However, as of last writing I had not yet had the opportunity to upload my “Provisional Wants List” (which I have given a unique name to and thus is no longer “Provisional”) to any of the aforementioned internet bookselling sites.

That was then; this is now.

As of this writing, I have uploaded my named “Wants List” (no longer “Provisional” as it has been given a unique title by me) to abe.com and have received some fascinating and at times perplexing results that I would like to share with readers.

First I need to step back and explain something: in MatchMaker, once a named “Wants List” is uploaded (by selecting the items you’d like to “move” or keep on your list and then by selecting “upload” simply by hitting an “upload” key), they are automatically moved onto the abe.com site as a group so that whatever results from abe.com dealers that match your personal “wants” that exist in the abe.com database are automatically sent to Æ members at their Æ personal homepage. Got that? Try it: it’s simpler than it sounds.

Of the approximately 200 items that I selected to be on my named and uploaded “Wants List,” I received a disproportionately small number of “matches” from the abe.com site to my Æ personal home page. In fact, out of the approximately 200 titles and items entered in my named “Wants List,” I received only 11 matches to titles on my list! I take this to mean that much of the material on my named “Wants List” is at best uncommon, at worst (or best, depending on your point of view) extremely rare for the most part.

And not only that: I noticed great variations in price for seemingly similar items. (This “comparison shopping” is all too easy to do when using Æ's MatchMaker.) For instance, one book – A history of the Kansas crusade; to its friends and foes; introduction by Rev. E. Everett Hale – a notable abolitionist title catering, as many religious books did then and still do now, to women, ranges in price on abe.com from $25 to $75, depending on the dealer offering it. Are these differently priced items different editions of the same title, or are they in vastly different condition? With Æ's MatchMaker I am readily and luckily able to go into each abe.com record directly and see what the seller has recorded about his or her offering. (I am even able to buy directly from this abe.com screen if I so choose.)

In terms of A history of the Kansas crusade…, I examine the descriptions of the different copies and find details that alternately both enlighten and puzzle me. They are all first edition copies, all printed in the same year, so there goes that theory. But there seem to be variations in their condition and importance. The cheapest copy ($25) comes with no jacket but is described as an ex-library copy, “very good, with stamps on pages and normal library markings on endpapers.” OK. The next cheapest copy ($36.50) is also an ex-library copy, “card pocket on pastedown, bumped, rubbed, frayed at spine ends.” Hmmm. Neither of these sound like copies I really want, though I can afford them. But interestingly I notice that there is another copy of the same book in my abe.com results priced just above these two prior copies at just $46. This copy is a first edition, but with a later inscription by the author, although it is described as an ex-library copy, “front hinge cracked at title, general age toning” – in other words, hardly in great shape. Still it is worth noting.