November 2004 - PGCanada - lists.pglaf.org

A bit of everything....
by James Linden 19 Nov '04

19 Nov '04

Hey list! Instead of doing to 4 line reply to each topic, I'm going to throw it all in on here. My apologies for being slow to reply. I'm currently on a working vacation in Utah, and only getting my email once or twice a day. I'm James Linden, currently the one trying to get PG Canada going. I have to say, it's great to see other people on the same side. :-) Regarding the website: Currently, the site is hosted by my own company, located in Barrie, ON. CompuSOLVE are the guys providing my 'net pipe, but they don't have anything to do with the site or the server it's on. I've not had a whole lot of time recently to do anything with the PG site, mostly because I've had to work like mad to make this 4 week trip possible around contracts, etc. Any ideas/help are great. I do have to point out that I'm opposed to using ANY of the main PG site. It's been hacked together over the course of a decade, and is only getting worse. Marcello has been doing a great job on the site, but has a long way to go. Regarding non profit: I have not been able to locate a lawyer, so that news is good news. I'll see what I can do about chipping in to cover the fees. Regarding backend: I'm very opposed to basing PG Canada on the current PG system, which does not meet even minimal requirements for cataloging and does not rely on a master XML document. If my ideas are too much for the PG Canada group that is coming together here, I'll step aside and not get in the way. I'd rather learn the appropriate lessons from PG's experiences, and do something better, which, I must point out, it not hard. I realize this information is not complete, and I'll get more thoughts together ASAP... :-) Good to see everyone here on the list!!!!!!! Regards, James Linden jlinden(a)projectgutenberg.ca

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James website and more news
by Darryl Moore 12 Nov '04

12 Nov '04

James, would it be possible to install a Wiki on your website so that many of the rest of us can start helping to create a few pages? Is this a good idea? I'd just like to keep some momentum going. In other news... Don Johnston who has been wonderful so far with the free legal advice has suggested we set up an informal organization (much like a church or scout group would) and create a bank account for it. Do we already have such a thing? We should put any money we are able to collect into it. Then when we incorporate we wind down this first entity. There is information for Federally incorporated non-profits here: http://strategis.gc.ca/epic/internet/incd-dgc.nsf/en/h_cs02147e.html for anybody who is interested. I was also contacted by someone at UOttawa faculty of law and the Canadian Internet Policy and Public Interest Clinic (www.cippic.ca) I told her all about Project Gutenberg, at least all that I could being an admitted newbie myself :-). I think I did a fairly good job explaining it all to her, and I pointed her to this list so hopefully she will be monitoring our activity. I am very hopeful we will get assistance from these sources as well. I received an email from Marcello who maintains the American PG site. There is about 28MB of data for the website there. I do not know what is the best option here and I know James has expressed a dislike for implementing the US code. Can we have a little more discussion on this and get something implemented? I'd really like to know more about what people think in this area. Anybody have any thoughts on what more we should do to keep this train moving along? Lastly... I know I am a newbie here so tell me if I am stepping on anybodys toes. I have significant enthusiasm for this project right now and I don't want my own momentum to wain. From what I've seen here I think there is a lot of enthusiasm from a great many people and I want to encourage that as well. I don't want anybody to feel pushed out, and I know if left on my own I'll just pick it all up and run with it until I burn out. So please tell me how I can help rather than just letting me take over. Thanks again, darryl

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CNIB/Maclean's
by Wallace J.McLean 12 Nov '04

12 Nov '04

Maclean's current edition (thick one, with university rankings) has a blurb in it about the CNIB (Canadian National Institute for the Blind) and their efforts to digitize books for blind, visually impaired, and other disabled readers. The blurb, or at least part of it, is online at: http://www.macleans.ca/topstories/technology/article.jsp? content=20041115_92047_92047 I seem to recall, in doing research on AMICUS (the National Library catalogue), that a large number of the most recent editions of old works -- in some cases, the first new edition in 50 or 60 or more years -- is either a Project Gutenberg edition which has been accessioned and catalogued by a library, or an edition produced by the CNIB or a commercial company specializing in large-print/talking- book/braille editions. I'm not sure, but some large-print editions may even be "typeset" by PG.

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first steps
by Darryl Moore 12 Nov '04

12 Nov '04

Hey all, It's really great to see all the activity here in the last 3 days. It's a stark contrast from what I see in the archive since April. I've only got a few minutes, and I want to speak on many of the points I've seen here, but I'll get to those on the week end. A number of people now have offered financial help to get this thing rolling. I think the next step is to get a bank account put together and a treasurer to mind it. Now I'm very new here and you should all be smart enough not to give your money to a total stranger, so I nominate James as treasurer. Is that OK with you James? Will someone second this motion? Once we get a reasonable fraction of the money together I'd like to set up a meeting with Don Johnston to start the ball rolling on our articles of incorporation. I'm hoping James, and anybody else in the Toronto area with interest in this dry legal stuff, will be able to participate as well. I'm hoping this can happen in the next week or two!! cheers, darryl

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Re: [PGCanada] Introductions, etc.: Comprends pas: Please explain.
by Wallace J.McLean 12 Nov '04

12 Nov '04

Qu'est-ce que vous ne comprenez pas? Serbian copyright law is, right now, life+50, but are they under political pressure (internal or external) to "harmonize"? If they eventually join the EU, presumably they will be forced to "harmonize" to life+70, so how close are they to EU membership, realistically? In other words, would building a life+50 public domain "library" in Serbia, under Serbian law, be a sound location in the long term? Sounder or less sound than Canada? Or kinda like building on beachfront in Florida or the San Andreas fault? None of this is to undermine the incredible achievement at DP-EU; I wish my Cyrillic proofing skills were more up to scratch! [PGCanada] Introductions, etc.: Comprends pas: Please explain. jiva das jivadas3 at yahoo.ca Tue Nov 9 19:17:54 PST 2004 "Wallace J.McLean" <ag737 at freenet.carleton.ca> wrote:Also: How vulnerable is Serbia to the life+50+more movement? What happens if it joins the European Union, and how close is EU membership, if at all?

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Making Digital Resources from Print Material
by James Linden 11 Nov '04

11 Nov '04

Everyone: Instead of typing a lengthy email and saying a lot of things I've already said many times before, here's URLs for some of my eBook related thoughts. Making Digital Resources from Print Material http://new.kodekrash.com/article?prn2dig That article describes the "right way", as I see it, to go about doing the technical side of producing ebooks. I'd love to hear everyone's thoughts on it.... -- James PS: I'm still assembling my new personal site, so don't make too many links to new.kodekrash.com, because eventually, that site will be www.kodekrash.com, etc. :-)

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GWTW
by Wallace J.McLean 11 Nov '04

11 Nov '04

To clarify as to why any GWTW reclamation project should use servers that are physically in life+50 countries... again it's a don't paint "sue me" on your ass situation. I am located in Canada, the actions I take on my keyboard and mouse are in Canada, but I guarantee that if I post the e-text of GWTW to my (US- located space) at Geocities, it won't last 24 hours there, and I'll probably lose everything else I've got posted as well. The notice-and-takedown threat still exists in life+50 countries (exhibit A: the current PG-AU kerfuffle), but going about it in an all- life+50 way reduces the risk and would give the Mitchell estate way too many expensive moles to whack.

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Re: [PGCanada] Gone With the Wind, redux
by Wallace J.McLean 11 Nov '04

11 Nov '04

----- Original Message ----- From: dlainson(a)sympatico.ca Date: Wednesday, November 10, 2004 7:05 pm Subject: Re: [PGCanada] Gone With the Wind, redux > I have two independantly produced copies of GWTW. My own for PG AU, > which I blush to say I have no record of the edition used, although > since it conformed to the life+50 law in CA and AU that may be a > non-issue It would be an absolutely terrible, horrible, evil, nasty thing if people in life+50 (or less) countries, with access to servers physically located in those countries, were to post copies of a clearly- PD-in-life+50-countries file of GWTW to said servers. It would be an absolutely terrible, horrible, evil, nasty thing, although not nearly as terrible, horrible, evil, or nasty as what happened to EMI in the Danger Mouse "Grey Album" controversy: http://www.google.ca/search?hl=en&q=%22grey+album%22+copyright+% 22White+album%22&meta= Countries with life+50 rules -- this is from the web, and don't believe everything you read on the internets, George Bush will tell you -- include Albania, Algeria, Angola, Argentina, Armenia, Australia -- well, strike Australia -- Azerbaijan, Bahrain, Bangladesh, Barbados, Belarus, Belize, Bolivia, Benin, Brunei, Bulgaria, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Cambodia, Canada, Chile, China, Cuba, Egypt, El Salvador, Fiji, Ghana, Iceland, Indonesia, Iraq -- under the new copyright law that the US-led forces have given them -- Japan, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Kenya, (South) Korea, Kuwait, the Kyrgyz Republic, Lebanon, Malawi, Malaysia, Moldova, Mongolia, Morocco, Namibia, Nepal, New Zealand, Niger, Oman, Pakistan, Panama, Papua New Guinea, the Philippines, Qatar, Russia, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, Saudi Arabia, Serbia and Montenegro, Singapore, Solomon Islands, South Africa, Syria, Taiwan, Tanzania, Thailand, Togo, Tonga, Trinidad and Tobago, Tunisia, Ukraine, the United Arab Emirates, Uruguay, Uzbekistan, Vietnam, and Zambia. Obviously some of these countries have better internet penetration than others. However, anyone wishing to host a public domain edition of GWTW might most likely find soulmates in Argentina, Bulgaria -- they must have computers, since they have computer viruses -- Canada, Chile, Iceland, Japan, South Korea, New Zealand, Serbia and Montenegro, Singapore, South Africa, Taiwan, Ukraine, and the various Caribbean countries on the list. Not advocatin'. Not suggestin'. Just informin'. As you were, troops.

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Gone With the Wind, redux
by Wallace J.McLean 11 Nov '04

11 Nov '04

I received the following PM today at Distributed Proofreading: From: [A DISTRIBUTED PROOFREADING VOLUNTEER'S ALIAS] To: [DP ALIAS] Posted: 10 Nov 2004 18:34 Subject: Another call to arms Hello [DP ALIAS], You are Canadian, aren't you? I need someone for a rescue operation; the pay is lousy* and the risk is ... er ... for you to decide. As you know, the Mitchell estate threatened Project Gutenberg Australia (PGA) with legal action if they didn't remove their etext of Gone With The Wind, and although I do not know whether Col Choat (who effectively is PGA) removed that file, all links to it now say "Page not found", or something to that effect. Luckily, my prodigious googling skills (cough!) allowed me to trace a copy. Unfortunately, although I am allowed to download it under [MY NATIONAL] copyright law, that same law prohibits me to publish it. Could you perhaps download it? I am not asking you to publish it or anything (the Mitchell estate lawyers are a lot closer to Canada than to Australia), you could at least legally pass it on to someone who is allowed to publish it. Also, I believe Michael Hart and John Mark Ockerbloom (Online Books Pages) are interested in the whereabouts of any surviving copies of their etext. Anyway, you can find a non-Gutenberg copy of the text at http://www.globusz.com/ebooks/GoneWithTheWind/. Also, part of a copy of the Gutenberg version seems to sit in the Google cache: http://64.233.183.104/search ?q=cache:rgeeJ5-OkIUJ:gutenberg.net.au/ebooks02/0200161.txt +%22gone+with+the+wind%22 +Plain+Vanilla+Electronic+Texts &hl=en. Truncated at some point, it is not very useful reading material, but perhaps it can be used to establish whether Globusz used the Gutenberg version. The search strings I used were: "gone with the wind" plain vanilla electronic texts and "Melanie and Pittypat had gone" I don't know if this is necessary; the Canadian volunteer who produced the text is known, and I would not be surprised if he still owned a copy, or even the original. In which case it could be rescanned and ran through DP Europe. Perhaps I am getting too worked up over nothing. I hope I am not inconveniencing you too much. Thanks, *) As in: non-existant.

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Re: [PGCanada] James website and more news
by Wallace J.McLean 11 Nov '04

11 Nov '04

----- Original Message ----- From: Jon Noring <jon(a)noring.name> Date: Thursday, November 11, 2004 10:28 am Subject: Re: [PGCanada] James website and more news > 3) Scan these texts, collect the metadata/catalog-info, and place the > page scans online. (Optionally, OCR can be done on these scans, and > the raw, uncorrected OCR text can be used to enable a "temporary" > full-text-search capability of the collection of page scans.) This last -- use of the raw, uncorrected OCR output -- is what drives projects like canadiana.org, ourroots.ca, newspaperarchive.com, and the cold north wind/paperofrecord.com family of products.

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