Hi there. Never posted on the ancient forums before, but thought I would give it a shot. Anyways, I recently bought a CD with over 250 books on ancient coins (and some other stuff about coins) on it. It was a really good deal and I was thinking I could resell it later on. If you guys were going to buy something like this, how much would you pay? (I don't have it in my possession yet, btw). I don't know how anyone could get anything else like this, and I don't know if any more of these exist. Thanks, I look forward to hearing from you.
Hmm. I vaguely recall seeing an eBay ad for this disc. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think all of the digitized books on this disc are ones which are in the public domain or which are available without fee on various sites. When you receive the disc, check and see the date of publication of the articles and spot-check a few to see if you can freely access them on academics.edu or other sites. Even if the articles are freely available, I might consider spending $5-10 for the convenience of having them in one place. Maybe. Also, I'd want to know the quality of the reproduction. If the articles include plates, how well are the plates reproduced? Does adding another generation of copy adversely affect the details?
I don't have this disc but I do have similar ones. Typically it is all stuff that is old enough to not have to worry about copyright laws and they sell very inexpensively. I would pay a good bit for the actual books. Not so much for the disc. The last one I bought was around $10.
I bought a big Lincoln cent collection on eBay and the same guy was selling the disc - yes, you were correct. I made an offer for $7 and free shipping and he took it. Maybe not the best deal for me as a reseller, but it will be fun to go through them and see what's there. I was thinking I could possibly copy everything and burn the books to a few other books and sell those. If I could get $5 each and sell 10, I would be really happy with that. I don't know all the rules for that though or if these are copyrighted? I was thinking I could do something like this (https://www.ebay.com/itm/112066071667), except mine are newer and I have a lot more than this guy. Do you think that would be a good idea?
I think you need to read copyright laws before you go any further with this idea. Also, you probably won't get much commenting or support here because this is an ancient coin collecting board rather than a how-to-help-you-make-money-from-us board.
There are thousands of out-of-copyright books on coins and hundreds of them still have some practical value despite their age. Considering the number of different disks available, the only real question is whether the one you are considering really has value to you. I bought a couple of these and a couple paper reprints of single books of which only one has ever been of any use to me. Disks containing in-print and in-copyright materials are thievery. You can decide if you buy from thieves.
I have similar discs also containing hundreds of out of print and in public domain books or published papers. Most of the books are late 1800’s and early 1900’s The ones I have says, May be used for non commercial, personal, research, or educational purposes. May not be used in a commercial way. I think if you wanted to give someone copies of the files that would be permissible. You might run into problems selling copies of these.
Thanks, everyone. I will wait until I get the disc and see if they are copyrighted. Even if they aren't, I will still probably sell the disc on eBay by itself.
Nearly all of those books are available for download and well-organized on Digital Library Numis. https://sites.google.com/site/digitallibrarynumis/ . A disc will appeal to folks who have a disc reader but Internet connection. You can find a list of places with no Internet at https://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/lists/the-last-places-on-earth-with-no-internet/ but good luck selling them the disc over the Internet. Books printed before 1921 in the USA can be freely shared and sold in the USA. Other countries have different rules. You can find the list at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries'_copyright_lengths . Try not to include works that are not in the public domain because you may have to pay $200 or more per work per copy. https://www.lib.purdue.edu/uco/CopyrightBasics/penalties.html
I have such a CD with most of the BMC Greek volumes -- from the 19th century and long out of copyright and in the public domain. While all of them are available online at various sources, it's nice to have them all in one place. The disc also contains some interesting old "how to collect" books and price guides, such as Akerman's work from the early 19th century. It's fun but next to useless as a reference work.
