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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;medoraman, post: 1334593, member: 26302&quot;]Actually I have a story about this kind of knowledge. In book auctions sometimes books come up from personal libraries of experienced collectors. A friend of mine is really into a certain series. I won&#039;t name it, (not sure my friend wants this known), so lets pretend its half dimes, and it was the Valentine book, but owned by the owner of the best half dime collection in history. For a WELL WORN book, (reading copy, binding coming loose, covers frayed, etc), he paid about 6 times what a brand new copy goes for. When I asked why, he showed it to me, and it was full of notes, listing different varieties, personal knowledge of errors the author made, etc etc by each date. My friend paid about $600 for a $100 book, but said his bid was set at $8,000, and he would have been happy to pay that for it. He said he had already made thousands using its insights, and he carries it with him always.</p><p><br /></p><p>There are reasons these books from famous collectors sell high. Knowledge is the most precious, most valuable commodity in collecting. The best way to acquire this knowledge is personally, but stumbling acrossed it like he did is also great, and he is smart enough to know that. There is a dealer in Byzantine coins that has his Sears book in literal tatters. He said he needs to copy over all of his notes every few years into a new copy to keep it from falling apart. I asked him if he would like to sell me his old one when he does that, he just smiled at me and said it was not for sale at any price, and he personally tears it apart, burns it, and destroys the ashes and flushes them. Knowledge is a powerful thing, and the best in this hobby know that and guards it like the crown jewels. <img src="styles/default/xenforo/clear.png" class="mceSmilieSprite mceSmilie1" alt=":)" unselectable="on" unselectable="on" /> I am not talking general knowledge that we all share here, but specific knowledge like where books have it wrong.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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