E-Currents

Citation

Falk, H. (2003), "E-Currents", Library Hi Tech News, Vol. 20 No. 7. https://doi.org/10.1108/lhtn.2003.23920gae.001

E-Currents

Howard Falk

More US archives may be terminated

Despite vigorous opposition from a coalition of library and government-watchdog groups, PubScience is no more. Lobbyists from the Software and Information Industry Association argued that PubScience unfairly competed against private-sector databases such as Scirus (www.scirus.com) and Infotrieve (www.infotrieve.com). In its justification for closing the PubScience database, the Department of Energy repeated the arguments advanced by the Software and Information Industry Association. Many fear the Software and Information Industry Association will now try to eliminate other federal databases, such as AGRICOLA (www.nal.usda.gov/ag98) and Global Legal Information Network (www.loc.gov/law/glin)

New release of DSpace

A new version of DSpace archiving software, the 1.1 release, provides many added features including advanced search capabilities, improved unicode handling, and OAI-PMH resumption token support. Bugs identified since the previous release have been fixed, and DSpace documentation has been updated. Code and documentation can be downloaded from the DSpace page at: http://sourceforge.net/projects/dspace. Be sure to get the updated documentation, since it describes the upgrade procedure that must be followed if the new release is to operate on existing DSpace installations.

Journal eDeposit in The Netherlands

Kluwer Online Publications has signed up for archiving of their journals by the National Library of the Netherlands (Koninklijke Bibliotheek, KB). KB will receive digital copies of all Kluwer journals and books available on the Kluwer Online Web site. The site now offers 235,000 articles from 670 journals and more than 600 science, technology and medicine ebooks. In 2003 more than 70,000 additional articles and 400 ebooks are expected to be added. Should Kluwer ever stop making its journals available commercially, the KB archive is authorized to provide remote access to the public. KB plans to make similar agreements with all major scientific publishers. On-site access to KB online collections is open to the public. The Koninklijke Bibliotheek (www.kb.nl) was founded in 1798. It is an autonomous organization, but is financed by the Dutch Ministry of Education, Culture & Science.

Electronic restrictions fail to curb piracy

There has been only limited acceptance of user restrictions imposed by DRM (Digital Rights Management) techniques, according to a report from In-Stat/MDR, a market research firm. The report notes that the past year has seen continuing industry disagreements about strategies for preventing unauthorized use of copyright electronic materials. Content development firms, the recording industry and movie studios have been emphasizing the need to stop all unauthorized copying and distribution. At the same time, information technology firms have been insisting that DRM techniques should allow copying of copyrighted materials for personal use. These disagreements have led to an increase in both DRM-related lawsuits and new legislative initiatives. The report also notes that DRM has failed to curb actual piracy, by those who make a business of selling unauthorized copies of copyright ebooks and recordings. There are, however, significant attitude changes that may ultimately improve cooperation between the two industries. These changes have led to a few small-scale inter-industry implementations of improved DRM solutions. In addition, within the next few months, announcements are expected from movie studios and recording industries of expanded Pay-per-View and Pay-per-Listen services. Meanwhile, most consumers seem to believe that DRM issues do not directly affect their lives or finances.

Journal merger said to threaten research

The US Department of Justice is being urged to block a proposed purchase of BertelsmannSpringer, the academic publishing arm of Bertelsmann AG. A UK partnership, Cinven and Candover, wants to buy BertelsmannSpringer and merge it with Kluwer Academic Publishers, which Cinven and Candover already owns. The merger would make them the second largest publisher of scientific journals in the world, exceeded in size only by Elsevier Science.

Opponents believe the merger will reduce access to critical research information. The main opposition comes from the Information Access Alliance, which includes the American Association of Law Libraries, American Library Association, Association of College and Research Libraries, Association of Research Libraries, Medical Library Association, and SPARC (Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition). The alliance was created because of concerns about the effects of mergers among publishers of science journals and legal serial publications. According to the alliance, prices libraries pay for journals have risen at three times the rate of inflation and merger activity has been a significant inflationary factor. Cinven and Candover have indicated that they plan to increase the profits of their new business. Such profits are likely to require further price increases.

Peer-to-peer gets a boost

Peer-to-peer networks allow electronic materials, like songs, movies, and ebooks, to be downloaded from the Internet by file-sharing software. A US District Court judge has ruled that companies which operate two popular file-sharing services are not liable when their users illegally copy copyrighted material. The companies involved are Grokster Ltd and StreamCast Networks Inc. The court ruling was based on a 1984 case where Sony Corporation was sued when its video cassette recorders were used to make illegal copies of copyright movies. Courts in that case ruled that selling copying equipment did not infringe on copyrights. When users seek digital files, no information is relayed by a computer owned or controlled by Grokster or StreamCast. In fact, if those companies went out of business their users could continue to share files with little or no disruption.

Having failed to stop peer-to-peer networking, what will movie studios and recording companies do next? They have tried directly attacking individual users of peer-to-peer networks. Four students, accused of operating peer-to-peer networks for trading music, were sued by record companies and settled for sums between $12 and $17.5 thousand. And, according to the New York Times, record companies are quietly developing cyberwarfare software to interfere with, or damage computers used for file sharing. But such measures are bound to increase public indignation.

A more effective approach has been taken by Apple Computer which sold over 1 million 99-cent song recordings over the Internet in one week in May. There seems to be a big online market for low-priced music.

DMCA developments

Some efforts to get around the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) were set back this year. The DMCA is designed to protect copyrights by preventing users of ebooks and other electronic materials from making unauthorized copies. In the Edelman case, the judge ruled that copyrights of a software company were more important than a researcher's right to investigate the worth of their product. Edelman, a computer researcher, had been examining an Internet content blocking program. In the Verizon case, the judge ruled that the DMCA does not violate constitutional rights by requiring Internet service providers to reveal the names of users who use peer-to-peer networks to download copyrighted music. The 321 Studios case had a more uncertain outcome. Seven movie companies want to keep 321 from selling DVD copying software. The judge in this case raised many questions about the DMCA, but has yet to rule for or against 321 Studios.

In May, President Bush signed a Free Trade Agreement (FTA) with Singapore. This FTA included agreement to place DMCA-style user restrictions on electronic materials. If Congress approves the FTA, the DMCA cannot be altered without violating US obligations to Singapore. US courts would no longer be able to rule on disputes about the DMCA because it is not the role of the courts to decide whether the USA should honor its treaties.

The American Foundation for the Blind testified at the Copyright Office, urging an exemption to the DMCA. That organization is only one of many that are asking for ways around the restrictions. Built-in restrictions in many ebooks prevent the use of text-to-speech software, essential to sightless readers. Many of the affected ebooks are recent best-sellers, but others are classics that have been in the public domain for hundreds of years. Software is available to translate ebook files instantly into sound or Braille. However, the DMCA prohibits any tampering with restrictions that ebook publishers build into their products. US copyright law allows non-profit organizations to copy books so people with visual impairments can listen to or read it using Braille. But, to avoid DMCA restrictions it is necessary to go through a time-consuming, laborious, and expensive process of scanning printed works, then using text-to-speech software to produce versions usable by sightless readers. The Institutional Materials Accessibility Bill (H.R.490), which has 97 congressional co-sponsors, would offer relief by requiring that books must be easily translatable for people with disabilities.

News of ebook services

Ebook Library, a new ebook lending service, is designed for use by library patrons. The service (offered by eBooks Corporation, www.ebooks.com) is to be available in some university and research libraries starting in September 2003 and to be generally available in January 2004. Ebook Library will allow many patrons to check out each ebook title. Readers will be able to browse titles online, and then download them to their own desktop, laptop, or hand-held devices. Interlibrary loans of titles will be permitted. The service was developed to meet the special needs of research and academic libraries. The catalog of ebooks offered by the service will focus on scientific, technical and medical titles.

Questia, an online library that provides access to books, journal, magazine and newspaper articles in the humanities and social sciences, has expanded its coverage from to 400,000 titles.

netLibrary now offers over 50,000 ebook titles. The service is seeking more Spanish-language, health, and business content titles. A project to digitize 150,000 English-language books published in the eighteenth century has been launched.

Knovel (www.knovel.com), a service that provides scientific and engineering books online, with cross-book searching, continues to add to its collection. The latest acquisitions are titles from the Center for Chemical Process Safety (CCPS) of the American Institute of Chemical Engineers (AIChE).

Ebrary (www.ebrary.com) now has over 20,000 e-book titles available. A Middle East Collection of approximately 100 full-text books and maps is now available for free online viewing.

Wiley InterScience (www3.interscience.wiley.com) now has a pay-per-view service that makes its electronic journals and ebooks available to individuals who do not have access to Wiley InterScience content through an institution. Registration at the InterScience site is open to the public. The service can be used from any Internet-connected computer, opening use from work, home and on the road. Users can pay through secure online credit card transactions.

Library outreach by ebook industry

A Library Special Interest Group (SIG) has been set up by the Open eBook Forum (OeBF), the trade and standards association for the ebook industry. The group hopes to provide discussion between librarians, publishers and technology companies about library issues related to ebooks. The OeBF, together with the American Library Association, is developing a survey of ebook use in libraries. One of the first goals of the Library SIG will be to develop the survey methodology, oversee the distribution of the survey and analyze and publish the results. Initial sponsors of the survey include OverDrive, Baker & Taylor, Adobe, Greenwood Publishing Group, Microsoft and Palm Digital Media. Details on survey sponsorships can be found on the OeBF Web site at: www.openebook.org/membership/sponsorships/surveysponsorship.htm

Online books without restrictions

Since Cory Doctorow posted his new novel on the Web more than 110,000 free copies have been downloaded from his site (www.craphound.com). The novel is called Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom, a science-fiction story. Doctorow figured that making his work available online would be good publicity, and apparently, he was right. His publisher, Tor Books, expects 8,500 copies of the print version of his book will be sold out by fall.

Random House has released three new ebooks for sale on the Fictionwise Web site, free of restriction encoding, allowing readers to make convenience copies. The ebooks: Tainted Garden by Jeff Stanley, Stone Maiden by Anne Aquirre, and Thagoth by Michael McClung are winners in a writing contest and are not being released in print form. The offering is intended as a promotion for Random House publications. Fictionwise (www.fictionwise.com) welcomes the release because they believe that many potential ebook customers will not buy restricted titles.

Ebook viewer flips pages

Hewlett-Packard is developing an ebook viewer that flips pages. The device has a thin film transistor screen and displays page images that look like photographs of an opened book. Touch-strips at the sides and bottom of the screen allow users to change displayed pages. The process is equivalent to holding a place in a paper volume with one hand while flipping through pages with the other hand. The screen resolution of the device is 100 dots per inch. Backlighting is used to provide a display that can be seen in daylight. However, the minimum battery life is only three hours.

New display screens

E Ink Corp. has a new paper-like material, just three-tenths of a millimeter thick, for displaying text and pictures. The display is lightweight and can be rolled up into a scroll without damage. Resolution of the display is up to 96 pixels per inch. E Ink is working with Royal Philips Electronics to produce a prototype ebook using the new material and hopes to have a commercial version in two or three years.

Toshiba is testing Organic Light Emitting Diode (OLED) technology for use in computer and cell phone displays. Phosphorescence is used to provide low-light display visibility. The technology is expected to be used in some Toshiba cell phones by the end of 2003.

Library closings and cutbacks

A devastating wave of library closings and cutbacks has been impacting communities across the USA. In Hawaii, public libraries are operating under reduced hours. In California, the Oakland Public Library book budget has been cut by one-third, Los Angeles County may close 15 of its 84 libraries and reduce hours at other branches. In the Whittier area, 15 libraries are slated to be closed. Library hours would be reduced at most San Diego branches and nearly all city libraries would close Sundays. California Governor Davis proposed cutting library funds from $31.5 in 2003 to about $1 million in 2004 and charging patrons for interlibrary loans.

In Salt Lake City, purchases of library materials are being cut by 18 percent and branches will be closing on Sunday. The medical library at Denver Health Medical Center is being closed for lack of funds. The central Denver Public Library and all 23 branches will be closing an additional day each week, spending on books, videos and DVDs will be cut 9 percent, and 35 library positions are scheduled to be eliminated.

In Indiana, the Valparaiso, Portage, South Haven and Kouts libraries will each be closed six additional hours per week, and the Porter County bookmobile has ceased operating. In Virginia, three branch Prince George County libraries have lost their full-time librarian. In Pennsylvania, libraries in Cambria, Somerset and Bedford counties are planning for layoffs and reduced hours. The Somerset County Library is expected to close.

Public libraries throughout New England and the Middle Atlantic states are affected. For example, the Huguenot Children's Library, and main library in New Rochelle, New York will have to close, unless residents agree to increase local taxes. To cut back on costs, libraries across Connecticut expect to cut back hours, and close some branches. Included are libraries in East Hartford, Wethersfield, Portland, and Glastonbury.

Howard Falkhowf@hotmail.com) is a freelance journalist based in New Jersey, USA.