Scribd is becoming a force to be reckoned with on the Internet.
At ScribdBlog in their posting What ever happened to Fact Checking?, the Scribd Team goes one on one with the Times of London on copyright issues relating to Scribd, involving such famous novelists as J.K. Rowling, Ken Follett, Nick Hornby and John Grisham, who has the current Number 3 Bestseller on the New York Times list of hardcover fiction with his book, of all things, called The Associate, which Patrick Anderson of the The Washington Post calls "A DEVASTATING PORTRAIT OF THE BIG-TIME, BIG-BUCKS LEGAL WORLD."
We were gratified (but of course "legally shocked") at the Times of London article which incurred Scribd's wrath to learn that immensely popular and writingly gifted novelist Ken Follett's World without End (a New York Times No. 1 bestseller) had been uploaded to Scribd and had been viewed 500 times in five months.
We recently uploaded some of our own published works to Scribd. After only one month we have more than 500 views of two of our documents:
The Norse Pharaohs: Astronomical Decipherments re Tanum Hierakonpolis Nazca Sahara Near East DOC
The Origin of the Cult of Horus in Predynastic Egypt DOC
We are strongly considering entry into the publishing field with a novel of our own. Ken Follett and cohorts, look out, there is competition on the way!
Tuesday, March 31, 2009
Tuesday, March 24, 2009
Europeana : Digital Library and Museum Cooperation : The European Union EU Cultural Resource Project with 4 Million Digital Items is Relaunched
We were informed by email today that Europeana, the digital cultural resource project of the European Union, currently presenting access to over 4 million digital items at museums and libraries throughout the EU, has relaunched again after a problematic start in November.
Europeana explains what it is about, and provides to us a list of the partner organizations that make materials available to Europeana.
That same "about us" page provides us with an overview of Europeana as follows:
"The [European] Commission has been working for a number of years on projects to boost the digital economy. These prepared the ground for an online service that would bring together Europe's cultural heritage.
Europeana explains what it is about, and provides to us a list of the partner organizations that make materials available to Europeana.
That same "about us" page provides us with an overview of Europeana as follows:
"The [European] Commission has been working for a number of years on projects to boost the digital economy. These prepared the ground for an online service that would bring together Europe's cultural heritage.
The idea for Europeana came from a letter to the Presidency of Council and to the Commission on 28 April 2005. Six Heads of State and Government suggested the creation of a virtual European library, aiming to make Europe's cultural and scientific resources accessible for all.
On 30 September 2005 the European Commission published the i2010: communication on digital libraries, where it announced its strategy to promote and support the creation of a European digital library, as a strategic goal within the European Information Society i2010 Initiative, which aims to foster growth and jobs in the information society and media industries. The European Commission's goal for Europeana is to make European information resources easier to use in an online environment. It will build on Europe's rich heritage, combining multicultural and multilingual environments with technological advances and new business models.
The Europeana prototype is the result of a 2-year project that began in July 2007. Europeana.eu went live on 20 November 2008, launched by Viviane Reding, European Commissioner for Information Society and Media.
Europeana is a Thematic Network funded by the European Commission under the eContentplus programme, as part of the i2010 policy. Originally known as the European digital library network – EDLnet – it is a partnership of 100 representatives of heritage and knowledge organisations and IT experts from throughout Europe. They contribute to the Work Packages that are solving the technical and usability issues.
The project is run by a core team based in the national library of the Netherlands, the Koninklijke Bibliotheek. It builds on the project management and technical expertise developed by The European Library, which is a service of the Conference of European National Librarians.
Overseeing the project is the EDL Foundation, which includes key European cultural heritage associations from the four domains. The Foundation’s statutes commit members to:
- Providing access to Europe’s cultural and scientific heritage though a cross-domain portal
- Co-operating in the delivery and sustainability of the joint portal
- Stimulating initiatives to bring together existing digital content
- Supporting digitisation of Europe’s cultural and scientific heritage"
Friday, March 20, 2009
Dictionary of Business, Commerce and Finance English-German German-English by Langenscheidt published via licence agreement with Routledge Ltd London
The definitive two-way Langenscheidt Dictionary of Business, Commerce and Finance (German-English English-German), now in its 3rd edition and published by license agreement with Routledge Ltd, London ("licence" in the UK) , and of which I am one of four co-authors, has a new link in English here, and I have changed the corresponding links on the LawPundit website which previously led only to the German-language page at Langenscheidt.
One reason that I am making this posting is that a random search of some library catalogues online indicates that there are still many libraries that do not have this essential resource, and if they do have it, they often have the totally outdated original 1997/1998 version which has been totally revised by us in the interim, and this includes the deletion of outdated entries. Even the Harvard Library has only the substantially improved 2002/2003 edition, but this runs only 1206 pages as compared to the 1440 page 2007/2008 edition. (Publication years vary because of CD-ROM versions etc.)
Especially in our contemporary fast-moving era of digital technology, five years of development are often like fifty or a hundred years only a decade ago. For example, SMS "texting" only really started in 1999, when SMS messages could first be sent between networks. The first BlackBerry integrating a cell phone was introduced in 2001. (A "cell phone", by the way, is called a "mobile phone" in the UK and a "Handy" in Germany - go figure). The current 3G mobile phone system, without which modern mobile phones could not do what they do, took off only in 2004.
The speed of change is shown by the development of online social networking. The social online network Friendster and also Plaxo Contacts were launched in 2002 and followed by MySpace (see U.S. President Obama's MySpace) and also the social business network LinkedIn in 2003, with the now most popular Facebook launched in 2004 and opened to the general public only in 2006. Twitter took off in 2007 and even U.S. President Obama used it before his inauguration in 2009. Tremendous changes as a result are taking place in the way social and business relationships are taking place - in the shortest span of time. In order not be overwhelmed, one has to keep up.
In a multilingual context, it is absolutely indispensable to have the most recent editions of state-of-the-art dictionaries, and believe you me, even we have trouble keeping up.
The German title of our English-German German-English Dictionary of Business, Commerce and Finance is Fachwörterbuch Wirtschaft Handel und Finanzen Deutsch-Englisch Englisch-Deutsch.
This dictionary is intended to be a comprehensive, up-to-date standard work and reference for business and legal professionals, for companies and institutions involved with Germany in business, commercial, financial and political affairs, as well as for specialist translators. Special attention has been paid to the integration of entries dealing with digital technology and the European Union. The 3rd edition now contains approximately 136,000 entries and updates are made annually to the CD-ROM version of the dictionary, which is fully searchable from one's desktop. New entries derive inter alia from personal experience and also the reading of cutting edge literature in the respective fields and that is why this dictionary is always one step ahead of the competition.
The Appendix contains business correspondence and documents, job titles used in commerce and management, International Standard Classification of Occupations, financial and economic indicators, cardinal and ordinal numbers, a list of countries, statistical classification of economic activities in the European Community (NACE), and Incoterms 2000.
For the librarians in our readership: the entry for the main library catalogue in German is found at the DNB (Deutsche Nationalbibliothek, German National Library).
Otherwise, I have put up the essential library data at Good Reads, and it can also be found at Langenscheidt.
Dictionaries are not archives but living, useful, often daily consulted documents. Put this dictionary on your desk, on your active shelf, or, if you are a library, in your reading room. Much of what you don't find online for English-German or German-English translations, is in this volume. Not everything .... but we are constantly working on it.
Mirrored at LawPundit.
One reason that I am making this posting is that a random search of some library catalogues online indicates that there are still many libraries that do not have this essential resource, and if they do have it, they often have the totally outdated original 1997/1998 version which has been totally revised by us in the interim, and this includes the deletion of outdated entries. Even the Harvard Library has only the substantially improved 2002/2003 edition, but this runs only 1206 pages as compared to the 1440 page 2007/2008 edition. (Publication years vary because of CD-ROM versions etc.)
Especially in our contemporary fast-moving era of digital technology, five years of development are often like fifty or a hundred years only a decade ago. For example, SMS "texting" only really started in 1999, when SMS messages could first be sent between networks. The first BlackBerry integrating a cell phone was introduced in 2001. (A "cell phone", by the way, is called a "mobile phone" in the UK and a "Handy" in Germany - go figure). The current 3G mobile phone system, without which modern mobile phones could not do what they do, took off only in 2004.
The speed of change is shown by the development of online social networking. The social online network Friendster and also Plaxo Contacts were launched in 2002 and followed by MySpace (see U.S. President Obama's MySpace) and also the social business network LinkedIn in 2003, with the now most popular Facebook launched in 2004 and opened to the general public only in 2006. Twitter took off in 2007 and even U.S. President Obama used it before his inauguration in 2009. Tremendous changes as a result are taking place in the way social and business relationships are taking place - in the shortest span of time. In order not be overwhelmed, one has to keep up.
In a multilingual context, it is absolutely indispensable to have the most recent editions of state-of-the-art dictionaries, and believe you me, even we have trouble keeping up.
The German title of our English-German German-English Dictionary of Business, Commerce and Finance is Fachwörterbuch Wirtschaft Handel und Finanzen Deutsch-Englisch Englisch-Deutsch.
This dictionary is intended to be a comprehensive, up-to-date standard work and reference for business and legal professionals, for companies and institutions involved with Germany in business, commercial, financial and political affairs, as well as for specialist translators. Special attention has been paid to the integration of entries dealing with digital technology and the European Union. The 3rd edition now contains approximately 136,000 entries and updates are made annually to the CD-ROM version of the dictionary, which is fully searchable from one's desktop. New entries derive inter alia from personal experience and also the reading of cutting edge literature in the respective fields and that is why this dictionary is always one step ahead of the competition.
- The chief author/editor is: Ludwig Merz (professional translator and university Lecturer in economics and business administration)
- Andis Kaulins (J.D. Stanford University Law School, former Lecturer in Anglo-American Law, University of Trier Law School)
- Dr. Heinz Werner (economist, German Federal Employment Services), see also his Unemployment Compensation Systems - A Cross-Country Comparison -
- John M. Hill (former Director, Language Department, German Bundesbank), up to and including the 2nd edition
The Appendix contains business correspondence and documents, job titles used in commerce and management, International Standard Classification of Occupations, financial and economic indicators, cardinal and ordinal numbers, a list of countries, statistical classification of economic activities in the European Community (NACE), and Incoterms 2000.
For the librarians in our readership: the entry for the main library catalogue in German is found at the DNB (Deutsche Nationalbibliothek, German National Library).
Otherwise, I have put up the essential library data at Good Reads, and it can also be found at Langenscheidt.
Dictionaries are not archives but living, useful, often daily consulted documents. Put this dictionary on your desk, on your active shelf, or, if you are a library, in your reading room. Much of what you don't find online for English-German or German-English translations, is in this volume. Not everything .... but we are constantly working on it.
Mirrored at LawPundit.
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