july05ff.indd


G a r y  P a t t i l l o  

Small town papers 
A new Web site provides Internet access to a searchable image archive of printed 
newspapers from small towns across the United States. There are currently 43 
titles representing 16 states plus Antigua. The pages of the newspapers are pre­
sented as fully searchable and indexed PDF files. The company creates digital 
images of the newspaper archives at no cost to publishers. The site currently 
contains about 150,000 pages of newspaper archives dating back to 1889. 
www.smalltownpapers.com/. June 3, 2005 

Spam zombies 
The Federal Trade Commission, in conjunction with 35 government agencies 
from 20 countries, launched “Operation Spam Zombies”—an effort to educate 
Internet service providers about hijacked, or “zombie,” computers on their net­
works. “Spammers and hackers use zombies to send unsolicited commercial 
E­mail, distribute malware, store illegal files, and conduct denial­of­service at­
tacks without the owners’ knowledge or consent.” Experts estimate that 50 to 
90 percent of spam originates from compromised PCs. 
Thomas Claburn. “FTC Launches International Campaign Against Zombies,” InformationWeek, May 24, 2005 www. 
informationweek.com/story/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=163700686. June 3, 2005 

First Amendment education 
A new study indicates that many high school students do not fully understand 
their First Amendment rights. Among students who have taken courses dealing 
with the media or the First Amendment, 87 percent believe people should be 
allowed to express unpopular opinions. Among students who have not taken 
such courses, that number fell to 68 percent. More than one­third think the First 
Amendment goes too far in the rights it guarantees. 
The John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, Survey Finds First Amendment Is Being Left Behind in U.S. High Schools, 
January 31, 2005. www.knightfdn.org/default.asp?story=news_at_knight/releases/2005/2005_01_31_fi rstamend.html 

Amazon’s reference tools 

lib.unc.edu 

C&RL News July/August 2005  560 

Gary Pattillo is reference librarian at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill, e-mail: pattillo@refstaff. 

Amazon.com’s “search inside the book” function now provides some new refer­
ence tools. When you mouse over the cover image of selected books, you can 
see additional information about the books, including a concordance of 
the 100 most frequently used words in the books, citations to and from the 
books, and text statistics, such as readability and complexity. 
Gary Price, Going Under Cover with Book Search Tools, Search Engine Watch, May 4, 2005. searchenginewatch.com/ 
searchday/article.php/3502416 

Book publishing 
U.S. publishing output in 2004 increased by 14 percent to 195,000 new titles 
and editions. Adult fiction accounted for the largest increase in growth, rising 
43 percent to 25,184 new titles. Adult fiction represents 14 percent of all titles 
published in the Unites States. University presses increased their title output 12 
percent to 14,484 new titles and editions. There were 11,458 new publishers 
registered with the U.S. ISBN Agency in 2004, an increase of 5.3 percent over 
2003. 
U.S. Book Production Reaches New High of 195,000 Titles in 2004. Bowker, May 24, 2005. www.bowker.com/press 
/bowker/2005_0524_bowker.htm June 6, 2005 

http:lib.unc.edu
www.knightfdn.org/default.asp?story=news_at_knight/releases/2005/2005_01_31_fi
http:www.smalltownpapers.com