Steven Krivit wrote:
Let's say you want to buy a copy of the ICCF-14 proceedings in a few years from now, or you want to get permission to republish text or image from a paper in the proceedings. If Nagel and Melich are on a cruise ship to Alaska for a month, you're dead in the water.
That is why I recommend a CCAL instead of a copyright. So that permission is granted automatically to anyone, under the terms of the CCAL.
This will also make it easier to print the proceedings at a Kinkos or Office Depot, where they sometimes refuse to print copyright material.
As I said to the ICCF organizers, a copyright serves many useful social purposes and has many benefits, but as it happens, none of them apply to ICCF proceedings. We do not want the protection that a copyright offers. Some people think we do, but in my opinion they do not understand what a copyright is for.
As for buying a printed copy a few years from now, that should be easier if we use a print-on-demand shop such as Lulu.com. The books there never go out of print. Perhaps Lulu.com will go out of business. In that case, we can transfer the files to another print-on-demand store. For that matter we can set up with two or three, in the U.S. and Europe, with different paper sizes and different bindings so that people who want a hardback copy and are willing to pay $50 more can get one.
As I see it, publishing as we know it is a dying industry. Editing is still important, but what World Scientific does adds no value to the book, and serves no purpose. It sure isn't worth the extra ~$150 they charge, above the cost of getting the book printed at Kinkos or Lulu.com. Their role has become almost ceremonial, like a Godmother at a christening.
All of the above is my opinion. I have no idea what the ICCF organizers agree or what they will do.
- Jed
