From the 1955 "Bowker's Annual" p83 [American Library Annual, is the original name] ["Table reprinted from Publisher's Weekly of March 27, 1954"] [Please note: Book Club Editions reflect retail price, but other books reflect wholesale price, as prices given are from

Weekly_July_13.txt **The Project Gutenberg Weekly Newsletter For Wednesday, July 13, 2005 PT1** *******eBooks Readable By Both Humans And Computers Since July 4, 1971****** Project Gutenberg of the Philippines is getting started, contact as below. I am preparing this Newsletter a day early, based on a projected 65 eBooks, as I expect to be called again for jury selection tomorrow. . .I am back on lunch break, and will update the figures as best I can. . there seems to be a discrepancy of 3 extras not counted, which might just balance out a three that we counted twice last week. 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 Please note that we are still in the process of correcting our statistical program data. Last week we subtracted a few that we thought had been in a duplicate count situation, but either that correction didn't stick or some new similar problem has occured. As always, the total count should be the consideration of some attention as to possibly being off by a few eBooks. Please note that PT2 of this Newsletter is currently in flux, as we shift from to an automated PT2 sender. The situation with Monthly Newsletters is in flux to an even greater degree. Our apologies as we make changes. * HOT REQUESTS AND ANNOUNCEMENTS "I am also helping to get a PGPH of the ground in the Philippines," which is also life+50. (see www.gutenberg.ph). Jeroen Hellingman <jeroen AT bohol.ph> * Wanted: People who are involved in conversations on Slashdot, Salon, etc. * 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 1 New From PG Australia [Australian, Canadian Copyright Etc.] 59 New Public Domain eBooks Under US Copyright *Headline News from Edupage, etc. *Information About the Project Gutenberg Mailing Lists *** *eBook Milestones In the first 06.25 months of this year, we produced 1738 new eBooks. It took us from July 1971 to May 1999 to produce our first 1738 eBooks! That's 27 WEEKS as Compared to ~27 YEARS!!! Last Weekend We Were Twice As Close to 20,000 as 10,000 !!! 16,694 eBooks As Of Today!!! 13,652 New eBooks Since The Start Of 2001 That's 250 eBooks per Month for 54 Months We are ~83% of the way to 20,000 3,306 to go!!! We have now averaged ~490 eBooks per year since July 4th, 1971 We Averaged About 339 eBooks Per Month In 2004 We Are Averaging About 278 books Per Month This Year We Are Averaging About 64 eBooks Per Week This Year 60 This Week It took ~32 years, from 1971 to 2003 to do our 1st 10,000 eBooks It took ~32 months, from 2002 to 2005 for our last 10,000 eBooks It took ~10 years from 1993 to 2003 to grow from 100 eBooks to 10,100 It took ~1.25 years from Oct. 2003 to Jan. 2005 from 10,000 to 15,000 * ***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.] [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 *** ***Continuing Requests New Sites and Announcements PROJECT GUTENBERG OF EUROPE TAKES OFF!!! "PROJECT GUTENBERG EUROPE" STARTS REGULAR ACTIVITY http://pge.rastko.net [Project Gutenberg Europe] http://dp.rastko.net [Distributed Proofreaders Europe] This past month marked the official beginnings of our new companion, Project Gutenberg of Europe with eBook entries expected in over 100 languages. In the first month we have seen a total of 100 about eBooks and an assortment of 65 articles in total, thus representing 62 Eurasian languages and dialects. Volunteer effort is totally responsible for these, and your assistance to PGE would be greatly appreciated in creating eBook titles from all of the ~120 languages and dialects in which PGE hope to produce eBooks. After a year of preparation "Project Gutenberg Europe", organized by "Project Rastko Network" and its "Distributed Proofreaders Europe", started regular activity last month, now having now its own server provided by leading South Eastern European provider "EUnet". PGE and its branches operate under European copyright legislation (life+50 and life+70). It already has volunteers all over the continent: European Community, Comonwealth of Independent States [ex-USSR] and other countries. "Distributed Proofreaders Europe"--as central European PD digitizing system, and only Unicode is capable of that kind in the world at the moment--releases a multilingual "European Proofing Package" of books this month, as special choices of general interest for whole continent. Also, regional and national campaigns in European countries were scheduled between May 31 and June 30, including first wave of physical events-- conferences and promotions--in Eastern Europe (Macedonia, Serbia, etc). [For details please email hart AT pglaf.org] * Darwin!!! Would anyone like to work on reproofing our Darwin collection and creating a compilation file as requested by our readers. We could also use some help making some new editions of "The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes" and "Frankenstein." * Project Gutenberg of Canada needs your help! Please email: pgcanada@lists.pglaf.org To subscribe to the pgcanada list, please visit: http://lists.pglaf.org/listinfo.cgi/pgcanada * v0.2 version of PodReader is out, and it interfaces to PG. This allows users to browse the catalog on their Desktop, pick a book, and have it downloaded to their iPod in the correct format...this is a good plus for PG users since it makes it a lot easier to get to PG documents. http://homepage.mac.com/ptwobrussell/podreader.html * 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! * REQUEST FOR RUSSIAN TRANSLATOR We are trying to start up a Project Gutenberg Russian Team, and we need someone to translate simple email messages from members of Project Gutenberg who want to provide a service to the Russian Team, but who do not know Russian. . .these people will be helping with scanning, finding books, etc. The messages will be in MS Word's .doc format in Cyrillic, we need them translated into English, also in a .doc file. Thanks!!! Contact Jared Buck <JBuck814366460@aol.com> * Please visit and test our newest site: www.pgcc.net [also available as www.gutenberg.us and www.gutenberg.cc] The Project Gutenberg Consortia Center [PGCC] Please let us know of any eBook collections that would be suitable for inclusion: public domain or copyrighted, for which we must ask permission. [or listed as copyrighted with permission] You should see some significant changes this week. * There is a new 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 checkout 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 06.25 months of this year, we produced 1738 new eBooks. It took us from July 1971 to May 1999 to produce our first 1738 eBooks! That's 27 WEEKS as Compared to ~27 Years!!! 60 New eBooks This Week 74 New eBooks Last Week 60 New eBooks This Month [Jul] ~278 Average Per Month in 2005 336 Average Per Month in 2004 355 Average Per Month in 2003 203 Average Per Month in 2002 103 Average Per Month in 2001 1738 New eBooks in 2005 4049 New eBooks in 2004 4164 New eBooks in 2003 2441 New eBooks in 2002 1240 New eBooks in 2001 ==== 13652 New eBooks Since Start Of 2001 That's Only 54.25 Months! About 250 books per month 16,694 Total Project Gutenberg eBooks 13,225 eBooks This Week Last Year ==== 3,469 New eBooks In Last 12 Months 462 eBooks From Project Gutenberg of Australia Not counting more posted on gutenberg.org * PROJECT GUTENBERG DISTRIBUTED PROOFREADERS UPDATE: Since starting production in October 2000, Distributed Proofreaders has contributed 7,123 eBooks to Project Gutenberg. 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 Please note the addition of the Internet Archive marked with <<< below. PGCC's current eBook and eDocument Collections listings of 18 collections. . .with this week's listing as: 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 Renaisscance 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 These eBooks are catalogued as per the instructions of their donors: some are one file per book; some have a file for each chapter; and some even have a file for a single page or poem. . .or are overcounted for reasons I have not mentioned. . .each of which could cause the overcounting or duplication of numbers. If we presume 2 out of 3 of these files are overcounts, that leaves a unique book total of ~45,714 Unique eBooks If we presume 3 out of 4 of these files are overcounts, that leaves a unique book total of ~34,286 Unique eBooks *** Please also note that over 23,000 eBooks are listed via The Online Books Page, of which over 5,300 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 #189 of 2005 This Completes Week #27 and Month #06.25 [364 days this year] 175 Days/25 Weeks To Go [We get 52 Wednesdays this year] 3,301 Books To Go To #20,000 [Our production year begins/ends 1st Wednesday of the month/year] 64 Weekly Average in 2005 78 Weekly Average in 2004 79 Weekly Average in 2003 47 Weekly Average in 2002 24 Weekly Average in 2001 41 Only 41 Numbers Left On Our Reserved Numbers list [Used to be well over 100] *** 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 33 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: 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 27 weeks of this year, we have produced 1738 new eBooks. It took us from 7/71 to 5/99 to produce our FIRST 1738 eBooks!!! That's 27 WEEKS as Compared to ~27 YEARS!!! FLASHBACK! Here's a sample of what books we were doing around eBook #1738 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 have been reposted] May 1999 El Dorado, by Baroness Orczy [More Pimpernel] [#2][ldrdoxxx.xxx] 1752 May 1999 Twilight Land, by Howard Pyle [Howard Pyle #3][twlndxxx.xxx] 1751 May 1999 Laws, by Plato [#29 and last of this Plato series][plawsxxx.xxx] 1750 [Translated by Benjamin Jowett] Cousin Betty, by Honore de Balzac [Tr.: James Waring] 1749 May 1999 Other People's Money, by Emile Gaboriau [E.G. #4][opmnyxxx.xxx] 1748 May 1999 The Red Seal, by Natalie Sumner Lincoln [redslxxx.xxx] 1747 May 1999 New Collected Rhymes, by Andrew Lang [Lang #14][nwclrxxx.xxx] 1746 May 1999 Poetical Works, by John Milton [pmsjmxxx.xxx] 1745 [Preface by the Rev. H. C. Beeching, M. A.] May 1999 Philebus, by Plato [More of Socrates][Plato #28][philbxxx.xxx] 1744 [Translated by Benjamin Jowett] May 1999 Twelve Stories and a Dream, by H. G. Wells[HGW#17][12sadxxx.xxx] 1743 May 1999 Miss Civilization, by Richard Harding Davis [#12][miscvxxx.xxx] 1742 May 1999 The White Moll, by Frank L. Packard [Packard #2][wtmolxxx.xxx] 1741 May 1999 The Flying U's Last Stand, by B. M. Bower [BMB #8][fuslsxxx.xxx] 1740 May 1999 The Black Death/The Dancing Mania,by J.F.C. Hecker[bdadmxxx.xxx] 1739 [Title: The Black Death and the Dancing Mania] [Tr.: B. G. Babington] [Ed. and with Preface by Henry Morley] May 1999 Statesman, by Plato [Plato #27][sttsmxxx.xxx] 1738 [Translated by Benjamin Jowett] Facino Cane, by Honore de Balzac [Tr.: Clara Bell & Others] 1737 May 1999 Cromwell, Shakespeare Apocrypha [1ws49xxx.xxx] 1736 May 1999 Sophist, by Plato [More of Socrates][Plato #26][sophtxxx.xxx] 1735 [Translated by Benjamin Jowett] May 1999 Secret Places of the Heart, by H.G. Wells[HGW #16][spothxxx.xxx] 1734 May 1999 The Red Cross Girl, by Richard Harding Davis [#11][rdcrgxxx.xxx] 1733 May 1999 The Schoolmistress, et al, by Anton Chekhov [AC#1][tschmxxx.xxx] 1732 May 1999 Sister Songs, by Francis Thompson [F. Thompson #3][ssngsxxx.xxx] 1731 Michael, Brother of Jerry, by Jack London 1730 The Deserted Woman, by Honore de Balzac 1729 [Tr.: Ellen Marriage] Apr 1999 The Odyssey, by Homer, Butcher & Lang Tr[Homer #3][dyssyxxa.xxx] 1728 Apr 1999 The Odyssey, by Homer, Tr. by Samuel butler [dyssyxxx.xxx] 1727 (See also: #348, Collection of Hesiod, Homer and Homerica) Apr 1999 Theaetetus, by Plato [More of Socrates][Plato #25][thtusxxx.xxx] 1726 [Translated by Benjamin Jowett] Heart of the West, by O. Henry [AKA: William Sidney Porter] 1725 * Have We Given Away A Trillion Books/Dollars Yet??? If our average eBook has reached just 1% of the world population of 6,453,652,151 that would be 16,694 x 64,536,522 = 1.07 Trillion !!! With 16,694 eBooks online as of July 13, 2005 it now takes an average of ~1% of the world gaining a nominal value of ~$.93 from each book. 1% of the world population is 64,536,522 x 16,694 x $.93 = ~$1 trillion] [Google "world population" "popclock" to get the most current figures.] With 16,694 eBooks onli8e as of July 13, 2005 it now takes an average of 100,000,000 readers gaining a nominal value of $0.60 from each book, This "cost" is down from about $.76 when we had 13,225 eBooks a year ago. 100 million readers is only ~1.5% of the world's population! At 16,694 eBooks in 34 Years and 00.25 Months We Averaged ~490 Per Year 40.8 Per Month 1.34 Per Day At 1738 eBooks Done In The 189 Days Of 2005 We Averaged 9.2 Per Day 64 Per Week 278 Per Month 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 5th was the first Wednesday of 2005, and thus ended PG's production year of 2004 and began the production year of 2005 at noon. This year there will be 52 Wednesdays, thus no extra week. *** *Headline News from Edupage [PG Editor's Comments In Brackets] IE LOSING FAVOR ON SOME CAMPUSES Frustrated with ongoing concerns about the security of Microsoft's Internet Explorer, IT staff on a number of campuses in the United States have begun to encourage faculty and students to use other browsers instead. In December, officials at Penn State started advising users to opt for either Firefox or Opera. IT staff in the physics department at the University of Florida have recently started urging users to switch to Firefox, saying that all Windows users should install the open source application and define it as the system's default browser. The university-wide Office of Information Technology at Florida now includes Firefox on a CD that is given free to all students. The CD includes network software and antivirus tools and previously offered IE and Netscape Navigator as browser choices. Although the university does not officially endorse any browser, it began adding Firefox to the CDs after many students and faculty had asked about it, according to Marc I. Hoit, interim associate provost for information technology. Alan Paller, director of research at the SANS Institute, said that because of Firefox's security and simplicity, he sees the move as beneficial, both for the schools and their users as well as the Internet generally. Chronicle of Higher Education, 7 July 2005 (sub. req'd) http://chronicle.com/prm/daily/2005/07/2005070701t.htm CHOOSING THE RIGHT COMPUTER FOR COLLEGE Computer makers are gearing up for the back-to-school season with packages targeting college students, though the choices included in many of those packages differ from what campus IT departments would prefer. This year's student-focused computer deals lean heavily on multimedia tools and performance. Features such as DVD burners, Microsoft's Windows Media Center Edition operating system, TV tuners, and high-definition audio tools are common in this season's offerings. Colleges and universities tend to be more conservative in their computer specifications, however, preferring operating systems such as Windows XP or Mac OS X, for example. Although few schools have strict requirements for student computers, many have arrangements with particular vendors that offer discounts on their systems. In terms of design, laptops now represent a greater portion of computer sales than desktops. Despite the price advantage of desktops, laptops are hard to turn down for students going from building to building across campus. CNET, 7 July 2005 http://news.com.com/2100-1041_3-5777151.html You have been reading excerpts from Edupage: If you have questions or comments about Edupage, send e-mail to: edupage@educause.edu 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 Novak still has to get prime mention. . .not to mention his connection with White House Chief Karl Rove. *STRANGE WORDS OF THE WEEK Robert Novak, whose article "outed" CIA operative Valerie Plame, was grilled on CNN last week, but still refuses to even say if he as even been asked to testify in the case that has now sent Judith Miller to jail for not revealing her sources on a story she never even wrote. Daniel Shorr comments: "The public no longer respects what we do," referring to journalists in general. He reported that he felt "very depressed" about the current situation, and mentioned a public outcry on his behalf that helped save him from a similar contempt charge in 1976, this time by a House Committee, so it was "Contempt of Congress," when he was refusing to reveal his sources when he revealed a secret Congressional Report about the CIA. "Today they would send me to jail without a murmer." * Judith Miller, herself, commented on CNN that this case was not about the issues at hand but rather about "whether there could be a Deep Throat today," a spectre she referred to as being "positively Orwellian." [1984, by Geo. Orwell] * DOUBLESPEAK OF THE WEEK All that nonsensical rhetoric about Novak not being questioned, followed by total silence when asked for current information. Not to mention implying that reporters think they are above the law. *PREDICTIONS OF THE WEEK Mark Felt [Watergate's Deep Throat] will be reported as to have enjoyed the bottle of Champagne President Nixon sent him after President Reagan pardoned him more than any other public event of his entire lifetime. [His assistance to Woodward and Bernstein [Washingto Post] was crucial in forcing President Nixon out of office for his role in the burglary of the Democratic National offices house in the Watergate complex. I have a feelling that the book and movie "All the President's Men" might be selling more copies right now.] In addition, since Mark Felt's only superior officer at the FBI, Director L. Patrick Gray, just died, we might expect a few more details to come out about *his* Watergate connection. Gray was also forced out of office due to his involvement, but I don't think any formal charges were ever filed." *ODD STATISTICS OF THE WEEK Book Club Editions 1947 1952 54.4 Million 48.4 Million $65.4 Million $60.3 Million ~$1.20 each ~$1.25 each "Inexpensive paperbound books, chiefly reprints" 95.5 Million 270 Million $14.3 Million $47.0 Million ~$.15 each ~$.17 each Textbooks 139.2 Million 142.0 Million $120.8 Million $152.3 Million $.87 each $1.07 each the publishers' reports, thus reflecting their sale prices, which are only the same as the consumer price in the case of Book Club Editions, not counting any taxes and shipping.] [Does anyone know what the markups were back in the day?] * Concert attendence down 12% in 2005. [I know this includes popular music, I don't know if it includes all kinds of concerts] * 50 million Americans live in various kinds "gated communites." That means out of just a handful of people, one is most likely living in such an "arranged community." * Still hoping for more statistical updates and additional entries. "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 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 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. * POEM OF THE WEEK The Demon of Poetry poetry has become a demon harrassment is its game thoughts upon thoughts of perfectly shaped fertile colorful rhymes incessantly harrass my spirit and then lose strength, meaning, and color as soon as I grab my pen to pin them down my thoughts, like caterpillars my words, like butterflies the mirror shows a wrinkled forehead and dark, unrested eyes Copyright 2005 by Simona Sumanaru and Michael S. Hart Please send comments to: simona_s75 AT yahoo.com & hart AT pobox.com *** *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