Rare Book Hub - Rare Books, Book Auctions, Antiquarian Book Collecting

Letters to the Editor

JeromeP8 April 01, 2003

Bookseller descriptions are covered by law. Descriptive material is owned
and protected. What you are suggesting with the 'sale' of the description
passing with the sale of the book is wrong!

diivinedbl February 01, 2003

Dear Bruce,

You were kind enough to email me when I tried to sign up for a trial
subscription on the ad you ran in Booksource Monthly which I subscribe to.

I just received another email from you. Congratulations on passing the one
thousand mark for subscribers.

Bottom Line: whoever figures out how to set up, what I think you're trying
to set up, will not only make a financial fortune but will do for the book
world what the New York stock exchange did for the capital markets almost
two hundred years ago and what the Nasdaq further did in the last decade.

Namely, to provide a universal and open and widely used medium for both auction and negotiated exchange of goods.

Up until now the bookworld continues in it's quirky, semi-subteranean world of operating in the secretive, ill-informed murky shadows of a third world bazar of haphazardly ferreting out buyers, sellers and information in the most obfuscated methods imaginable.

You're on the right track but you still have a helluva lotta work to do and there are twenty other people all trying to do the same thing.

As as a buyer and collector of books all I can say is that abebooks has the format but I think they're going to drop the ball. They
remind me of Commodore Computers twenty years ago or maybe Amiga. Same with E-Bay. Both had the beginnings of a magnificent platform but not able, for whatever reasons of corporate lack of foresight, to see the
bigger picture.

Are you the Steve Jobs of books? I certainly hope so. I hope, and know, that out there one of you is going to figure it out.

As I see your problem now, you have the vision but you're getting bogged
down pretty quick now in HOW you're putting it into effect. And please, though it's wonderful you now have a thousand subscribers, don't delude
yourself, as abebooks and e-bay have, into thinking that because you're finally making some money and creating a niche that you've answered to and found out the real solution to the big picture and are genuinely filling
that need.

Stay with it, keep soliciting ideas, keep revising the plan and tweeking it. I think, while aesthetically pleasing to look at, your web-site is missing a lot of 'meat' that's needed to fuel this puppy of an idea that your nurturing.

Well, I care about books and so took the time because you seem to really on some level be able to grasp what's needed in this book market so hope you found my comments if not helpful then at least interesting.

If I may be of further help, please let me know... all the best to you in
your endeavors, I hope you create what we all need.......and I hope this
e-mail makes it to you.

Kind regards,

Bill Brazz

e-mail at: divinedbld@comcast.net

hhurt December 03, 2002

To: catchall@americanaexchange.com

Date: Sun, 1 Dec 2002 09:56:40 -0800

Subject:

Dear Ms. Tallmer--

Thank you for the article on e-Bay. Let me add an experience that I've
had that surely is not unique. On three occasions that I have documented,
I have received what appeared to be good-faith queries from individuals
asking me to provide scans of high-end books. I have done so. Then
normal back-and-forth discussions have ensued about possible discounts,
questions about the books' condition, shipping, etc. In the cases noted,
I have then seen the scans of my items (absolutely identified by small
mars on the books in the scans) appear for sale on e-Bay at starting
prices far above my asking price. Clearly, the e-Bay seller was offering
my books and then, if he had a successful buyer, he would then consummate
the purchase from me. (The e-Bay seller's name in each case was seemingly
unrelated to the person I thought I was dealing with.) At first, this
angered me as simply wrong. In each case, I ceased negotiations with the
fake buyer. My complaints to e-Bay were received indifferently. I did
begin to watch the patterns of what appeared to be similar sales (always
very high-end books) and realized that the practice was certainly not
isolated.

In any case, as a bookseller I find e-Bay a good place to buy certain
books, but I've never tried to sell anything--except through these
operators I've just described.

Thanks again for your article.

Henry Hurt.

Shadetree Rare Books

Al Bukowsky November 15, 2002

Good Day,

Please sign me up for a year. The temporary trail period has already produced Lewis and Clark books at upcoming auctions that I would have not found otherwise.

Happy Trails,

Al

George December 01, 2014

I look forward every month to reading AE Monthly. Why lessen the enjoyment by including leftist political orthodoxy into otherwise delightful articles.

The latest offender::

"He continued through life to support political candidates who were focused on helping the needy, rather than those who sought to reduce taxes on the wealthy…"

—The Greatest Book Collector Dies at 100

Had the collector's forebears been of like mind, the collection receiving accolades likely would never have been formed.