The Arachnet Electronic Journal on Virtual Culture __________________________________________________________________ ISSN 1068-5723 September 27, 1993 Volume 1 Issue 6 SQARV1N6 HART THE RATE OF CHANGE OF THE RATE OF CHANGE: COLUMN THREE SEPT, 1993 ADULT LITERACY FALLS TO 53% AS COPYRIGHT IS GETTING LONGER AS BOOKS GO OUT OF PRINT SOONER by Michael S. Hart" [If you can provide ANY assistance in the creation of an etext about the contents of the Adult Literacy Report or similar reports, please let me know.] This past week the media has brought us several important aspects of the Rate of Change of The Rate of Change, the most important I would say was the Report on Adult Literacy in the United States. However, I have not seen any in depth reporting on this story, other than one local Sunday morning news program, and neither myself nor a group of research assistants have seen much about it on the net. The fact is that no matter how good our libraries are, electronic or otherwise, it would now appear that half the people are not going to be able to read what is in them. I have conversed with the media and others about this report without getting more satisfactory information than is listed below, and thus am doing more research, which will hopefully add up to enough to put together an etext on the subject. The gist of this report was that 20% of the population of the United States is illiterate to the point of not being able to read or write more than their names, and that 47% were unable to read anything any more difficult than simple instructions or directions. For many years the Adult Literacy Rate in the United States reported in at 99%, as did that of the other "advanced" nations. From "World Factbook" of the CIA for 1991 and 1992 we see the following: Literacy: 97% (male 97%, female 97%) age 15 and over having completed 5 or more years of schooling (1980) Labor force: 126,424,000 (includes armed forces and unemployed); civilian labor force 124,787,000 (1990) However, last week's Report was the first official report stating an Adult Literacy Rate that did not approximate 100% since literacy was initially reported to have approached 100% in the United States back at the end of the 1920's, when it first passed 90%. Without getting into the legal definitions of the census reports for the last century [basically writing your name was enough for many of the reports] or of the differences between illiteracy and functional illiteracy, I think most of us can accept the fact that the reported incidence of illiterate graduates of secondary schools and colleges, from the previous decade were some indication of what we are seeing. *** A worldwide survey by UNESCO in 1970 reported world illiteracy to be about one-third of the total world population [15 years or older, as is the case for the World Factbook] This figure indicated that 1/20 or 5.2% of the world population had become literate since 1960. The African illiteracy rate was reported at 73.7% and 46.8% for Asia. A look back to 1950 indicated illiteracy fell from 44.3% to 34.2% from 1950 to 1970 which reflect little or no change in the Rate of Change from the 1950 to 1960 period and the 1960 to 1970 period. This same report indicated illiteracy to be 1.5% in the United States and 3.6% in Europe. [Additional figures would be appreciated.] The concept of functional literacy may have begin during World War I when the United States Army learned many trainees were literate to a point of being able to read and write, their skills were not to such a level as to allow them to be taught the army skills required. The result was the beginning of literacy programs to achieve these goals which yields yet another dubious honor for advances due to war, that were not being made in peacetime. The result was one of the earlier definitions of functional literacy as the ability to read and learn, from U. S. Army manuals. One of the other standards used to define functional literacy was in reference to the sixth grade reading level [a level which was not an extremely standardized figure]. To this was added the sixth grades' performance levels in arithmetic [the three R's. . .reading, writing and 'rithmetic] which yielded non-standard results that a 13% to 50% portion of the United States population was functionally illiterate. Certainly some of the reasons for the fuzziness of these figures are due to the unwillingness of some people to admit their country might not be quite what it was expected to be. We find similar restraints on the willingness of official reports to acknowledge other things a country might not want to admit, such as economic depressions and/or recessions. [How many of you know that the Depression was named for this very reason? As I understand it, the term Recession was feared to such a degree that the term Depression was invented "We aren't in a Recession. . .this is only a Depression." The fact is that most of us knew we were in Recessions long before a government report was ever likely to say so and the same was true in the case of illiteracy. The trouble is that it is hard to work on fixing a problem before it is acknowledged to be a problem. So, the recent adages: "Speak as if you are addressing audiences of a seventh grade reading level and an MTV attention span" is not such a long distance off the mark, if you are addressing a whole country. My conclusion is that future politics in the United States are going to acknowledge the illiteracy of half the population by making those campaign speeches even more childish, and we will have to watch out, as we approach the same situation that Rome did 2000 years ago, when bread and circuses [read welfare and TV] were used to deal with much of their population. If you think you are literate, try reading The Fall of the Roman Empire. . .an amazing book. . .which we are trying to produce at Project Gutenberg. Let me know if you should care for some volunteering to create this etext.] [My apologies to those who do not regard the United States as center (which it appears in some of my writings), but I live here and don't have as much access to information about other places (but I want to have it)]. [Another apology: I have referred to the Dark Ages many times in my articles as though everyone when through them, but I see from my research on literacy in other parts of the world that others did not go through the Dark Ages and suffer the same high illiteracy as was brought on by the Dark Ages, which mostly affected Europe.] [UNESCO: United Nations Educational. Scientific, and Cultural Organization] *** While all this was going on, literacy and education falling together by the waysides, along with any kind of vision for civilization, the copyrights have been extended in many countries including the United States, and discussions are underway to extend them again even if an average book goes out of print in much less than a decade. [Rule of Thumb: Half of a book's sales will happen in the first years' sales and a quarter in the second year, an eighth in the third year, etc., etc., etc. Sales/year 50% + 25% + 12.5% + 6.25% + 3.125% + 1.5625% + .78125% Year number 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 years Totaled 50%: 75%: 87.5%: 93.75%: 96.875%: 98.4375%: 99.21875% * Compare this to scholarly research appearing in: Bodian, Nat. G, Book Marketing Handbook, v.2, New York: Bowker, 1983 p. 435 [100% 200% 50% 25% 12.5% 6.125%] Est Est 2nd Year 3rd Year 4th year 5th year 1st Year 5 Years should be should be should be should be 4,000 8,000 2,076 1,077 559 288 [4000] [8000] [2000] [1000] [500] [250] 3,500 7,000 1,817 943 489 251 [3500] [7000] [1750] [875] [438] [219] [My estimation formula added in brackets: you should note my formula gives fairly similar results for these categories and is also applicable to other categories, based on even shorter spans down to six months initial sales periods (substitutions of peak sales periods being applicable for those books taking more than six months to establish themselves.] [Please also note that these are the most conservative of the estimates I have found, with most estimates for GENERAL BOOKS (all books and copyrighted materials sold) being much quicker at 90% in the first year to 90% in the first six months, with the six week shelf life of many paperbacks insuring 99% sales in that six week period]. Kind of interesting, isn't it, that at the same time fallen literacy is finally reported and acknowledged, thus indicating for the second time in the United States history that approximately half the people are not considered as an audience for written material, the congress is considering powerful recommendations from the "European-Economic- Community" for copyright to get longer, while books are going out of print faster and faster. Here we are, in the Information Age, and it turns out about half of the population aren't capable of receiving information [of a nature any more demanding a nature than what comes over the television]. Not only that, but the information providers, who have always had an extended set of intellectual property rights longer than those of an assortment of inventors and other patent holders, are now lobbying a whole world of subscribers to the Berne Copyright Convention to make copyright another 20 years longer than the 50 year minimum [or who's going guess at the maximum] in force today. [Which was recently, in the US, extended from 28 years with a second period of 28 years upon a renewal request. Now there is no copyright notice required, which makes it even more difficult, if not impossible, for average readers to be able to tell what is under copyright and what is Public Domain any longer. . .I can tell you that already a great portion of energy at Project Gutenberg is spent on copyright research and that it will become an even greater problem, when copyright information no longer is available on the back of the title pages.] If a person writes a book at the age of 35 today, and lives to 85, a whole century of copyright protection is available for that book, as a Berne copyright today covers the life of the author plus 50 years. Thus, even if the author dropped dead immediately, the work will not enter the Public Domain for 50 years, and if the author lives an 100 years, the work will not enter the Public Domain for 150 years. The state of affairs is sad if the law requires an early death for early entry into the Public Domain. Of course, there are no such provisions about the intellectual right to a monopoly of an invention which is protected by patents that are 17 years long and have never been changed. Why it is so obvious for patented information to enter the Public Domain so we can have VCRs, TVs, and all the rest of our gadgets and gizmos in the Public Domain within 17 years of their inventions, with it being not so obvious in the case of books, or the videotapes we USE on our VCRs and TVs. . . is somewhat of a mystery to me. . .except there has never been guild or union protection for inventors. . .perhaps because invention is a very individual effort, requiring more individual, independent kinds of people, who were never likely to work together. [I don't know.] However, the fact remains, that inventions are required to enter the Public Domain in 17 years, while books don't enter the Public Domain for much, much longer. In an age when 99% of the profits from all copyrighted materials are made within the first ten years after publication there is something wrong with this kind of agenda. . .something we don't see. I have been credited with the quote: "You will soon be able to hold The Library of Congress in the palm of your hand," but I am starting to wonder if they will let you hold such vast amounts of information in your hand, even when it is practical and inexpensive to do so. I have reported to you that a LaserDisc big enough to fit your average room could hold every word ever written in all history, but I had to wonder if this was ever going to happen when the copyright issues we have recently seen began to affect the Rate of Change of the Rate of Change we are now living in. It is not as if this has never happened before, either. Every time technology has allowed us greater access to information a movement has arisen to keep those technologies out of the hands of a member of the public, and into the hands of a small group of private sector business concerns. Today, for the first time, technology has given us the power to put every word ever written in a single room-- the consequences are enormous--for public and private concerns. Before books were mass produced by Johann Gutenberg, there were none of the modern concerns about who would have a copy of anything, just as there was little concern about who would have nuclear power, when it was obvious that only two countries could make nuclear materials. Now that anyone can easily make their own copies, and even open up a publishing house, the publishers can no longer rely on their natural monopoly, but want to extend their monopoly via other methods: just as they did an hundred years ago in founding of a Copyright Register of the United States, which was 200 years after copyright was begun, by the Statute of Anne which established the 28 year copyright, with which most countries started as a guide for their copyrights. These processes were not terribly fast, as the Statute of Anne in 1710 was not followed outside England until 1793 in France, and then finally, during the 1800's in the rest of Europe, and then the United States. Remember, that before Gutenberg the average book cost as much as the average farm, and so only the very rich could afford even one book. After Gutenberg there were millions of books on the market, forty or so million being sold during the next few decades after 1455. These books eventually established a book market, much like any other kind of market, with real marketplaces where people could buy books, sell books, and make publication deals. This led to a desire to wipe out competition, and the printer guilds eventually lobbied themselves a monopoly such that no one else could print books, and no one could be published without passing through a Censor, whose approval was now necessary to print anything. England gave this monopoly to a group known as the Stationers' Company which controlled all publishing in England for quite some time. Today, for the first time, a middle class person can have a somewhat complete library at home, the epitome of that "home library" concept of the turn of the century, which saw the popularity of the first of the large encyclopedias and dictionaries. Many of you have been led to believe that the modern editions of these reflect a tradition for hundreds of years, but the truth is that even the oldest of these in fact don't predate 1900 by all that much in editions you would see a similarity in, as compared to the editions you see today, or even 50 years ago. Book popularity blossomed around 1900, as publishing was again begun in earnest, with many publishers printing their versions of the "home library." The difference today is that these "home libraries" now contain many thousands of books worth of information, and are on their way to the millions of books worth of information. The average CDROM holds the equivalent of a thousand books of information and even back before I had more than two CDROMs of my own, I saw collections with over 100, and which cost tens of thousands of dollars. These were targeted at libraries, and I must confess I have not attended any national ALA's since then, so I can't tell you if those sets have followed the same pricing structures most other CDROM's have, with data doubling while prices fall to half with each succeeding edition, as they have for a wide selection of CDROM's. The fact is that the price of a CDROM is now less than one dollar to a company producing them even in small quantities, and that with the average CDROM holding a billion characters or more [using compressed files] it would only take one thousand dollars to create copies of a million book library [without illustrations, at present]. Let's face it, at current prices, one average bookshelf full of sets of average books, is going to cost that much. [My shelves are four, or so, stacks high, and hold about 100 books. Counting half as hard and half as paper bindings, it is obviously going to be well over an estimated thousand dollars per bookshelf.] The problem is that not everyone thinks it is a good idea for all of the people to have a million books worth of information at home. Even many of the people who believe in having access to massive data files of information still believe that that information is the best when stored in central locations, though others argue that this will encourage the 1984 syndrome of rewriting history [which I do not see as a threat, even though it happens in paper publishing. Facts are, it is easier to find a rewrite in a computer file than in paper]. However, it would appear that the efforts to extend copyright are in some kind of coordination with the increases in publishing, and that the publishers have always wanted a monopoly on books and apparently on the information they contain, as well. I was warned about this: many years ago, and it was impossible for me to believe it then as I was too naive to even imagine such a thing, but my experiences since then have led me to reevaluate this. As I see it, the present efforts to extend copyright are a response, as were the others, to a comprehensive increase in the publications, proliferations and dissemination of information. In fact, sometimes this was true of the largest and most famous of libraries: in which many books are actually the copies that were consigned to burning by the censors, [or which were never actually published, or were once a published item, but were confiscated and burned, except for copies a confiscating agency kept itself]. And--rarely were all the books in question actually destroyed--thus leaving the best collections of an example of literature that was banned in the hands of those who sent the books to their destruction. The very fact that a million books now might cost a thousand dollars to produce on CDROM is probably what is motivating this move towards a longer and longer copyright. From no copyright we moved to guilds having a complete monopoly, to the 28 year copyright, to 28 plus 28, if renewed, to "author's life plus 50 years" which is now up for the extension to "author's life plus 70 years" at a time when illiteracy is rampant and books rarely stay in print for even 10 years. Just as the Printers' Guilds monopolized the printed words after the Gutenberg Press, so too did they extend their control each and every time the possibility of "unlimited literacy" arose, not only for the profit but also because "knowledge is power." We have seen these results through thousands of years of our history when knowledge is spread or confined. . .the choice is clear. . .are we the kind of people who want more "Golden Ages" or "Dark Ages." ===================================================== Thank you for your time and consideration, 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 or hart@vmd.cso.uiuc.edu COPYRIGHT 1993 PROF. MICHAEL S. HART, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED THIS MESSAGE MAY NOT BE COPIED WITHOUT WRITTEN PERMISSION *OTHER THAN TO REPLY TO THE AUTHOR OR TO THIS EMAIL LIST* PERMISSION EASILY AVAILABLE UPON REQUEST TO THIS ADDRESS. THIS MESSAGE IS A PRIVATE COMMUNICATION, INTENDED ONLY TO BE READ BY THE PEOPLE TO WHOM IT IS ADDRESSED. 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