Annual Report by Michael S. Hart 3 Pages (C)January 31, 1995 The most important thing I can tell you is that the Internet is a combination of Star Trek communicator, transporter & replicator-- and. . . that the direction the Internet is taking changed drastically for the year 1994, not always for the better. 75% of 1994's Internet growth was of a commercial nature, and the odds that you don't know something about that already are minimal to say the least. I will only hit the high/low points. From 1988 to 1994 the number of people involved in the Internet & its various projects fairly tripled every year and the amounts of email I sent and received did too. However, in 1994, while the number of people ON the Internet grew at very huge rates, the number of people involved in humanitarian projects such as Project Gutenberg stayed about the same; in 1993 we never quite hit 500 volunteers, in 1994 we may have for a peak week of the year. The amount of Email I receive directly has also tapered off. The total amount of Email was a little larger, due to some mail going to dircompg@ux1.cso.uiuc.edu [Thanks Karin!] 94 = 118M 93 = 118M 92 = 88M 91 = 60M 90 = 25M 89 = 15M Nevertheless, if it isn't obvious to us all already, it should be soon as the Internet becomes more and more obviously the property of The Telephone Company and related interests, and you get great amounts of electronic junk mail from addresses you can't reply to [you might try postmaster@ root@ etc., to make your replies.] Even with all this, it is highly likely that Project Gutenberg is going to be able to stay on schedule for 1995: as we now have 50 volunteers with scanners, and copyright clearances on books which were published in the US before 1920 automatically being cleared. We also have finally found our first copyright lawyers outside of the US, and we hope to get rolling with some other languages. It is quite obvious that in 1995 Project Gutenberg will have to do a greater job per volunteer than we have in the past, since numbers of volunteering types on the Internet appear to be leveling out. For us to achieve our goal of 200 books in 1995, each of you will have to do 40% of a book; 80% in 1996, 160% in 1997, 320% in 1998 and 640% in 1999, leaving 1280% in 2000 and 2560% in 2001. It is quite obvious that we will have to achieve some kind of new mass production technique and/or technology or each of you should be facing two books a month in 2001, which is possible, even with today's technology; but I would like to think we can make it some reasonable amount easier for you by then. On a happier note, we are receiving continued and increasing Scan Team support from Calera/Caere, and should have more copies of an assortment of OCR programs to hand out in a few months. Also, we are receiving some support from the people at MicroSoft, and will be able to provide some of you with site licenses for operating a machine for Project Gutenberg. Our CDROM is continuing to sell-- many thanks to Walnut Creek for contributing over half our budget last year based on those sales. Were it not for Walnut Creek, we would be in serious financial trouble. We are hoping to make our own "Basement CDROM" this year, having received permission to try from Walnut Creek, as long as we don't underprice them. This may help keep too many of our financial eggs from being in one single basket. . .much better one than none, however, and a Walnut Creek representative doesn't feel we will cut into their sales much. The press continues its coverage of Project Gutenberg, you should be able to find an article about us in Associated Press media, it supposedly went out on the "technical" wire last week, and again, yesterday, on their "national" and a perhaps even "international" wires, as response to last week's article was apparently hot. It will be posted here shortly, except for the photographs. This is somewhat of a landmark, as it marks the 100th time we have been a feature in the media or a conference. [There are many articles I have never seen, as I don't go to great lengths to get them if an interview doesn't make it obvious we are being written about. If you see articles about Project Gutenberg, please send them to me. Current Highlights The new Pentiums can search the Complete Works of Shakespeare, in a RAM disk, in about one second, if your quote isn't there. That means in a half second, on the average, if it appears only once-- which means the old Pentiums and 486/99's and 100's can find your quote in about a second. This highlights the reason that indices are not going to be a requirement for electronic libraries in the future, unless you are searching databases many times the size of the Complete Works of Shakespeare. You want speed, make a RAM disk, and load the material you should like to search in there. VERY fast, unless you have a super slow search program. More Speed. The 20,000 year old French cave paintings hit the news a week ago last Friday, and were on the Net less than a week later. If your abilities allow you to upload them to our "incoming" directory, I would love to hear from you. When compared with the Dead Sea Scrolls which were discovered the year I was born, and didn't surface until just a few years ago, a huge leap has been made in sharing information. . .and my largest compliments to the French for this and their other achievements-- MiniTel, Tres Grandes Biblioteque [or whatever they call it now]. Merci! I should also like to thank the several colleges and universities who have allowed a small percentage of their Etexts to be made an available resource to the rest of the world via FTP, WWW, etc. A sincere thanks and hope for the rest of your electronic libraries to become available. As I understand it, there are about 10,000, or so, Etexts on the Internet machines, only 1,000 or so of which are actually available. And thanks to all those who have, are, and will help this Project Gutenberg effort to eliminate illiteracy and ignorance. ============================================= Michael S. Hart, Professor of Electronic Text Executive Director of Project Gutenberg Etext Illinois Benedictine College, Lisle, IL 60532 No official connection to U of Illinois--UIUC hart@uiucvmd.bitnet and hart@vmd.cso.uiuc.edu Internet User Number 100 [approximately] [TM] Break Down the Bars of Ignorance & Illiteracy On the Carnegie Libraries' 100th Anniversary! If I don't answer in two days, please resend. It usually means I did not get/see your note. General queries to: dircompg@ux1.cso.uiuc.edu [Project Gutenberg Director of Communication]