BBC Four - James May's Big Trouble in Model Britain

[Captain Kernow]

15 minutes ago, Ian J. said:

Even the official documentation that books often use as their source can have errors, so cross-checking and confirming via independent secondary sources is always necessary for good quality research, but not always possible if there is only one source.

Correct, but ultimately any source can have errors in it, as has been pointed out, but one has to start somewhere.

 

I would venture to suggest, speaking from personal experience at least, that when one is writing something for publication, there are possibly more opportunities to cross-check what one has written, before committing to a final version for publication. Whilst this could also be said for the internet, there remains at least the opportunity for much quicker publication and, therefore, less checking of facts.

 

[south_tyne]

4 minutes ago, Edwardian said:

Besides which, the context of my earlier post was the contention that the internet has taken over from books.  In this field, no it has not.  

 

Agreed - the advantage of the 21st Century world is that we should be able to research and build knowledge from a wider variety of sources: books, the internet, first-hand recollections and the preservation movement. The combination of these sources is what can build a comprehensive knowledge. For those interested in the steam-era, the further away we get from the time itself, the less we will be able to draw on first-hand knowledge and recollection from those who lived through the time period. Therefore, the more we rely on second-hand sources. The internet is certainly useful, but it's not the be all and end all, and there obvious ability for anyone to publish information online, whether verified or not, means that it should be treated with caution and used as an add on to other resources. 

[Guest teacupteacup]

13 hours ago, Captain Kernow said:

Also, don't forget that the internet isn't necessarily accessible to everyone, to the same degree. There are some people with medical conditions (I'm not referring to partially-sighted people, which is another thing again), for whom excessive staring at a computer (or phone, tablet etc.) screen can be detrimental to their health (triggering migraines, for example). As such, they must ration their time using display screen equipment. Books tend not to present the same kind of problem in that regard.

You've hit the nail on the head there.  Even without  medical reasons, staring at a screen for extended periods cannot be good for you.

 

I have never bought a digital book or magazine, I much prefer the real thing.  I do have a kindle which was bought for me as a present, along with a series of ebooks on it.  Im reading through the ebooks when I go on holiday, but all other times, it lies dormant.   The plus point of an ebook is storage space in luggage, minus points are it lacks 'soul' and its a pain when wanting to flick back to previous pages.  Oh and when you forget to charge it.....

 

I love a printed book, especially pre-owned books, the feel and smell of the pages automatically puts me at rest.  When Im staring at a screen I always seem to feel tense.

 

The internet has changed buying books for me, I now have a world-wide market to source the books I want, at a price that suits me, but it will never replace physical books for me.

[Dunsignalling]

There's certainly no s/h market for many of the run-of-the-mill 1950s'60s B&W nostalgia "photo albums", often with poor reproduction and undated captions that are pretty useless from a modelling viewpoint. However, there is much better stuff mixed in with the dross, and for much the same prices.

 

I've recently been filling in the gaps in my library of quality colour albums by Peter Gray, Hugh Ballantine and others at prices often less than the P&P.

 

In addition, I've picked up several long-out-of-print OPC "Illustrated History Of" volumes that I thought would be forever out of my reach for £20 or less. All in excellent condition too, albeit, as to be expected with anything so useful, seldom mint.  

 

Prices have certainly softened, but these and their like probably contain the highest concentration of "modelling level" information, in their respective fields, that is likely to be found in one place for the foreseeable future. The ready supply and reasonable prices, though, are unlikely to last forever.  

 

John

 

 

[34theletterbetweenB&D]

11 hours ago, The Stationmaster said:

Although more widely than r-t-r the comparison goes a bit further.  Unbuilt kits, especially from 'good' manufacturers tend to get high prices.  But completed kits, even to a fair standard, which can supply a host of parts such as quality (think Portescap etc) motors and things like r Romford wheels and axles can also fall into the 'box of railway books' part of the market.  A while back i saw a lot of a dozen kit built 0-6-0 tank engines go for well under £100 yet for motors, wheels, and axles alone they would have been a little gold mine if you wanted their size of driving wheel.  A 'boxed lot' I picked up at auction for under £50 contained 2 part built loco kits with a completed chassis (Romfords and etched valvegear), including a Portescap motor, for one of them and the chassis parts for the other plus a completed and somewhat modified K's kit (K's motor but a good runner!) and another completed kit which was a lousy runner plus numerous useful parts and materials...

Aaagh No! "Keep it secret, keep it safe." Terrible confession time, I haven't needed to buy much in the way of kit loco components in many years thanks to the low, low prices that assembled whitemetal kits go for. The ones that have met the floor in particular can be astoundingly good buys. Ecologically it is the right thing to do of course, reuse, repurpose, recycle, reclaim.

 

5 minutes ago, south_tyne said:

...The last 20 years have seen mass buying and collecting of RTR models from a generation of folk that have had a greater level of disposable income, more leisure time through healthier and longer-lived retirements. I suppose I mean those born post-war through the 1950s (my dad's generation!). Very naively, and no doubt simplistically, there is going to become a point in the next 10 to 20 years when there are masses of stuff from recent times that will need to be disposed of, not to put too fine or morbid a point on things, as this generation of modellers go to make their maker.... The modelling hobby will contract and there will be less folk interested, although it certainly isn't going to die out, and I wonder where the market will be for these second hand models? Those who collected lots of stuff in the post-2000 boom years, when Hornby, Bachmann, Heljan etc were really shovelling out new models, made the most of (relatively) cheaper prices but surely there will be a saturation of the market leading to limited sell-on potential and low re-sale prices.

 

I've no doubt my thinking is probably too simplistic but surely the RTR aspect of the hobby has peaked...

I am a fifties child with - barring accident or disease- an actuarial outlook of at least 25 years more good health. (This is the insurance industry opinion, and they do have the data, much to my regret...) So I don't think the baby boomer spending power is quite over yet.

 

What has happened is that the RTR OO market is almost* surfeited with largely competent models of all the established  favourites among traction classes. I have the models, they run beautifully and look the part, no reason to upgrade. I perceive this situation to be driving two parallel developments: production of OO models of less popular items, and production of RTR O, in an attempt to extract the money from our accounts. Whether the net profit level of the industry  is maintained by this I don't know for sure; but the fact that so many are participating, presumably with the motivation of turning an honest penny, suggests to me that the situation isn't all bad.

 

* The Gresley V2. All of us conscientious East Coast types need 0.9 V2s for every Doncaster pacific we own. Just think of the potential sales volume.

[Pacific231G]

3 hours ago, Bernard Lamb said:

That sound like a statement of fact to me.

I have spent many hours at Kew in recent years digging out information for various authors.

When the books were published they seemed to sell rather well.

One went into a reprint and the information gathered on one particular subject within that book led to a monogram on that subject.

This also sold very well.

They are railway related books.

In the last couple of years I have been involved with a publisher of local history and art books.

These have also sold rather well and have been nominated fro awards in a couple of cases.

At every book launch the venue has been packed and there has been no problem in getting backing from major companies to help with promotion.

From where I sit there is a very large market for books. In particular those on specialised subjects.

Most of the material is not available on the internet.

When you start on a research project you will soon find out just how much available material is, for various reasons, not on line.

Bernard

 

Nowadays if I want some basic information on something I usually find it online though not without quite a lot of searching.  For more depth I generally turn to printed sources, though Ironically these have often been digitised so accessed online. This is very different from a Google or Wikipaedia search and can often give access to primary sources. For anyone taking research seriously, primary sources are far better than other people's interpretations. Even the most carefully written books include errors and not all books are carefully written and far too many simply take what someone else wrote earlier as gospel. Primary sources include things like works drawings; photos; old postcards; old maps (National Library of Scotland for the UK) ;aerial mapping photographs; contemporary submissions, reports, papers and even newspaper reports.

What I am increasingly finding is that local historians and people who've made genuinely learned studies of specific subjects are choosing to publish them online rather than in print. I simply couldn't have written some of my own articles without access to online sources including websites set up by enthusiasts who are unlikely to ever publish their findings in print, aerial mapping photos, old postcards and govenment papers.  Sometimes I get hold of a primary source document that leads to an article but even then it needs a lot of online research to flesh it out.

 

So what has this got to do with models in general and Hornby in particular?

 

Well, the books we buy or access for the specific information and insights they include are perhaps equivalent to models we buy for a specific modelling project.  Ideally these go straight into service but they do include the models we buy for the layout we're going to build one day and we'd better buy them now because they might not be available when the time comes. I doubt if I'm the only one who has rather a lot of these.

 

Then there are the books we bought because we liked the pictures in them but have hardly ever opened. These are a bit like the models we bought because we simply had to have them and if they spend their life in a box or ideally a display cabinet then so be it. 

 

It used to be said that Colman's profits relied on the mustard left on the side of the plate and I'm quite sure that if we all only bought the models we needed as and when we needed them  Hornby and its rivals would be out of business. Fortunately for them that will never happen!

.

Edited March 30, 2019 by Pacific231G

[Captain Kernow]

22 minutes ago, teacupteacup said:

I love a printed book, especially pre-owned books, the feel and smell of the pages automatically puts me at rest. 

 

How true that is!

 

I love going into the second-hand bookshops of places like Hay-on-Wye and ferreting out interesting railway titles that I can add to my collection.

 

[south_tyne]

25 minutes ago, 34theletterbetweenB&D said:

I am a fifties child with - barring accident or disease- an actuarial outlook of at least 25 years more good health. (This is the insurance industry opinion, and they do have the data, much to my regret...) So I don't think the baby boomer spending power is quite over yet.

 

 

You're probably right but I think it will become an issue on the next 20 years or so, this saturation of the market and a glut of second-hand toys from a generation of folk who have, very generally, had a more comfortable life than their parents had. Just my personal opinion and I am happy for others to disagree 

Edited March 30, 2019 by south_tyne
Clarification

[Edwardian]

48 minutes ago, teacupteacup said:

 

I love a printed book, especially pre-owned books, the feel and smell of the pages automatically puts me at rest.  When Im staring at a screen I always seem to feel tense.

 

 

 

I love the smell of books, new and old; part of their character, part of the experience.

 

My most distinctive volumes in this regard is the 3-vol RCTS Bradley set on LB&SC locos.  The previous custodian of these books was a dedicated pipe smoker, and nothing too mild at that. I can smell them before I'm close enough to pick one up!

[jjb1970]

The majority of books rely on literature review/secondary sources, which as Pacific231G points out means that errors creep in. More significantly such books will be subject to the position and selection bias of the writer. Hence I'd agree with those pointing out that in many ways books should be approached in a similar way to finding information on the Internet. One of the good things about the Internet is that more and more primary sources are being digitised, although often you have to pay a fee to access them.

[Edwardian]

15 minutes ago, jjb1970 said:

The majority of books rely on literature review/secondary sources, which as Pacific231G points out means that errors creep in. More significantly such books will be subject to the position and selection bias of the writer. Hence I'd agree with those pointing out that in many ways books should be approached in a similar way to finding information on the Internet. One of the good things about the Internet is that more and more primary sources are being digitised, although often you have to pay a fee to access them.

 

Not all books are equal, and they are no more infallible than anything else. This is of no relevance to the fact that on many subjects they provide the best and most comprehensive treatment and are essential to understanding what you are attempting to model. You would be lucky to find 3-4 people alive who might have the knowledge and understanding of a given area that resides in a good book on the subject. 

 

The author's own expertise may be limited to a particular aspect, e.g. a company's locomotives.  The number of times, for instance, I see photo captions confusing the SER's Folkestone Car Train for its Hastings one, you would not believe!  

 

 

 

Edited March 30, 2019 by Edwardian
spelling!

[Not Jeremy]

1 hour ago, jjb1970 said:

The majority of books rely on literature review/secondary sources, which as Pacific231G points out means that errors creep in. More significantly such books will be subject to the position and selection bias of the writer. Hence I'd agree with those pointing out that in many ways books should be approached in a similar way to finding information on the Internet. One of the good things about the Internet is that more and more primary sources are being digitised, although often you have to pay a fee to access them.

 

I can't stand it any more!!

 

Whilst not necessarily disagreeing with any of the above, this last just can't go unchallenged.

 

1.) Errors do not arise from using secondary sources if they are correct or reviewed and used appropriately, and in any case many many books are and have been based upon original research.

 

2.) "Position and selection bias of the writer" oh right, and this never affects anything on the Internet? 

 

3.) Following on from the above, Noms de plume apart, writers of books invariably don't "hide" behind the asinine or obscure usernames that the Internet is riddled with. I would suggest that for any author then putting your actual name to something - in print - will give you cause to try and make sure you do not make mistakes. Or talk rhubarb , well maybe not....

 

4.) Speaking as a publisher, I can assure you that spending many thousands of pounds on printing a book is another pretty strong motivation for trying to get it right. Of course nothing in this world is perfect, but I am venturing to suggest that the world of books and print publishing is, in general terms, streets ahead of the mass of unreviewed information that is "freely available" on the Internet.

 

Yes, I am aware of digitising information projects etc, but this is mostly in the world of scholarly and academic publishing which is an entirely different kettle of fish, and not what we generally look at in our interests.

 

All of which is not to decry the wonder of the Internet, which does without a doubt represent a challenge to printed media.

 

From an alternative viewpoint then I would highlight the fantastic resource that Paul Bartlett has provided for us as being particularly splendid. But think about it, apart from the odd hosting issues, Paul has changed how he operates and by now to get a really useful image you need to contact him and pay for either a decent download or an actual print.

 

And what happens to the resource of information when Paul dies or otherwise tires of maintaining it?

 

So the book is not dead.

 

As regards secondhand prices etc, well yes. Except, as others have noted, certain books and references remain in demand.

 

I would however agree that there is an absolute wealth of printed codswallop out there, the best thing for all of it is to go into recycling.

 

Just think, if we tried really hard then even having Paul Atterbury's name on a book might not be quite the commercial kiss of death that it currently is...

 

With apologies to Paul Atterbury, who has put his name to a lot of very nice looking books! 

 

Simon Castens

 

Sitting in a specialist railway bookshop on a sunny day with no customers, hmmmmm

 

 

Edited March 30, 2019 by Not Jeremy
Missing everything I wanted to say!

[Edwardian]

1 minute ago, Not Jeremy said:

 

I can't stand it any more!!

 

 

 

Then turn off your computer and relax with a book.

[Mallard60022]

If I want reliable info I immediately post my question on RMWeb. I then wait for a few days, have a look, ignore almost all of it as it is usually dross and then I take the couple of valid tips/links/and what books to look at suggestions and follow that up.

If I have insulted anyone then so be it; I shall just go and sniff some of my Library.

A.N. Ar$£

[Jol Wilkinson]

2 hours ago, Islesy said:

Books are subject to almost as many errors as you will find on t’internet and many statements have been made in print that have not been challenged or corrected. The key to effective research is utilise your sources properly and to carefully cross check facts, with proper reference to contemporary photographs.

 

Possibly because much of what appears on the internet is derived from those books, the internet may be less accurate.

 

10 minutes ago, Mallard60022 said:

If I want reliable info I immediately post my question on RMWeb. I then wait for a few days, have a look, ignore almost all of it as it is usually dross and then I take the couple of valid tips/links/and what books to look at suggestions and follow that up.

If I have insulted anyone then so be it; I shall just go and sniff some of my Library.

A.N. Ar$£

How do you know what is dross? If you have the knowledge to decide that, then why do you need to ask ion the first place?

 

Back to somewhere nearer the OP, given that the RTR manufacturers and commissioners can now rely heavily on scanning the preserved item, surely that should ensure that RTR models would be without fault.

[Mallard60022]

6 minutes ago, Jol Wilkinson said:

 

Possibly because much of what appears on the internet is derived from those books, the internet may be less accurate.

 

How do you know what is dross? If you have the knowledge to decide that, then why do you need to ask ion the first place?

 

 

Sense of humour failure there...…...never mind. 

P

[Jol Wilkinson]

16 minutes ago, Mallard60022 said:

Sense of humour failure there...…...never mind. 

P

I thought your post might be in jest, but as others often use the "ask first, don't bother to think" approach, I wasn't totally sure!

[APOLLO]

1 hour ago, Captain Kernow said:

How true that is!

 

I love going into the second-hand bookshops of places like Hay-on-Wye and ferreting out interesting railway titles that I can add to my collection.

 

 

Indeed. we were in Hay a few years ago and found a couple of reasonably priced bound Railway Magazines from The Great War period.

 

We also had a look round an antique shop there - most stuff was just expensive tat - though I found an interesting book for a fiver. What caught my eye was an absolutely superb kit built O gauge Britannia (my favourite loco). It was of museum quality and very well finished. The price was £800, which I thought was well worth it (if it ran as good as it looked !). Not tempted as , 

a. Family were there  - beans on toast for rest of holiday !!

b. It wouldn't fit in with my American O scale modelling

 

Speaking of which, I've found many American O gauge bargains on ebay recently.  A brand new mint dual motor / flywheel Atlas GP15 for £200, and a Weaver U25B again dual motor / flywheel fitted for £75 plus postage - the body is just a touch tatty but  the loco runs well.

 

I've virtually done buying OO now - basically I have enough / too many models. At current prices any future OO purchases will have to be on my very short "would like one of those if ever they make one" list. (LNER J1 or J6).

 

Brit15

 

 

[Mallard60022]

Just now, Jol Wilkinson said:

I thought your post might be in jest, but as others often use the "ask first, don't bother to think" approach, I wasn't totally sure!

Thanks matey. I just get so ##### off with the droning on and on about stuff and this thread is creaking and groaning towards its' end.  Sadly I just can't resist being a ####### on occasion just because I can, so apologies if I caused stress!

ATB

Phil

[adb968008]

Ive seen lots of “facts” in the last page that seem unchallengedfor proof.  It makes me feel its not just printed authors who have or suffer bias.

 

However just because books say its right doesnt make it so.

many many books use data based on other books, either quoted or unquoted.

 

But its the power of the internet that has put many well known railway authors and their books contents to question...

 

Books and the Internet are neither fully reliable, quoting one as a source of fact doesnt make it fact unless the data behind it is present and checked, often its not possible until some time driven circumstance presents itself....often decades later.. “Black Swans”.

 

Quote

Juvenal's phrase was a common expression in 16th century London as a statement of impossibility. The London expression derives from the Old World presumption that all swansmust be white because all historical records of swans reported that they had white feathers.[4] In that context, a black swan was impossible or at least nonexistent.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_swan_theory

 

How many people have been mocked for having inaccurate gen, because a book says so, only to have proven correct once accurate data was technically possible ?

 

https://www.whatreallyhappenedtosteam.co.uk/

“50% of records for Cashmores were incorrect”

 

of course its not just books that get facts incorrect..

4965 was afterall scrapped at Swindon Works in the 1960’s, though much of the stamps on 4983 at Tyseley say a different story.. one which we 20 years later now all know and accept.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/52451.stm

 

Dont rely on your A-Z for accuracy either, they deliberately put false gen in high use pages, usually in obscure parts as copyright protection markers... look at the map of Canary Wharf, by the park on the south side by the thames, you’ll see a false street deliberately placed, to use as evidence if they suspect mis-use.

(as i suspect i will be challenged on this “fact”: see Nicholas Cranes Coast on BBC for an explanation and demonstration), I think it was this one....

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b04473ng

 

Edited March 30, 2019 by adb968008

[Steamport Southport]

The "Whatever Happened To Steam" debacle wasn't the authors fault. It was well known back in the 1980s that there was serious mistakes in those books. That was decades before the internet.

 

It was certain individuals who sent in information to the magazines at the time making up information about sightings. Probably to get one up on their fellow trainspotters.

 

You had trolls even then....

 

 

Jason

[The Stationmaster]

Ah, primary sources.  Now Swindon (yes the GWR bit) was notorious for producing GA drawings whc were - shall I say - at times apt to be somewhat misleading mainly because they portrayed the way the Drawing oFfdice thought a ;opv co should be built rather than the way the factory actually built it (I have exaggerated a little -bit now an example).   A while back I was involved, deeply involved as it happens, in researching prototype detail for a loco and had the good fortune to aquire through a contact a copy of the ortiginal Swindon GA drawing.  A copy of the drawing duly went off to the factory (together with numerous photos, a written spec, and so on).  Fairly late on in reviewing the CADs I finally noticed that there were no cylinder draincocks included so the designer in China was diuly tipped off and back came a request to know wehat they looked like and exactly where they went because they had not been shown on the original drawing.

 

Now I'm absolutely certain that no lov co engineer worth his salt would design an engine without cylinder draincocks, but in this case he had.  I suspect it had happened because he was working off a much older drawing to develop a modern version of the engine concerned and I bet the original as built pbably had no drain cock control rods from the cab so the cocks weren't on the drawing.   So primary resources yes - but don't forget the bag of Saxa.

 

Now the danger of secondary sources.  I am absolutely fed up with being told, some tmes from lofty heights - that the Midland Railway avoided facing points like the plague in a manner which suggests they were different from every other railway in the land.  In reality they were no different from any other railway, the same 'rules' (i.e. the Board of Trade/Dept of Transport Requirements) applied equally to every single railway and their compliance with the Requirements was subject to inspection and approval of all new works.  The Midland was no different from any other railway - they all had to avoid facing points except where they were essentially required such as at junctions, and Midland railway junctions had facing points so they didn't go round avoiding them..

[Edwardian]

1 hour ago, Not Jeremy said:

 

I can't stand it any more!!

 

Whilst not necessarily disagreeing with any of the above, this last just can't go unchallenged.

 

1.) Errors do not arise from using secondary sources if they are correct or reviewed and used appropriately, and in any case many many books are and have been based upon original research.

 

2.) "Position and selection bias of the writer" oh right, and this never affects anything on the Internet? 

 

3.) Following on from the above, Noms de plume apart, writers of books invariably don't "hide" behind the asinine or obscure usernames that the Internet is riddled with. I would suggest that for any author then putting your actual name to something - in print - will give you cause to try and make sure you do not make mistakes. Or talk rhubarb , well maybe not....

 

4.) Speaking as a publisher, I can assure you that spending many thousands of pounds on printing a book is another pretty strong motivation for trying to get it right. Of course nothing in this world is perfect, but I am venturing to suggest that the world of books and print publishing is, in general terms, streets ahead of the mass of unreviewed information that is "freely available" on the Internet.

 

Yes, I am aware of digitising information projects etc, but this is mostly in the world of scholarly and academic publishing which is an entirely different kettle of fish, and not what we generally look at in our interests.

 

All of which is not to decry the wonder of the Internet, which does without a doubt represent a challenge to printed media.

 

From an alternative viewpoint then I would highlight the fantastic resource that Paul Bartlett has provided for us as being particularly splendid. But think about it, apart from the odd hosting issues, Paul has changed how he operates and by now to get a really useful image you need to contact him and pay for either a decent download or an actual print.

 

And what happens to the resource of information when Paul dies or otherwise tires of maintaining it?

 

So the book is not dead.

 

As regards secondhand prices etc, well yes. Except, as others have noted, certain books and references remain in demand.

 

I would however agree that there is an absolute wealth of printed codswallop out there, the best thing for all of it is to go into recycling.

 

Just think, if we tried really hard then even having Paul Atterbury's name on a book might not be quite the commercial kiss of death that it currently is...

 

With apologies to Paul Atterbury, who has put his name to a lot of very nice looking books! 

 

Simon Castens

 

Sitting in a specialist railway bookshop on a sunny day with no customers, hmmmmm

 

 

 

By way of bumping your answer, as much as anything, for the benefit those who, like me, failed to see the whole scope and majesty of the thesis that your original post surely implied?

 

Anyway, well said. Good points, well brought out.

 

Given your use of that excellent and depressingly frequently apt adjective, asinine, I was expecting the name at the end of the post to be 'Ed Reardon'

 

Best wishes

 

Paul Atterbury

 

 

 

(You shouldn't, of course, believe everything you read on the internet)

 

 

[adb968008]

2 hours ago, Jol Wilkinson said:

 

given that the RTR manufacturers and commissioners can now rely heavily on scanning the preserved item, surely that should ensure that RTR models would be without fault.

I cannot think of a faultless model that has been made. OOgauge itself is a compromise of HO.

 

Restorers of preserved vehicles  often have slight or major modifications to suit todays environment that the subject never originally had or have to make changes based on assumptions too based on available evidence.

Take 46100s tender extensions, 61994’s extended tanks etc etc, the central door locking on the LT 4TC units etc etc.

if you get chance compare 4468 Mallards footplate to that of 60009 with all its Mainline gubbins installed. I have pictures of 60010’s footplate back 20 years ago in its still BR condition, with all kinds of BR era plates / markings / labels etc that I’d not seen before on the UK preserved ones.

 

Scanning helps, Accurascales fast turn around and high quality I would offer to demonstrate that, but  ultimately as long as Humans have a part to play in the process, but mistakes can still creep in, for error or by design choice.

 

maybe another certain member here might contribute their experiences on scanning in the design stage ?

Edited March 30, 2019 by adb968008

[Captain Kernow]

2 hours ago, Not Jeremy said:

I can't stand it any more!!

 

Whilst not necessarily disagreeing with any of the above, this last just can't go unchallenged.

 

Wot ho, matey! I wondered if you'd pop in on this thread!

 

2 hours ago, Not Jeremy said:

So the book is not dead.

 

Of course it's not. Ridiculous to suggest otherwise.

 

I just feel sorry for those who cannot see the attraction of a good book or think that the printed page has no future, whatever the subject matter, but then again, there's no accounting for taste.

 

2 hours ago, Not Jeremy said:

Sitting in a specialist railway bookshop on a sunny day with no customers, hmmmmm

 

Have you tried offering free ice creams with every copy of MRJ?