Re: thought for the week

On Mon, 9 Aug 1999, Robert Cumbow <rcumbow[_at_]grahamdunn.com> wrote:
>
> On Sat, Aug 07, 1999, Jeroen Hellingman <jehe[_at_]kabelfoon.nl> wrote:
> >
> > To establish whether a book is in print, some guidelines should be
> > incorporated on what would constitute enough efford in finding whether
> > it is in print, including, for example asking the publisher/author (but
> > he may not willing to tell you) checking publications like "books in
> > print" (my best bet, they are available in most libraries and larger
> > book stores) attempt to order the work.
> >
> > Already the Dutch laws allows somewhat wider "fair use" if a work has
> > gone out of print.
>
> Increasingly, a lot of book dealers -- particularly Amazon.com and
> Barnes & Noble -- pride themselves in being able to obtain "out of
> print" books. Question whether a book is truly "out of print" if
> copies are available through a major online ordering system. The
> answer will depend upon the out of print clause in the agreement
> between the author and the publisher, which defines what is meant
> by "out of print" and determines whether a work will be deemed to
> be o/p or not. One more resource that is not available to the
> would-be re-user trying to find out if a book is o/p or not.

Dealers have supplied o/p books, including the Gutenberg Bible, for a very long time. AB Bookman's Weekly has published desiderata lists ever since I can remember. The online thing is simply an extension of such services.

It seems to me that under most publishing agreements, "out of print" status can be assigned only by the publisher and, with the publishers' default, by the author.

Some publishers made agreements with UMI in the 1960s to permit UMI to supply microfilm and photocopies, the idea being to keep the book "in print" indefinitely.

Albert Henderson
Editor, PUBLISHING RESEARCH QUARTERLY
<70244.1532[_at_]compuserve.com> Received on Tue Aug 10 1999 - 19:49:53 GMT