Low Tech Gutenberg? 108
Peace Corps Guy asks: "I have a friend who recently left for a two year Peace Corps stint in Mozambique. While there she has limited access to electricity, no technology, and not a lot to do with her 'off' time. She's a big literature fan, and many of us here at home would like to send a care package - but how best to ship pieces of free online text like Project Gutenberg to a developing nation? We can print it (high shipping and printing costs), print it very small and ship her a high quality fresnel lens (awkward), or put it all on a cheap PDA, which would be a high theft risk en route and in situ. High shipping costs on weight and volume are another major limiting factor. What alternative solutions can Slashdot readers suggest for shipping a freely available byte-stream to someone without a computer?"
I am befuddled by your question (Score:2, Informative)
These "books" aren't that much heavier to ship than high quality fresnel lens or PDAs.
Re:Should have thought of this *before* she left (Score:1, Informative)
It's called "customs declaration" -- yes, I do label everything I send overseas.
PDA versus Microfiche? (Score:2, Informative)
Find out if the Peace Corps sends other people either to where she is doing her stint, or if someone will pass through. Send the PDA with them, and have her meet them at the airport. This won't solve the theft in situ problem, but she probably has quite a few personal possessions in that category already, so it is not like an unaddressed problem. At least if you get a PDA to her, shipping her bytes consists of just sending a flash media card in a letter.
She might not live near an Internet cafe, so printing out the material might not be feasible, or might be prohibitively expensive, depending on how much she wants to print out.
I think PDA-based solutions might even beat out microfiche at this time, which surprised me. It was difficult to find out how much Computer Output on Microform (COM) costs; closest page to prices [iu.edu] I could find seemed to imply that there is a $175 USD setup fee per run. This page [docudatasolutions.com] seems to imply a $0.02/page cost. Maybe the Canadian government agency price of $0.12 CAD per image [ca.gov] says I'm completely wrong, and if you can ship someone a TIFF file of the entire microfiche, they can turn around the microfiche to you for really dirt cheap. Or they might be talking about a TIFF image per page, and not per microfiche. I would be astonished if it was not priced per page, and really was $0.12 CAD per microfiche. If it was that cheap, then I would reconsider a PDA based solution if cheap microfiche readers can be found.
Oh, alright. Google is not all knowing. Curiosity got the better of me, so I broke down and called Microfacs [microfacs.com] and spoke with a nice guy named Rick. Minimum pricing is $0.05 USD per page, and they think 2,000 pages is a very small order. For that, the deal goes like this. You ship them single page TIFF images. You get about a week turnaround, and it is in the form of 16mm microfilm. If you want microfiche, that costs extra. I didn't ask, because $0.05 per page sounded like about the limit for the low budgets we are talking about; I'm guessing that $0.10 per page for microfiche. More expensive than a copy shop, but a heck of a lot cheaper to ship around I would imagine.
Recondtioned readers [icestorm.com] don't go below $130 USD, although some student projects [thinkcycle.org] seem to be aware of the advantages of shipping bulk human readable data around on microform (they are aming for a $20 USD reader, for example). There are handheld microfiche readers that use sunlight [cannondirect.com], but they cost about the same as a new low-end PDA, so you would still have in situ theft concerns. Used readers have $50 USD opening bids [ebay.com] on eBay in the here and now. This is all for microfiche readers; search around for 16mm format microfilm readers that are sunlight or battery capable (if she isn't around reliable electricity), though I'm not sure about the prudence of using for long periods of time any readers that you have to peer through optics.
It currently seems tough to beat the TCO combination of an eBay'd Palm, solar panel, and SD media if you are talking about shipping all of Project Gutenberg to her. Microform readers cost more than a cheap PDA, even used and reconditioned, and the reproduction costs can really swing the cost picture into the PDAs favor (even assuming a couple get stolen) when you start dealing with 10,000 pages (roughly the number of proofed Project Gutenberg pages) and up. If she is around re
Re:Should have thought of this *before* she left (Score:4, Informative)
Go buy a big Bible or other book but Bible has advantages. Make sure to look for something that is shrink wrapped. The One Year Bibles I believe come like that. You take and cut a spot in the middle of it for the PDA. Reshrink wrap it, get a cheap Royal brand type PDA, a cheap calculator or something and put em in the same box. Now you can etchically say misc small electronic devices and a bible. Ship it off and it should make it. The other 2 pieces might not, but hopefully the Bible will since in most countries people don't steal Bibles.
In addition, she can store the PDA in the Bible once she gets it which might be a way again to help keep it safe.
At least an idea of a way to do it, don't know if it will work.
Re:Don't be selfish! (Score:3, Informative)
Normal acid paper will be destroyed in a few years.
Unless you're using something like newsprint, they don't make acidic paper anymore [librarypreservation.org].
Granted, that doesn't mean that there aren't other possible issues, and while most paper today is acid-free, it's not generally buffered, so contact with acidic materials can still ``infect'' it. But most laser-printer and copy paper isn't going to fall apart due to acidification.
Bound Printed Matter (Score:2, Informative)