March 10, 2006

CNN.com - Bin Laden niece to star in reality show - Mar 10, 2006
NEW YORK (Reuters) — Osama bin Laden’s niece, an aspiring singer who posed for a sexy photo shoot in a men’s magazine last year, has signed up for a reality television show about her life and her as yet unfulfilled “quest for stardom.”

US to Osama: We can take our mindless anti-intellectual culture to a stupider extreme than you can take yours.

Official Google Blog: A real find
As a librarian and a Googler, I love the “Find it in a library” links we’ve added to many — but not yet all — of the titles in Google Book Search. While we work on getting these links rolled out for the rest of the books, at least one user has taken matters into his own hands: “Superpatron” Edward Vielmetti has written a Greasemonkey script for Firefox that enables him to see which books are available at his local library.

Since Google Book Search is all about helping you discover and locate books you never knew existed, it’s especially gratifying to see people [from Ann Arbor /wfz] like Ed embracing and extending this mission.

Cool. Not only can I see that the Ann Arbor District Library has a copy of the first book I published, I can also see that someone has it checked out right now!

Official Google Blog: Writely so
I’ve been part of a Silicon Valley startup called Upstartle, which makes Writely, a collaborative word processor that runs in a web browser. Well, as of Monday, I’m happy to say that I, and the rest of the Writely team,

Great idea. Does Writely open and save Word 97-2003 documents? If it doesn’t, this isn’t nearly as exciting.

Google has sent publishers an e-mail inviting them to dive into the Google Book Search system and start setting prices for on-line access. Unfortunately, there is a huge hole in the launch announcement..

Google Offers Online Pay Plan - 3/10/2006 - Publishers Weekly
In what it is calling the first in a suite of tools that will help publishers generate revenue from titles that are part of Google Book Search, Google has introduced a new program that gives houses the ability to sell access to their titles online. Under the initiative, publishers tell Google what books they want to offer unlimited access to to consumers and at what price. Google will then remove the restrictions which limit consumers’ view of a title, enabling them to view the book at parameters set by the house. Publishers can also decide if they will permit a book to be printed out.

“This will enable publishers to experiment with different pricing models,” said Jim Gerber, director of content partnerships. Consumers will have “perpetual access” to a book they buy, but they will not be able to download the title, Gerber said. Google and publishers will split the fee charged to consumers, with the majority of the payment going to publishers.

Unfortunately, without precise information about the fee sharing, it is impossible for publishers to set sensible prices! This lends the impression that Google has not perhaps thought this launch through very carefully.

Update: Scoop! GBS just wrote back to answer my question. The rate is 70% publisher, 30% GOOG.

The New York Times > Science > Image >

NASA’s Cassini spacecraft has spotted plumes of icy crystals shooting off Enceladus near its south pole, seen in this enhanced image. That suggests pockets of liquid water exist near the surface, and makes the moon a new target in the search for life in the solar system.