#Crystals And Minerals 3
28 messages in this thread
Nathon,
I just received a postcard from Myrddin Emrys Limited. There was no news about
our books, but it invited me to their stand at the Willamette Valley Gem and
Mineral show in Canby, OR this weekend. I think I'll stroll by (with the
cancelled check in my pocket) and inquire about the whereabouts of the books.
Wish me luck…
Guy
Good luck,
I forgot to ask Jon about volume three, but rumors are it is printed yet.
Lanny
Hi, Lanny
> I forgot to ask Jon about volume three, but rumors are it is printed yet.
It is, or It is not? <g> I would guess that if it has been printed, by now I
would have one. I'm going to give him the opportunity to BS me into waiting a
bit longer. If he fails, I get a refund or a free (nice) mineral specimen. <g>
Guy
Tat was supposed to be an "isn't".
By the way, Mr. Lapidary, just before I flattened those two tires, I was up a
couple creeks (it was some day) checking out reported agate localities for
locations for Vol. 2 of the Idaho guide. Didn't find enough to direct people
too, but in a road, did find three nice pieces of blue banded agate, one was
about 2 inches thick and 4 x 5 inches. Quite nice.
Lanny
Guy,
Let me know what you find out at the Willametter Gem fair. I tried the 800
number you gave me for Myrddin Emrys ltd., but got an answering maching.
Although I left an 800 number for the reply, none ever came>
I will have to find the money order receipt and file suit in small claims
court. 🙂
Nathan
Hi, Nathan
I elected not to go to the show today as it was raining cats and dogs, and the
best part of this show is the mineral 'flea market' in the large field next to
the fair grounds. I plan on attending Monday as a high pressure ridge is
developing and the forecast is for sunny skys with highs around 80'. Good
thing – I just discovered that my furnace is not working (again…). 🙁
I'll let you know what I find out. If Gladwell isn't at this show Monday,
there is another show (Gresham) later this month that he has always attended
in the past. If that fails, there is always the Cascade of Gems show in
October.
Guy
Hi, Nathan
> I will have to find the money order receipt and file suit in small claims
> court. 🙂
I just talked to Jon about the book. It seems that Vol. III of Crystals and
Minerals will not be published. The printer inverted one entire section, and
transposed several captions. Jon refused delivery, and the printer refused to
return his money. Jon cheerfully wrote me a refund check on the spot. When I
mentioned that I knew someone in NJ that had ordered a copy, he interjected
"would that be Nathan Schachtman?" He has not cashed your money order – it's
in his refund to-do file.
Doug, if you're listening, could you delete crymin.txt from lib 12? Or if I
can do it could you let me know how? No point in making Jon's refund to-do
pile any deeper.
Thanks, Guy
Hi, Guy–
I do not have special library privileges. I will pass the request to those
who do. For future reference, I do not know how it would be done with OzCIS,
but in CIM it is easy; when you call up an abstract, there is a "Delete" button
which only works for the uploader or a privileged sysop.
–Doug
> when you call up an abstract, there is a "Delete" button which only works
> for the uploader or a privileged sysop.
O.K. I'll check that out and report back.
>> when you call up an abstract, there is a "Delete" button which only works
>> for the uploader or a privileged sysop.
> O.K. I'll check that out and report back.
Doug,
I found a 'kill' option available while viewing the abstract, but I believe
that it only removed the entry from my local db. I could find no evidence that
it deleted anything after I had gone on-line again. I guess it's time to
(GASP) read the documentation.
Thanks, Guy
Hi, Guy–
I went in to clean out some old RM*.ARC files and saw no "Kill" button using
DOS CIM 2.13 – I browsed geology, highlighted a file, hit [Enter] and got a
short description, then hit the "Abstract" button for a longer one, which had a
"Delete" button, the method I have often used with good results before. I do
not recall checking existence soon after, but by the following day a short
library scan by OzCIS would not see the deleted files.
–Doug
Hi, Doug
> I went in to clean out some old RM*.ARC files and saw no "Kill" button using
> DOS CIM 2.13
Not to worry – the 'kill' button is in the new OzCis. I'll run a short scan
this pass – if crymin.txt is still there, I'll see about cleaning up with DOS
CIM.
Thanks, Guy
Guy,
Thanks for tweaking Jon about the refunds. Frankly, I would have preferred
the book. Perhaps we can help him publish it electronically and disseminate it
by file attached to email?
Nathan
Hi, Nathon
> Perhaps we can help him publish it electronically and disseminate it by file
> attached to email?
That's not a bad idea! If Jon shows at the Gresham, OR show this weekend, I'll
ask, though I'm not sure this medium is mature enough yet for a book that is
focused on such a small local area. I only know one other rockhound in the
greater Portland, OR metropolitan area that has a CI$ account, (my boss) and I
haven't been able to talk him into getting active in this forum. Michael and
Lanny might be interested, but we're still only up to 5 customers. Of course
if we forwarded the news of the availability of the book on to the internet
all bets could be off. Unfortunately I couldn't afford the mail bucks to
attach a copy of a book to all of the folks there. By the time the photos were
digitized it could be a _hefty_ attachment. <g>
Thanks, Guy
Hi, Guy–
While I have not tried it yet, there might be a library associated with the
Internet newsgroup sci.geo.geology, where the book might be posted. If not,
some university can probably be induced to post it for anonymous FTP, and
people could be informed of the address via the rocks-and-fossils mail list.
If there are not that many potential customers on-line yet, making the book
available could help draw more rockhounds on-line. Several such books
available only via on-line access might be the key to luring them on-line
wholesale.
It is a pity we networked rockhounds are not yet numerous enough to casually
organize write-in campaigns that might convince the publishers not to give up
on a particularly interesting book.
–Doug
Some of us in the publishing business are also trying to get them to not give
up on having short run books published the old fashioned way-using ground up
tree parts in thin sheets.
In fact, at this time, I am working with three individuals with four books of
which I am sure at least two of them will make it to press in a year or less.
But, the limited market for all "rockhound" related books is a problem. They
still cost a lot to print. If we did things right, we could get some that would
otherwise never be printed available on-line. I like the paper kind (easy to
carry, accessible in the field, etc.), but "publishing" on-line is definitely a
much cheaper method to make the written word available to all interested.
The problem is not just to those who write something for a smal local audience.
The new updated guide of Colorado Minerals has been in the works for nearly two
decades and keeps getting put off year after year. The big problem now
(according to the unofficial word and rumors I hear) is the publishing cost,
and this book will probably have a bigger market than anything I've ever
published!
Lanny
Lanny,
There are still some advantages for on-line publishing or even distribution
via disk rather than hard copy.
First, You could print out just those pages needed for a days trip. No more
soiled gyuidebooks. Now that just about *everyone* has a laptop, the whole book
could be accessed on the portable computer, anyway.
All right, try this one. The savings in paper and printing costs would mean
lower product prices, and more profit for author and publisher. Now that's a
reason to give up paper book publishing; no?
Narthan
Hi, Nathon
Due to an illness in the family, I was was unable to attend the Gresham
mineral show and talk to Jon about electronic distribution of his book. 🙁
Just as well, I suppose, as I'm not quite sure how to approach the subject.
Jon (and Lanny) as authors would like some compensation for their work – how
best to approach this? Go with the shareware concept – I.E. if you like my book
send me 10 bucks, if not give it to someone that might like it? A book with a
lot of illustrations could add up to an expensive download, even at 14.4 kbps.
Perhaps CI$ could be persuaded to pay authors royalties based on total
download/connect fees racked up by the subscribers? I believe that the forum
Sysops (not the volunteer assistants like Doug) get paid this way. Suggestions
anybody??
Thanks, Guy
P.S. One more thought – go with shareware idea of letting anyone download an
abridged sample of the book. Registration gets you a diskette (s) of the full
book?
Hi, Guy–
That author/CIS arrangement sounds interesting. There would still be the
honor system for shareware as regards passing diskettes to others after
downloading, but this sounds like the easiest way to pay the shareware fee. I
wonder if CIS is working on this for general subject on-line publishing?
–Doug P.S., David Staska is back on the Internet, see RM0030.ARC.
> P.S., David Staska is back on the Internet, see RM0030.ARC.
Thanks for the reminder Doug. I'm behind on the RM*.ARC series, I'll check it
out.
Thanks, Guy
Guy::
Just for your information … the primary SYSOPS do indeed get paid a "royalty"
… however, since I run this forum via a long distance phone connect … my
phone bill is usually more than my royalty!
Rick Needham/SYSOP
Hi, Rick
> the primary SYSOPS do indeed get paid a "royalty"
I thought so – seems to me I got trounced rather thoroughly several years ago
when I campaigned to get more of the forum areas in the 'free' ($8.95/month)
part os CIS. 🙂
> however, since I run this forum via a long distance phone connect … my
> phone bill is usually more than my royalty!
I hear you – I'm about a mile northwest of the Portland, OR metro area connect
zone. Might as well be in the next state. <g>
Cheers, Guy
Hi, Lanny–
I often want my books both ways, on paper and in my computer. Each has
certain virtues, though one day computers may get to where the advantages of
paper are minimal. Durable (even in the field), flat, higher-resolution,
wireless networked, calculator-cheap computers ought to do it if they are
possible.
If rockhound books are costly to print due to a small audience, at present they
may have little impact via cheap on-line publishing just because too few
rockhounds are into computers. We need a few to take the chance early in order
to draw those rockhounds on-line, in hope the "revolution" will come soon
enough to feed the authors. Once most are on-line, there should be more
rockhound reading material than ever before.
–Doug
To Doug, Nathan, and Guy,
That all sounds good and are definitely good ideas. The problem is primarily
still that *everyone* does not acatually have a laptop, in fact nowheres near
enough rockhounds/collectors seem to be regular users of computers (as judged
by my contacts at the major shows, and my attempts to get articles via disk or
online instead of paper copies I need to retype).
Even if there were enough rockhound computers out there, there is the problem
of getting people to pay the shareware fee. Apparently the statistics are
rather dismal for software, and probably would be for books. Guy's suggestion
of having some sort of abridged version online/downloadable and getting the
full version on disk when the fee is paid would be good. In fact I will
consider testing the idea.
Definitely, it would be so much cheaper to produce a book on disk/online.
Although the download fee could be high for a book of any lenght, especially
with photos. Disk yes, could get a lot of text on a text and quite a lot of B&W
illustrations (and compacted color?). A CD-ROM would of course make almost
anything possible. The cost of publishing a book on disk would be cheap, real
cheap. In fact, the actual "publishing" cost would be nearly zero.
Generally, personally, I am not sold on having most books on disc (I have a
small sampling of CD-ROMs now and find them only handy for the amount of color
photos and for extensive data, not convenient as a book).
Also, I stopped uploading the Mineral News to CIS and have not heard from
anyone asking "where are they?" Did anyone even notice? Did anyone even read
the first three?
Jon Gladwell will probably be a dealer at the FM Symposium in Tacoma, WA in a
week and a half from now. I will ask him his thoughts and suggest that he
consider uploading Vol. 3 of his guide. BTW he is on AOL now, so he does have a
modem.
Lanny
These days, there are products like Adobe Acrobat that make it easy and
convenient to take any generic PostScript output from a word processor or DTP
program and turn it into a portable yet electronic and cosmetically identical
format, viewed through inexpensive programs. (Adobe sells or even sometimes
gives away both the Acrobat Distiller and the Viewer for the PC and Mac,
bundled with Illustrator, for example.)
Acrobat definietly would be useful for such a product. I shall look in to
planning/preparing for such things. For now, I shall prepare and upload
condensed text (the basics, not all the info and not the maps and photos) for a
coupled guidebooks. Interesting to see what happens with them.
Lanny
Hi, Lanny–
CD ROMs also may somewhat discourage piracy. If the CD is full of interesting
stuff, one cannot easily transfer it all to another system without swamping it.
Getting together several different authors, all on similar subjects, to fill up
a CD might do it. But sooner or later writeable media will catch up in
capacity again…
If CD-ROMs are not as competitive with books as they might be, it is still a
very young medium. They probably do not make it as easy as they might to do
tricks no book can match, like letting you search the whole book or collection
for a certain wild-carding text string. I am not aware that many make use of
hypertext, which if fully realized should make references immensely more
powerful than a book can be.
It will take me days to add the data from Manuel Robbins' new book into my
LOCALES database of fluorescent mineral sites, and I do not know when I will
have the time. But had I received an electronic copy, revising the info into
database form would take hours instead of days, and be much more accurate as
well.
I certainly did notice that you stopped uploading Mineral News issues. I did
not remark it because I was glad enough that some were in the library, enough
to give someone the flavor of it, and did not wish to appear ungrateful.
Receiving the paper copies is sufficient, but I will miss being able to add
more of your issues to the broadened fishing-for-key-words searches I expect to
be practical when I get a new desktop with removable hard drive, and can set up
a minerals-only hard disk.
–Doug
CD-ROMS definitely are the way to go for references and other books. I have
been teasing readers of the MN with the idea of a photo encyclopedia of
minerals and CD-ROM is the only way to do it so that it wouldn't weigh 100
pounds and cost $1,000! But, it still takes a lot of money to actually do it. I
thing WW at Min Rec is also toying with the idea.
Actually, the only reason I haven't uploaded the last few MNs are I have been
too busy traveling/collecting and doing my work. Just haven't taken the time to
prepare them, do have the April issue about ready, and now that I am stuck home
with the coming winter, I will get them all done. Actually not stuck yet, still
have the FM Symposium in Tacoma next weekend, the Montana Mineral Collector's
Rendezvous the weekend after, a week-long trip to the Thomas Range the week
after that probably a couple days helping develop that Montana natrolite
locality after that, then the NW Micro mineral study group meeting the first
weekend of November, then stuck at home till spring.
Lanny