Hessenthal and Schreiber book

[Paul C]

I hope it is OK to do a little market research here. As most of you know I have been putting ranklists and research material on CD. My first three CDs have done fairly well and include ranklists from 1900 forward plus the 1908/09 DOA.

For my next endeavor I am considering putting the Dr. von Hessenthal and Schreiber book "Die Ehrenzeichen des Deutschen Reiches" on CD. If you have been collecting Imperial German for any length of time you will know how valuable this book is. I think an original book from 1940 sells in excess of 200 euros.

My question is would you be willing to pay 25 euros for this book on CD in Adobe PDF format? Understand I am not asking you to buy it I am just asking your opinion if it is a viable project for me. Please do not hesitate to give your opinion. If enough people say yes I will go forward. If enough people say no I will not.

Thanks in advance.

[Les]

I hope it is OK to do a little market research here. As most of you know I have been putting ranklists and research material on CD. My first three CDs have done fairly well and include ranklists from 1900 forward plus the 1908/09 DOA.

For my next endeavor I am considering putting the Dr. von Hessenthal and Schreiber book "Die Ehrenzeichen des Deutschen Reiches" on CD. If you have been collecting Imperial German for any length of time you will know how valuable this book is. I think an original book from 1940 sells in excess of 200 euros.

My question is would you be willing to pay 25 euros for this book on CD in Adobe PDF format? Understand I am not asking you to buy it I am just asking your opinion if it is a viable project for me. Please do not hesitate to give your opinion. If enough people say yes I will go forward. If enough people say no I will not.

Thanks in advance.

Paul,

Yes, I'd be interested. By the way, speaking of books on a pdf format, I'll be sending you an email about ordering a copy of volume 2.

Les

[joe campbell]

if we could avoid euros ,

i'd be interested.

joe

[JensF.]

Actually the reprint will cost you min. 200 Euros. The original book from 1940 is around 1200 Euros if you find one.

[Ed_Haynes]

Reprint?

How about ?18.00?

http://www.naval-military-press.com/FMPro?...ameset.htm&-new

[Paul C]

I checked it out. It is one book at 18 English pounds which is $36 and at least $15. for shipping, total $51. My CD would be 1/2 as much.

[Ed_Haynes]

I checked it out. It is one book at 18 English pounds which is $36 and at least $15. for shipping, total $51. My CD would be 1/2 as much.

Yes, I'm not saying at all that your offering was a bad deal. It is just that if people preferred a paper reprint of H&S -- and some do -- the price wasn't anything near to EUR 200, as had been quoted. In fact, a quick search on abebooks shows a large number of even cheaper copies, including originals at WAY under EUR 1200! Try approx. EUR 500 for an original edition.

While I don't mind books on CD-ROM, some have an issue with it. But at least, unlike some cheaper reprints, the pages don't fall out of a CD.

[Claudius]

My vote is for the H&S on a CD.

Thanks Cherpurko

[Wild Card]

Hi Paul,

Sounds like a good idea; but I would caution you to check out the copyright implications with regard to the reprint.

Best wishes,

Wild Card

[Tom Y]

Hi Paul,

Sounds like a good idea; but I would caution you to check out the copyright implications with regard to the reprint.

Best wishes,

Wild Card

I just checked my Naval & Military Press copy and there's nothing mentioned about copyright. Better safe than sorry, though.

[Ulsterman]

I suspect that H&S copyright is held by somebody in Germany; there was a reprint done there about 15 years ago and that will lead to real problems if done illegally. I think Orden-der-Welt will know who holds the present copyright as Hessenthal hasn't been dead for the time limit yet anyway to make it publically owned (life of writer + 80 years?).

Edited May 10, 2006 by Ulsterman

[Ed_Haynes]

I know that the late Dr. K long asserted that HE AND ONLY HE held the copyright on this. But, then, the dear old gent asserted many things . . . .

So far as I know, no one has sued the N&MP boys. And they have reprinted many things, including things more problematic than H&S. (Though you need to take care, for you may not live long enough for them to fulfill your order -- months and months!)

[notned]

Paul,

You can count me in for a copy!

Regards

Paul D

[Bob Hunter]

Paul C. you do not have permission to use my photo as your avatar. It is a violation of my agreement with the federal witness protection program people.

[notned]

Yeah! i thought i recognised that ugly mug somewhere! ...

[Paul C]

Actually I had another thought. I wonder how a English translated copy of the book would sell. If I did it in paperback, said it was based on H&S's book and changed a few works I would not have to worry about copyrights. I could sell the book for maybe $50. Opinions?

Edited May 11, 2006 by Paul C

[Tim Tezer]

If you translated it AND obtained photos of bonafide originals of as many pieces as possible (none of this "that will have to do as a filler photo" attitude that some authors fall into), then we would have your bronzed image placed in the Pantheon of medals authors. You might not actually make any money, but we'd love you for it anyway.

Tim

Edited May 11, 2006 by Tim Tezer

[Paul C]

Tim, Actually at the end of the book is about 10-15 pages of pictures. Since they were not makeing fakes in 1940 the images should be good. Maybe as a teaser I will post a page tonight.

[Les]

If you translated it AND obtained photos of bonafide originals of as many pieces as possible (none of this "that will have to do as a filler photo" attitude that some authors fall into), then we would have your bronzed image placed in the Pantheon of medals authors. You might not actually make any money, but we'd love you for it anyway.

Tim

I like the idea of including -additional- photos of bonafide originals, or at least better photos of some of the fuzzier or less clear examples in "H & S.". Perhaps some of the forum members would agree to let Paul use some of their photos as a start?

Les

[Guest Rick Research]

Ha! As the owner of the only known print of Oberstleutnant Chuckles (merci bien Fran?ois! ) I have "asserted" as they say control of copyright and "licensed" Paul to use it as his avatar.

With the royalty income, I will now be able to make the monthly payments on the portable iron lung for my cat, Mister Snuggles.

I have always resisted computo-anything versions over Real Books, based largely on my own medieval inclinations and such not really rational "arguments" as being able to lug around a book and read it anywhere, rather than being chained to a power source.

But I'll tell you, having seen Paul's CDs, and having printed out a clean white copy well larger than original size of the 1903 Bavarian Rank List (as an example of what can be done) not ONLY is a CD version easier to see (a problem for me with my vision), cleaner to handle (no more food smears ), and more likely to "flip" all pages without having two original's pages stick together but

after the 20+++ years that I have been using some of my now almost century old books---

the originals are literally wearing out. Books made to be replaced a year later are not meant for the ages... but I was actually hoping for my lifetime. Now maybe CD/computer technology will be completely different 20 years from now, and books will ALWAYS be readable as books...

but the price of a REPLACEMENT CD 20 years from now is still going to be orders of magnitude cheaper than the ever rarer original books.

[JBFloyd]

A translation would still require permission of the copyright holder, who would maintain rights to control derivitive works. You would have to make substantive changes to get around that, it which point it would no longer be a translation of H&S, but a new work. If Kleitmann owned sole copyright to H&S, that would pass to his heirs.

Under US copyright law, works published between 1922 and 1963 (as was H&S) were copyrighted for 28 years from the date of publication. If the copyright was renewed, the term extended for an additional 67 years.

To determine the precise status of the copyright would require some work in Germany to see it the original was ever extended.

All of this is why Military & Naval Press never bothered with checking.

With all of that said, I'm still a book person. It's far easier to use a book, where you can flip among multiple pages; don't have to have a power source; etc. I have a hundred or so US WWI unit histories on CD, and I use none of them regularly (at most, maybe 2-3/year). CDs work better for searchable data.

[Wild Card]

Gentlemen,

For the record, Rick has stated my sentiments exactly. At the same time I want to make it clear that I am speaking of the proposal as outlined in post #16. However, once you get into additional pictures (posts #17 & #19), you begin to approach another Magnum Opus/Nimmergut.

As an aside, I would like to point out that there is a reason for the rather strange pictures of the medals in H&S. What you are looking at are not the medals themselves but clay or plaster (I forget which) copies which were made to eliminate light reflection problems and show better detail when being photographed.

Best wishes,

Wild Card

[Paul C]

Wild Card, a very interesting point about the clay casting. The attached pic seems to bear that out. It seems like do a translation or a re-print of the H&S book will create more headaches then it is worth. I think the best alternative is to do a CD copy. I just have to determine if it makes financial sense to do it.

[medalnet]

...CDs work better for searchable data.

Jeff,

I totaly agree with this statement. The Ranklist are fine on CD. They would be better as searchable data base, but regular books on CD - not for me.

Andreas

[Paul C]

While I totally agree that a CD can not replace a book, I have to state that the cost of a ranklist library is very expensive. The Navy Honor Ranklist only sells for over 200 euros. Some of the Saxon and Bayern ranklists are darn near impossible to find. I have been very luckly over the last 2 years to have acquired most of my library. I would estimate that to buy a research library for WWI German Army and Navy Officers would exceed $2000. This is the main reason I have done the ranklists on CD.

As we all know that typeset of the ranklists is old German fractur (I am sure I did not spell that correctly). Due to this fact it is not possible to scan a ranklist into Adobe PDF format and have it searchable. The technology is not there. If it was I would do it. The sales of my ranklists on CD have been OK but not to the level that I had hoped. Volume 1 did rather well but the DOA and Volume 2 sales are very slow. Due to this fact I may not proceed with my next step which was to develop a website that would offer ranklists individually. For example you would be able to order on CD just a 1890 Prussian Army Ranklist or a 1851 Saxon Army Ranklist. The cost per ranklist would start at 20 euros.

I think part of the problem is that there are not many researchers. I must thank everyone that has supported my project!!! I greatly appreciate your orders. Please provide any feedback on what you would like to see next from Ranklist on CD.