E-Currents
UK digital deposit law moves ahead
The Legal Deposit Libraries Bill, designed to ensure that digital materials are archived at UK's legal deposit libraries, is to go to the House of Lords,then back to the House of Commons for third reading on its way to enactment as a law. Passage is expected in May 2003.
Existing law provides for depositing a copy of all printed UK publications in the legal deposit libraries (one of these is the British Library). Based on a voluntary agreement, materials such as CD-ROMs and microfilm/micro-fiche have also been deposited. But the agreement did not include online publications and Web sites. The Legal Deposit Libraries Bill is intended to cover these digital materials.
Online scholarly books are expanding
Early English Books Online now offers 3,000 searchable (SGML/XML) full-text scholarly electronic versions of fifteenth, sixteenth and seventeenth century texts. The texts can be accessed through academic libraries that pay fees to the Text Creation Partnership (TCP). The University of Michigan and the ProQuest organization have teamed up to form TCP.
For an academic library that pays a $50,000 TCP fee, the cost is about $16 per title. TCP claims that revenues and commitments are in hand to reach approximately 10,000 titles. If the fees do not change, the per-title cost would then drop to $5.
Conversion to produce the searchable titles is done offshore, using images provided to vendors by ProQuest. Keyboarded files are then reviewed, either at Michigan or Oxford, to ensure they conform to a standard of 99.995 percent character accuracy.
Each page of a TCP text edition links to a corresponding image page, imported from a ProQuest server computer. Fee-paying libraries are entitled to receive a copy of the text file for local loading and management. Five years after completion of production, these libraries will be allowed to distribute freely some or all of the TCP files to neighboring high school students, state residents. Since ProQuest owns the page images, those will not be freely available.
Based on their success with the Early English Books project, the TCP partnership has gone on to make an agreement with Newsbank/Readex to convert 6,000 Evans Digital Early American Imprint texts, and hopes to contract with Gale to convert thousands of eighteenth-century texts as well. More information about TCP can be obtained at www.lib.umich.edu/eebo.
Repository management software is released
The first phase of a repository management system has been released by the Flexible Extensible Digital Object and Repository Architecture (FEDORA) project team, based at Cornell and the University of Virginia. The system can be used to build accessible collections of digital materials that include items managed by repository owners and also items that are completely outside the direct custody of the repository. The system allows these items to be delivered in a variety of ways and to be accessed by several different software applications. The system is open-source and is based on FEDORA. Version 1.0 of the FEDORA system is available under a public license at http://www.fedora.info.
Founder's copyright open to the public
Several hundred book titles have been released with shorter-term copyrights,using the Founder's copyright process. Creative Commons(www.creativecommons.org) has announced the opening of its Founders' Copyright submission process to the public. Rather than registering with the US Copyright office for a copyright term that will exceed their lifetimes by 70 years,authors can now opt for a 14- or 28-year term with Creative Commons. Using a simple Web form, the authors can submit their works for consideration for release under the Founders' Copyright.
O'Reilly and Associates is releasing 157 out-of-print titles, and 394 in-print titles under short copyright terms. Lawrence Lessig will release Code and Other Laws of Cyberspace, The Future of Ideas, and his next book (due Spring 2004), under similar terms, and so will Dan Gillmor, widely read technology pundit and columnist for the San Jose Mercury News, who has a forthcoming book. Andy Kessler, Wall Street veteran and frequent Wall Street Journal contributor, will also release his celebrated book, Wall Street Meat: Jack Grubman, Franke Quattrone, Mary Meeker, Henry Blodget and Me,under the Founders' Copyright. The Creative Commons Web site will announce the availability of these books as their Founders' Copyright terms lapse.
States consider super DMCA laws
Many states are being pressured by the Motion Picture Association of America(MPAA) to pass super-DMCA laws that limit freedom of speech and public rights. Seven states: Delaware, Illinois, Maryland, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Virginia and Wyoming have already passed such laws. Nine other states: Arkansas, Colorado,Florida, Georgia, Massachusetts, Oregon, South Carolina, Tennessee, and Texas are considering super-DMCA laws. These super-DMCA laws attempt to criminalise possession of what they call unlawful communication and access devices. The laws would allow communication service providers to restrict what consumers can connect to their Internet connection, cable or satellite television line.
Under existing law, those who have legitimately purchased services such as cable TV, satellite, or broadband Internet, are free to connect whatever they like to the wires they pay for, so long as they do not violate any other applicable law. For example, they are free to connect a new TV, PC, VCR or TiVo to cable television.
All of the proposed bills seem to be derived from a single model bill developed by MPAA lobbyists. These bills would all impose a new ban on possession, development, or distribution of a broad array of communication and access devices. The bills protect communication services, which include every wire in a consumer's house for which a fee is paid, including telephone, cable TV, satellite and Internet lines. Also included are Internet-based subscriptions services. For further information on super-DMCA laws, see the Electronic Frontier Foundation Web site: www.eff.org.
ERIC to be downgraded
National priorities that have strained library budgets are threatening to force drastic changes in operations at ERIC, the world's largest education database. A new draft statement of work (SOW) places ERIC under the coordination and control of a single new contractor and would eliminate most of the customer-service component of ERIC programs. Under the new contractor, three content experts in each of the current ERIC Clearinghouse topic areas would select materials for inclusion in the ERIC database. This seems inadequate because Clearinghouse areas each cover a range of subjects too broad to be encompassed by the expertise of three individuals. In addition, the three would be removed from the day-to-day operations of database generation and user inquiry. The SOW also directs the new ERIC contractor to press for use of abstracts and indexing information provided by publishers. The American Library Association (ALA) believes this will significantly reduce the value of ERIC because it will undermine the quality and consistency of abstracting and indexing and could lead to a great loss in the effectiveness of database search retrieval.
ERIC Clearinghouses now answer nearly 200,000 telephone requests each year and run the AskERIC Web service that gets six million hits a week. The replacement service proposed by the SOW, called What Works, may provide help for educational practitioners but, according to the ALA, it will be unable to serve the researchers, and students who need the expertise of Clearinghouse staffs and information products. The SOW proposes linking the ERIC database to commercial vendors. ALA believes this will create two classes of ERIC users: those who have uninhibited institutional access to materials (mainly on college and university campuses), and those who will have to purchase access to ERIC materials.
New CD-ROM-and-book combination
Before present-day ebooks became available, some electronic book titles were recorded on CD-ROM disks for display on computer screens. Baen Books (www.baen.com) has decided to try CD-ROM publication once more with the release of a hardcover version of Hell's Faire,by New York Times best-selling author John Ringo. The book comes with a CD-ROM that contains 20 novels, and includes the author's complete backlist. In addition, the CD-ROM provides computer screen-savers, a role-playing game, a number of MP3 audio chapters, and an abridged version of the War of Honor. Also included is an audio book version of Hell's Faire. The novels recorded on the CD-ROM can be read by any device that runs any version of Windows. (It can also be read on Mac computers.)
Chinese palm handheld has an ebook reader
China's largest PC firm, Legend Group, is now selling a Chinese language Palm handheld device. The Legend Palm 168 has a color screen, an MP3 player, a voice recorder, and headphones with built-in volume controls. There is a 3.5-inch display (240 320 pixels) that shows over 65,000 colors. The Legend Palm 168 has 16MB of storage RAM and a 16MB Flash ROM. It also includes a memory card expansion slot. A rechargeable lithium-ion battery powers the unit. Battery life is rated for 20 hours of MP3 playing (with the display turned off). Dimensions of the device are 120mm 74mm 12.5mm (4.72 2.9 0.5 inches) and it weighs 125g(4.4oz).
The Legend device runs Palm OS 4.1 software, and users can choose between simplified Chinese or English-language display. In addition to standard Palm applications, software that comes with the unit provides infrared messaging, an ebook reader, an electronic photo album, calculator, and a Chinese-English Dictionary. The list price is 2,800RMB (about US$338).
Japanese low-power ebook device
Matsushita Electric Industrial plans to sell a low-cost, low-power ebook device – the Sigma ebook – that can run up to six months on two AA-size batteries. The secret of the low-power operation is in the display. Conventional liquid-crystal displays (LCDs) refresh the screen about 60 times a second, and each refresh draws power. The Sigma e-book LCD screen needs only one refresh (when an ebook page is turned). Between page-turns the image is locked and requires no added power. The LCD screen does have one peculiarity: instead of grayscale, it displays blue text and images against a white background. When the magazine-sized Sigma device is opened, two 1024 x 768-pixel displays,measuring 7.2 inches each, are visible side-by-side. Storage is on a removable card, and the card is encrypted with a key that controls user access. The Sigma unit weighs about one pound.
At first, only comics and fiction will be available to Sigma users. Matsushita expects to sell the unit in China later in 2003, at a price equivalent to US$250.
High-speed Internet2 news
In early May, Internet2 (www.internet2.edu)announced that the MAN LAN (Manhattan Landing) exchange point has been set up in downtown Manhattan. Internet2 networks already connected to MAN LAN include Abilene, GEANT (the pan-European research network) and HEANet (the Irish research and education network). In the next few months NYSERNet (which serves New York State educational and research institutions) and CA*net 4 (Canada's research and education network) also plan to connect to MAN LAN. Other international Internet2 exchange hubs include StarLight in Chicago, Illinois,Pacific Wave in Seattle, and AMPATH in Miami, Florida.
Internet2 also announced in May that it had set up a National Research and Education Fiber Company (Fiberco) to support regional fiber-optical networking dedicated to research and higher education.
Universities such as Stanford, MIT and Cal Tech – 225 universities in all – are now connected to Internet2, which allows users to operate at very high speeds and to rapidly send and receive huge amounts of data. Internet2 is not just for researchers and engineers. For example, students at Bradley University in Peoria, Illinois have used Internet2 to connect to California State University in Los Angeles for a screenwriting class with writers and directors speaking live from Hollywood.
Bookmobiles sell instant titles
The Bookmobile, a mobile digital library in a van, was demonstrated at the O'Reilly Emerging Technology Conference in April 2003. The van is equipped with a printer, a book binding machine and a satellite dish to download ebooks from the Internet. It takes ten minutes to print and bind one copy of Alice in Wonderland and only one dollar to buy it at the Bookmobile. The van is designed to demonstrate that paperback books can be quickly and inexpensively produced from its searchable database of 20,000 public domain online books. However, the Bookmobile produces only black-and-white paperbacks. The one-dollar price is made possible by using lower-quality paper and giving up color.
According to Brewster Kahle, director of the Internet Archive, which funds the Bookmobile, a van with all its equipment costs $12,000 to $15,000; and a stationary Bookmobile would cost only about $3000. Kahle says the next Bookmobile will be built in the Library of Alexandria, and will be funded by HP,the US Embassy. He also says that India is planning to build 30 Bookmobiles,funded by the Indian Ministry of Information.
Funding for Massachusetts libraries vanishes
The Boston Globe reports that when the Massachusetts House Committee on Ways and Means released its proposed 2004 higher-education budget, almost every item was reduced, but state funding for public college and university library materials simply vanished. The 2002 budget for those materials was $5 million. The 2003 budget was down to $1.2 million. Now the budget for 2004 is to be zero. School libraries have already been forced to limit hours and cancel hundreds of subscriptions. Now schools can expect to get no money at all from the state to buy books and magazines.
Howard Falk (howf@hotmail.com) is a free-lance writer based in New Jersey, USA.
