Greetings. There was a two month gap in my participation on the List until recently. Somehow, and no one has yet explained it, my subscription was removed (this happened again two weeks ago). Unfortunately, I missed a brief discussion of the book I wrote - it was reviewed in Dr. Dobb's Journal. Had I known, I would have contributed. To make matters even worse, the Classiccmp archive maintained by Kevan Heydon (many thanks man), also suffered from a technical glitch and needed to be restored. Now I've finally read the thread and please accept two observations and two invitations. Observation #1 - the books' identity crisis The book is a guide about the hobby of collecting computers and not a traditional collector's price guide. In a perfect world one would first read the guide to collecting and then want to read a collector's guide - the first guide stokes and refines the interest while the second guide assists in ensuring a collection is complete and in determining how much to buy and sell for. Observation #2 - the book's other identity crisis The book is for both seasoned collectors and beginners. It is not JUST a book for anyone who thinks collecting computers could be neat. Sure the guide will, by design help the novice, but it's equal strength is in helping the existing collector by affirming our practices and techniques and, by all means, sharing some of the practice and techniques the veteran collector might not know about. We should all be open to accepting our knowledge-gaps. In fact, a computer collector might not consider their collection complete without a copy of the first-ever book about collecting computers. Invitation #1 - answering questions about profilees I've been asked why some collectors were omitted and even why some were included. I expected such questions. As an author with a deadline and goal in mind I invited collectors who exemplified the experienced collector, the new collector, the big collector, the small collector, the international collector, etc trying to show how collecting is the same all over the world - same passions and problems. These collectors would/could also be role-models. The book might have included more profiles if the collectors had responded on a timely basis and with answers to the questions I asked. One collector didn't remember the dates and circumstances surrounding his most important acquisitions so I rejected the story because it was incomplete (even after several attempts to help improve its accuracy). Please send your questions about the book to me directly. Invitation #2 - my first attempt at building a web site Please take a moment to visit my site. See the orphan 360/22 mainframe (orphan because it was announced the same year the 370 series was!) and a few other systems that aren't that popular. Thank you. Happy collecting. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ------------------------------- Kevin Stumpf * Unusual systems * www.unusual.on.ca +1.519.744.2900 * EST/EDT GMT - 5 Collector - Commercial Mainframes & Minicomputers from the 50s, 60s, & 70s and control panels and consoles. Author & Publisher - A Guide to Collecting Computers & Computer Collectibles * ISBN 0-9684244-0-6 .