INFORMATION UPDATE "Offering Information Solutions" November, 2002 Number 38 A Monthly Publication of Shamel Information Services mailto:InfoUpdate@shamelinfo.com Welcome to INFORMATION UPDATE, the free monthly newsletter for people who need to know. ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ IN THIS ISSUE ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ => Do It Yourself - Free Books Online: Project Gutenberg => Did You Know - Market Share is Out There => Notes, News and Announcements => Subscribe/Unsubscribe Information ************************************************************ DO IT YOURSELF - Free Books Online: Project Gutenberg ************************************************************ Begun in 1971, Project Gutenberg has produced over 6,000 eBooks. About 1,500 volunteers hope to produce about 2,400 more eBooks in 2002, nearly twice as many as the 1,240 they created in 2001. By their 7,000th eBook, Project Gutenberg hopes to have included examples of books in 20 languages, and already has one eBook that contains selections translated into over 75 languages. Project Gutenberg encourages volunteers to identify books in the public domain (not protected by copyright) and enter the full text into the Project Gutenberg database. They cannot publish any texts still in copyright. This generally means that their texts are taken from books published pre-1923.(It's more complicated than that, but 1923 is a good first rule-of- thumb for the U.S.A.) So you won't find the latest bestsellers or modern computer books here. You will find the classic books from the start of this century and previous centuries, from authors like Shakespeare, Poe, Dante, as well as well-loved favorites like the Sherlock Holmes stories by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, the Tarzan and Mars books of Edgar Rice Burroughs, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland as told by Lewis Carroll, and thous- ands of others. There are three portions of the Project Gutenberg Library, basically described as: >>Light Literature; such as Alice in Wonderland, Through the Looking-Glass, Peter Pan, Aesop's Fables, etc. >>Heavy Literature; such as the Bible or other religious docu- ments, Shakespeare, Moby Dick, Paradise Lost, etc. >>References; such as Roget's Thesaurus, almanacs, and a set of encyclopedia, dictionaries, etc. Project Gutenberg wants people to be able to look up quota- tions they heard in conversation, movies, music, other books, easily with a library containing all these quotations in an easy to find etext format. In fact, these Project Gutenberg Etext files are so plain that you can do a search on them without even using an intermediate search program (i.e. a program between you and the disk) Norton's and other direct disk access programs can search every one of your files with- out you even naming them, pointing to an etext directory, or whatever. Visit the Project Gutenberg web site for a complete listing of free books available. Note: The text for this article comes largely from the Project Gutenberg website: http://promo.net/pg/index.html Project Gutenberg invites volunteers. For more information, go to http://promo.net/pg/volunteer.html ************************************************************ Did You Know? - Market Share is Out There ************************************************************ Market share information provides companies an idea of how their product, or their competitor's product, is doing in the market place, compared to similar products. There are lots of reasons for understanding a product's market share, including defending claims in court, planning advertising strategies, and tracking the standing of your own company's products compared to competitors. Finding this market share information is sometimes easier said than done. There is always the chance that a simple Internet search, using Google at http://www.google.com or Northern Light at http://nlresearch.northernlight.com/ could yield useful results. Often, however, the project requires a carefully planned search of commercial databases to obtain useful information. These databases are available through such services as LexisNexis, Dialog, and Factiva. Many business professionals and individuals do not have accounts with these search services. Even if they do have access, many do not want to take time to learn how to search them. In order to take advantage of the excellent information available only through the commercial database providers, contact a professional researcher. For more information on locating market share data, or for help with your information needs, contact Shamel Information Services at 800-330-9939. http://www.lexis-nexis.com http://www.dialog.com http://www.factiva.com ************************************************************* Notes, News, and Announcements ************************************************************* Astronomy Picture of the Day. A different image every day with an explanation and links to other pictures. http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ For an excellent source of information on research resources, consider subscribing to Free Pint. http://www.freepint.com "Helping 53,000 people use the Web for their work" Independent information professionals attending Online Information 2002 in London, December 3-5 will want to attend The President’s Breakfast, sponsored by the Association of Independent Information Professionals on Tuesday, December 3. For more information, e-mail cshamel@shamelinfo.com ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ The Shamel Information Services web site at http://shamelinfo.com contains Information Update archives. Just click on "Newsletters" and check for any issues you might have missed. ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ SUBSCRIBE/UNSUBSCRIBE ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ Subscriptions to INFORMATION UPDATE are free. You may subscribe or unsubscribe by sending a message to: mailto:InfoUpdate@shamelinfo.com with SUBSCRIBE or UNSUBSCRIBE in the subject line. Copyright 2002 Shamel Information Services Please feel free to forward this issue to colleagues, in its entirety. Other uses without permission may violate copyright. Online archives at http://shamelinfo.com/newsletter.htm ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ Cynthia L. Shamel, editor Shamel Information Services Poway, California mailto:cshamel@shamelinfo.com Author, "Centralized Library and Learning Resources: A Remote Access Demonstration Project," Community & Junior College Libraries 10(4):13-28. Author, "Building a Brand: Got Librarian?" Searcher July/August, 2002. http://www.infotoday.com/searcher/default.htm President-Elect of the Association of Independent Information Professionals http://www.aiip.org. Telephone: 858-673-4673 Toll Free: 800-330-9939