to less than 25
percent, although U.S. Web surfers evidently visit more pages each.
InformationWeek, 9 November 2006
http://www.informationweek.com/news/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=193700359
COMMUNITY COLLEGE INTRODUCES IPOD PROGRAM
The Community College of Southern Nevada (CCSN) is launching an iPod
program to try to find out if the devices can assist in student
learning. Students in the five or six classes in the pilot program will
be loaned iPods by the institution. Faculty in those courses will
augment the syllabus with podcasts of lectures and other lessons, as
well as additional resources, such as music or other recorded material
that helps explain a concept. After the semester is over, faculty
involved in the program will be surveyed on whether the devices
improved student outcomes; if so, the program is likely to be expanded
in later terms. Lester Tanaka, an instructor at CCSN, said that
students today are immersed in technology and expect college content to
take advantage of it. Faculty can continue to lecture, he said, which
will simply put students to sleep, or they can "step up to the plate
and deliver the material in a way that is more palatable." Richard
Carpenter, president of CCSN, noted that "the students who have
appropriate self-discipline will love it. Those who don't have that
may not do as well."
Las Vegas Sun, 7 November 2006
http://www.lasvegassun.com/sunbin/stories/sun/2006/nov/07/566678255.html
ORGANIZATION IDENTIFIES WORST INTERNET CENSORS
Paris-based Reporters Without Borders has issued a list of 13 countries
it says are the most egregious censors of Internet speech. On the list
are Belarus, China, Cuba, Egypt, Iran, Myanmar, North Korea, Saudi
Arabia, Syria, Tunisia, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, and Vietnam.
According to the organization, these countries stifle online speech
they deem subversive or threatening to the government, including
sentencing to prison individuals accused of posting such material.
Reporters Without Borders also criticized Yahoo and other Internet
companies for cooperating with the governments of these countries in
identifying individuals targeted for prosecution. In the case of Jiang
Lijun, a Chinese man sentenced to four years in prison for
pro-democracy remarks, Reporters Without Borders said Yahoo's
assistance was key to Chinese authorities' ability to identify him.
"It's one thing to turn a blind eye to censorship," said Lucie
Morillon, a spokesperson with the organization. "It's another thing to
collaborate."
Silicon Valley, 8 November 2006
http://www.siliconvalley.com/mld/siliconvalley/15955567.htm
You've been reading excerpts from Edupage:
To SUBSCRIBE to Edupage, send a message to
LISTSERV@LISTSERV.EDUCAUSE.EDU
and in the body of the message type:
SUBSCRIBE Edupage YourFirstName YourLastName
or
To subscribe, unsubscribe, change your settings,
or access the Edupage archive, visit
http://www.educause.edu/Edupage/639
*HEADLINE NEWS AVOIDED BY MOST OF THE MAJOR U.S. MEDIA
Rumsfeld War Crimes Charges Files In Germany
Ousted U.S. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld is being charged
in German courts via a complaint filed by the international Center
for Constitutional Rights. Also charged are Alberto Gonzales, who
was previously White House Counsel and is now U.S. Attorney General,
along with former CIA Director George Tenet.
The complaint filed requests the opening of an official look into
the various unofficial charges of torture at Abu Ghraib prison in
Iraq, the Guantanamo prison in Cuba, and perhaps the various kinds
of "Black Prisons" and "rendition" of prisoners to locations where
they could be tortured in peace and quiet without oversight by the
U.S. courts or Congress.
The suit names one dozen victims who claim they were tortured with
electricity, beatings, sexual abuse, hypothermia [severe cold] and
long periods without food, water, or sleep, among other events.
Several countries have such laws that allow the prosecution of war
crimes no matter where they were committed. Previously Mr. Rumsfeld
held "diplomatic immunity" which prevented such charges being filed,
but he recent ouster only one day after the U.S. elections could be
just the ticket these countries need to put him on wanted posters.
The 220 page complaint names 14 defendants, including generals and
lawyers who supported the torture in writing, along with the above,
who also apparently signed incriminating memos that have surfaced.
Apparently it was not only diplomatic immunity, but also some NATO
meeting in Germany, that prevented these charges previously, when
Rumsfeld was encouraged to participate in the NATO meeting by not
allowing the charges to become official.
Source: Democracy Now, Fox News, Center for Constitutional Rights,
but not much from the major U.S. television networks, mostly radio.
DOUBLESPEAK OF THE WEEK
Will The Real 007 Please Step Forward
Great Britain's secret agents are using the new James Bond movie
as a recruiting tool going public for the first time in a manner
previously reserved for surreptitiously whispered conversations,
nearly always taking place with students at Oxford or Cambridge.
[The question thus arises whether the new recruits would fall in
a sort of "glass ceiling" situation in which they could not have
any promotions past a certain level due to the infamous caste of
class systems in The United Kingdom.]
[Of course, MI6 denies any operations not in accordance with laws
of the UK, not to mention being in a recruiting crisis.]
Source: BBC, MI6 [Military Intelligence, Branch 6]
*QUOTES OF THE WEEK
"Bipartisan" "Iraq Study Group" "Non-Starter" new DC buzzwords.
*PREDICTIONS OF THE WEEK
The Democrats will not say or do much. . . .
Perhaps oust John Bolton, who was never really UN Ambassador,
perhaps finally get a new national minimum wage, though most
states have taken this into their own hands, not waiting for
Washington's interminable quid pro quoisms from both parties.
*ODD STATISTICS OF THE WEEK
Many states have not only already passed their own standards
for minimum wages, but many of these are higher than those
being proposed at the national level. "The Governator" had
to embrace one of these to get re-elected in California.
/
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.
*
Information About the Project Gutenberg Mailing Lists
For more information about the Project Gutenberg's mailing lists,
including the Project Gutenberg Weekly and Monthly Newsletters:
and the other Project Gutenberg Mailing Lists:
The weekly is sent on Wednesdays, and the monthly is sent on the
first Wednesday of the month.
To subscribe to any (or to unsubscribe or adjust your subscription
preferences), visit the Project Gutenberg mailing list server:
http://lists.pglaf.org
If you are having trouble with your subscription, please
email the list's human administrators at: help@pglaf.org
pgweekly_2006_11_15_part_1.txt
If you liked this post, say thanks by sharing it.