bookseller?

Some Guy writes:

Leaving books you're listing at the public library sale is going to be
about as successful as putting them on the sidewalk in front of your
house WRT being able to go get them again after you've made a sale.

If I understand you correctly, here and in your other posting, you seem to
be thinking in terms of sporadic book sales, which I agree would not make
it possible to get the book to the client within a few days of the book being
ordered. But some libraries have continuous book sales by allocating some
permanent space for sale books. So, there would be daily access.

Allan Adler wrote:
Someone suggested that the books move too quickly for such a scheme to work.
I'm not sure that is true.

You're welcome to run any field tests you care to make. Do let us know
what the results are.

Actually, I was thinking in terms of articulation and computer simulation
of the relevant stochastic processes. I'm not good at doing that, but I'm
making some inquiries. In your other posting, you mention that you are familiar
with some theoretical models. Can you describe any that might apply here?
--
Ignorantly,
Allan Adler
* Disclaimer: I am a guest and *not* a member of the MIT CSAIL. My actions and
* comments do not reflect in any way on MIT. Also, I am nowhere near Boston.

Some Guy writes:

You'd have to have a library with a hefty collection of valuable books
that keep being put out for sale at low rates, where almost no one
except this bookseller comes and buys them, and the book sale is one
that allows the bookseller access within the time frame required by the
listing services for shipping, which I believe is either 2 days or 3
days for Amazon.

Valuable books tend to disappear from library sales much faster than
they are ordered online, but the returns from the eventual sale nearly
always makes it worthwhile to snap it up right away for the astute
seller. It's just too darn risky to do otherwise.

I addressed the issue of access in my reply to your other posting, so
let me focus on what you say about valuable books. The topic of valuable
or, rather, very expensive books arose in this thread in connection with
pricing strategies, and I don't really disagree with what was said about that.

But maybe that isn't what you are referring to. Maybe you just mean books
that one can sell for much more than the $2 one is likely to pay for them
at the booksale and which might really be in demand through Amazon. If such
a book actually comes along, I would agree that one should grab it. The
2-volume work of Kobayashi and Nomizu on differential geometry, absolutely,
they should simply spend the $2 per volume and buy it.

However, the books that this person was carefully going through and checking
against Amazon were just the ordinary kind of stuff that one finds at library
book sales. I think stuff like that tends to move more slowly. For the most
part, it is not qualitatively different from stuff one sees being sold by
sidewalk book vendors and their stuff doesn't seem to change much when I look
at their tables. Even there one does occasionally find some worthwhile books:
I found a student edition of Demosthenes in Greek and a copy of Liddell and
Scott and a book on Latin prose composition, all in reasonably good shape,
and took all the ones I didn't already own; but I buy books to read them and
to use them for reference, not to resell or collect them.

Assuming there are some booksellers operating as I have described, it
is quite possible that they are not very successful. It is also possible
that they are making enough money to make it worth their while.

The latter case probably happens about as often as winged monkeys make
their exit from one's nether regions. Having assisted a bookseller who
was hunting for inventory at library sales in the face of other
booksellers doing the same thing, I know that such a possibility is not
worth considering for someone who's planning on eating based on the results.

If you don't mind sharing your experiences, I'd like to know more about
how the bookseller you assisted operated at library book sales, and how
they operate in general at book sales.

Or one could go to a library sale after finding out who are the local
booksellers and seeing what is left over after they've picked the place
clean.

I would recognize them by their laptops?
--
Ignorantly,
Allan Adler
* Disclaimer: I am a guest and *not* a member of the MIT CSAIL. My actions and
* comments do not reflect in any way on MIT. Also, I am nowhere near Boston.

"Bill" wrote in message
ups.com...

You may be right, but I was using the "let's assume
the poster is correct -- then what?" approach.

Bilp, everyone in usenet wishes you would die. And yet you've never used the
"let's assume the poster is correct -- then what?" theory to conclude you
should blow your brains out. Why is that?

Allan Adler wrote:
Some Guy writes:

Leaving books you're listing at the public library sale is going to be
about as successful as putting them on the sidewalk in front of your
house WRT being able to go get them again after you've made a sale.

If I understand you correctly, here and in your other posting, you seem to
be thinking in terms of sporadic book sales, which I agree would not make
it possible to get the book to the client within a few days of the book being
ordered. But some libraries have continuous book sales by allocating some
permanent space for sale books. So, there would be daily access.

Sure, that's one aspect. But the much more important one is that other
people have access to "your" stock and can take it away from you without
there being anything you can do about it. That will virtually certainly
result in a high non-fulfillment rate for you, and consequently eventual
ejection from the listing services.

Allan Adler wrote:
Someone suggested that the books move too quickly for such a scheme to work.
I'm not sure that is true.
You're welcome to run any field tests you care to make. Do let us know
what the results are.

Actually, I was thinking in terms of articulation and computer simulation
of the relevant stochastic processes. I'm not good at doing that, but I'm
making some inquiries. In your other posting, you mention that you are familiar
with some theoretical models. Can you describe any that might apply here?

Well, I've described one already in another post, e.g. that
circumstances have to be so heavily and unrealistically tilted in the
favor of such a bookseller that an extraordinary situation is the only
wherein their scheme could work.

As far as computer models, I can't help you with that; but I can tell
you that I have seen library sales before and after the booksellers have
gone through the lots, and the results bode ill for anyone trying to
make a living on the leftovers.

Allan Adler wrote:
Some Guy writes:

You'd have to have a library with a hefty collection of valuable books
that keep being put out for sale at low rates, where almost no one
except this bookseller comes and buys them, and the book sale is one
that allows the bookseller access within the time frame required by the
listing services for shipping, which I believe is either 2 days or 3
days for Amazon.

Valuable books tend to disappear from library sales much faster than
they are ordered online, but the returns from the eventual sale nearly
always makes it worthwhile to snap it up right away for the astute
seller. It's just too darn risky to do otherwise.

I addressed the issue of access in my reply to your other posting, so
let me focus on what you say about valuable books. The topic of valuable
or, rather, very expensive books arose in this thread in connection with
pricing strategies, and I don't really disagree with what was said about that.

Always realizing that "valuable" and "expensive" are not quite the same
thing. "Vaulable" in this case implies a level of demand consistent
with the high price tag, whereas "expensive" simply means there is a
high price tag that might ultimately never result in a sale.

But maybe that isn't what you are referring to. Maybe you just mean books
that one can sell for much more than the $2 one is likely to pay for them
at the booksale and which might really be in demand through Amazon. If such
a book actually comes along, I would agree that one should grab it. The
2-volume work of Kobayashi and Nomizu on differential geometry, absolutely,
they should simply spend the $2 per volume and buy it.

Although this discussion started with Amazon in mind, keep in mind that
there are other online listing services which affect the total online
bookselling market.

However, the books that this person was carefully going through and checking
against Amazon were just the ordinary kind of stuff that one finds at library
book sales. I think stuff like that tends to move more slowly. For the most
part, it is not qualitatively different from stuff one sees being sold by
sidewalk book vendors and their stuff doesn't seem to change much when I look
at their tables. Even there one does occasionally find some worthwhile books:
I found a student edition of Demosthenes in Greek and a copy of Liddell and
Scott and a book on Latin prose composition, all in reasonably good shape,
and took all the ones I didn't already own; but I buy books to read them and
to use them for reference, not to resell or collect them.

There are two other reasons why the person might have been checking what
looked like normal, not particularly valuable books besides making a
list of material he/she was going to list on line but store at the
library. In my opinion, one of these is more likely based on my
experiences:

A. The person was a newbie who does not have enough experience to
recognize valuable (or potentially valuable) books on sight and so was
being slow & methodical in learning what was what.

B. The person was checking for sleepers that booksellers might have
missed. No bookseller knows every valuable book in existence, and it
has happened that I've pulled good stuff from a library sale after the
other booksellers have been through it, but this has not been common and
has been limited to specific books in niche markets I knew from
experience would sell quickly and highly. I certainly could not support
myself on such books since they happen along so rarely.

Assuming there are some booksellers operating as I have described, it
is quite possible that they are not very successful. It is also possible
that they are making enough money to make it worth their while.
The latter case probably happens about as often as winged monkeys make
their exit from one's nether regions. Having assisted a bookseller who
was hunting for inventory at library sales in the face of other
booksellers doing the same thing, I know that such a possibility is not
worth considering for someone who's planning on eating based on the results.

If you don't mind sharing your experiences, I'd like to know more about
how the bookseller you assisted operated at library book sales, and how
they operate in general at book sales.

Since she has passed away and her business is being sold off, I don't
see any reason not to. If I decide to enter the bookselling business
myself, my supply won't be based on library sales. Bear in mind that
these are MY experiences, not necessarily a universal manner in which
they operate, though I would be surprised at any significant and
widespread variance.

A good bookseller knows which libraries tend to end up with the best
donations and thus which ones are worth spending time exploring.
Usually each bookseller will have some area in which they have more
expertise and so will concentrate on such books, so among several
booksellers you'll usually have enough to cover the majority of
interests at the better library sales. Often, they will strive to be
one of the first ones in the door if they can to get first look at the
tables or shelves.

Depending on the bookseller's skill, they'll either quickly skim the
rows and pluck out the good stuff with dispatch, or where they're not
sure they will just grab things they think are worthwhile and make a big
pile, then go through and check them in more detail, either through
technology (e.g. laptops or Amazon scanners) or their own evaluation
where they don't trust a rapid glance enough. They will then return to
the library shelves or tables the books they have decided or discovered
are not worth buying.


Or one could go to a library sale after finding out who are the local
booksellers and seeing what is left over after they've picked the place
clean.

I would recognize them by their laptops?

Well, some of them. Though I have to say that having an iPhone is now
going to make it even easier to pick out the good stuff in advance, but
also take some of the excitement out of the process. It'll also make it
even harder to find sleepers, as they can be looked up relatively easily
now.

Some Guy wrote:

Allan Adler wrote:

Some Guy writes:

You'd have to have a library with a hefty collection of valuable
books that keep being put out for sale at low rates, where almost no
one except this bookseller comes and buys them, and the book sale is
one that allows the bookseller access within the time frame required
by the listing services for shipping, which I believe is either 2
days or 3 days for Amazon.

Valuable books tend to disappear from library sales much faster than
they are ordered online, but the returns from the eventual sale
nearly always makes it worthwhile to snap it up right away for the
astute seller. It's just too darn risky to do otherwise.


I addressed the issue of access in my reply to your other posting, so
let me focus on what you say about valuable books. The topic of valuable
or, rather, very expensive books arose in this thread in connection with
pricing strategies, and I don't really disagree with what was said
about that.


Always realizing that "valuable" and "expensive" are not quite the same
thing. "Vaulable" in this case implies a level of demand consistent
with the high price tag, whereas "expensive" simply means there is a
high price tag that might ultimately never result in a sale.

But maybe that isn't what you are referring to. Maybe you just mean books
that one can sell for much more than the $2 one is likely to pay for them
at the booksale and which might really be in demand through Amazon. If
such
a book actually comes along, I would agree that one should grab it. The
2-volume work of Kobayashi and Nomizu on differential geometry,
absolutely,
they should simply spend the $2 per volume and buy it.


Although this discussion started with Amazon in mind, keep in mind that
there are other online listing services which affect the total online
bookselling market.

However, the books that this person was carefully going through and
checking
against Amazon were just the ordinary kind of stuff that one finds at
library
book sales. I think stuff like that tends to move more slowly. For the
most
part, it is not qualitatively different from stuff one sees being sold by
sidewalk book vendors and their stuff doesn't seem to change much when
I look
at their tables. Even there one does occasionally find some worthwhile
books:
I found a student edition of Demosthenes in Greek and a copy of
Liddell and
Scott and a book on Latin prose composition, all in reasonably good
shape,
and took all the ones I didn't already own; but I buy books to read
them and
to use them for reference, not to resell or collect them.


There are two other reasons why the person might have been checking what
looked like normal, not particularly valuable books besides making a
list of material he/she was going to list on line but store at the
library. In my opinion, one of these is more likely based on my
experiences:

A. The person was a newbie who does not have enough experience to
recognize valuable (or potentially valuable) books on sight and so was
being slow & methodical in learning what was what.

B. The person was checking for sleepers that booksellers might have
missed. No bookseller knows every valuable book in existence, and it
has happened that I've pulled good stuff from a library sale after the
other booksellers have been through it, but this has not been common and
has been limited to specific books in niche markets I knew from
experience would sell quickly and highly. I certainly could not support
myself on such books since they happen along so rarely.


Or both together.

I once went over a table of books after a number of dealers had been through it,
and picked up a first edition of Wilfred Owens's poetry. Apparently, the others
were not up on the fact that he was one of the famous Waar Poets of WWI.


Assuming there are some booksellers operating as I have described, it
is quite possible that they are not very successful. It is also
possible
that they are making enough money to make it worth their while.

The latter case probably happens about as often as winged monkeys
make their exit from one's nether regions. Having assisted a
bookseller who was hunting for inventory at library sales in the face
of other booksellers doing the same thing, I know that such a
possibility is not worth considering for someone who's planning on
eating based on the results.


If you don't mind sharing your experiences, I'd like to know more about
how the bookseller you assisted operated at library book sales, and how
they operate in general at book sales.


Since she has passed away and her business is being sold off, I don't
see any reason not to. If I decide to enter the bookselling business
myself, my supply won't be based on library sales. Bear in mind that
these are MY experiences, not necessarily a universal manner in which
they operate, though I would be surprised at any significant and
widespread variance.

A good bookseller knows which libraries tend to end up with the best
donations and thus which ones are worth spending time exploring. Usually
each bookseller will have some area in which they have more expertise
and so will concentrate on such books, so among several booksellers
you'll usually have enough to cover the majority of interests at the
better library sales. Often, they will strive to be one of the first
ones in the door if they can to get first look at the tables or shelves.

Depending on the bookseller's skill, they'll either quickly skim the
rows and pluck out the good stuff with dispatch, or where they're not
sure they will just grab things they think are worthwhile and make a big
pile, then go through and check them in more detail, either through
technology (e.g. laptops or Amazon scanners) or their own evaluation
where they don't trust a rapid glance enough. They will then return to
the library shelves or tables the books they have decided or discovered
are not worth buying.



You should see the feeding frenzy at the Glastonbury, Connecticut library book
sale. It is held outside on the lawn of the library. The sale starts at 9:00
am, so by 8:45, hhundreds of people have encircled the tables outside the start
line. At 9:00 sharp, a librarian sounds a horn or rings a bell, and everyone
charges. Images of a movie I saw in the 50s about the great land rush with
settlers' wagons wrecking themselves in the headlong dash always come to mind at
that moment. One has about five minutes to find books other than those of niche
interest.


Francis A. Miniter

Francis A. Miniter wrote:

You should see the feeding frenzy at the Glastonbury, Connecticut
library book sale. It is held outside on the lawn of the library. The
sale starts at 9:00 am, so by 8:45, hhundreds of people have encircled
the tables outside the start line. At 9:00 sharp, a librarian sounds a
horn or rings a bell, and everyone charges. Images of a movie I saw in
the 50s about the great land rush with settlers' wagons wrecking
themselves in the headlong dash always come to mind at that moment. One
has about five minutes to find books other than those of niche interest.

Apparently the library encourages this by sounding a horn or ringing a bell.

Frankly, one time at a book sale like this is more than enough for me.
(It seemed like this in Princeton one year, and that was a *small* sale!)

Bleh.

Let's remember that the goal of a library book sale is to raise money
for the library now. A book might sell for $50 if the right person sees
it but may sit on the shelf for years before that happens. The library
would probably rather sell it for $2 now and not worry about storing it,
etc. Our library has a continuing book sale, but certainly cannot put
all the books out at once, so books that don't sell for a while get
cycled into the back room and replaced with other books. This system
does not work well with the idea of pricing by market value.

--
Evelyn C. Leeper
Virtue is more to be feared than vice, because its excesses
are not subject to the regulation of conscience. -Adam Smith

"Evelyn C. Leeper" writes:

Our library has a continuing book sale, but certainly cannot put
all the books out at once, so books that don't sell for a while get
cycled into the back room and replaced with other books. This system
does not work well with the idea of pricing by market value.

Based on this remark, I am now convinced that a bookseller operating in the
manner I described would not necessarily have access to the books, even if
the sale is continuous and the book is not purchased by other patrons. I
think that adequately shoots down my theory without having to do any
computer simulations or field studies. The stochastic modelling problem
associated with my hypothesis about the bookseller's modus operandi is,
however, of independent interest as a mathematical problem, and I'll
keep thinking aobut it for its own sake. That won't be appropriate to
discuss here, so I'll pursue that on newsgroups devoted to statistics.

Anyway, I consider my original question to be completely answered. Thanks
for all the helpful input in this thread.
--
Ignorantly,
Allan Adler
* Disclaimer: I am a guest and *not* a member of the MIT CSAIL. My actions and
* comments do not reflect in any way on MIT. Also, I am nowhere near Boston.

Some Guy writes:

There are two other reasons why the person might have been checking what
looked like normal, not particularly valuable books besides making a
list of material he/she was going to list on line but store at the
library. In my opinion, one of these is more likely based on my
experiences:

A. The person was a newbie who does not have enough experience to
recognize valuable (or potentially valuable) books on sight and so was
being slow & methodical in learning what was what.

B. The person was checking for sleepers that booksellers might have
missed. No bookseller knows every valuable book in existence, and it
has happened that I've pulled good stuff from a library sale after the
other booksellers have been through it, but this has not been common and
has been limited to specific books in niche markets I knew from
experience would sell quickly and highly. I certainly could not support
myself on such books since they happen along so rarely.

These explanations are quite plausible.

Allan Adler wrote:
If you don't mind sharing your experiences, I'd like to know more about
how the bookseller you assisted operated at library book sales, and how
they operate in general at book sales.

Since she has passed away and her business is being sold off, I don't
see any reason not to. If I decide to enter the bookselling business
myself, my supply won't be based on library sales. Bear in mind that
these are MY experiences, not necessarily a universal manner in which
they operate, though I would be surprised at any significant and
widespread variance.

Thanks for sharing these experiences.

they will just grab things they think are worthwhile and make a big
pile, then go through and check them in more detail, either through
technology (e.g. laptops or Amazon scanners) or their own evaluation
where they don't trust a rapid glance enough.

What is an Amazon scanner? Where does one get them?

Though I have to say that having an iPhone is now
going to make it even easier to pick out the good stuff in advance, but
also take some of the excitement out of the process. It'll also make it
even harder to find sleepers, as they can be looked up relatively easily
now.

I've heard of iPods but not of iPhones. How does one use it to pick out
good stuff?
--
Ignorantly,
Allan Adler
* Disclaimer: I am a guest and *not* a member of the MIT CSAIL. My actions and
* comments do not reflect in any way on MIT. Also, I am nowhere near Boston.

Allan Adler wrote:
Some Guy writes:

[snip]

they will just grab things they think are worthwhile and make a big
pile, then go through and check them in more detail, either through
technology (e.g. laptops or Amazon scanners) or their own evaluation
where they don't trust a rapid glance enough.

What is an Amazon scanner? Where does one get them?

They are little hand-held devices that read a barcode on a book with an
ISBN and displays what the going price is on Amazon. I've seen them in
the hands of people a few times at sales.

I don't know if they are sold by Amazon or a third party, but we
eschewed them for a couple of reasons, one being that we were more
interested in certain pre-ISBN books anyway.

Though I have to say that having an iPhone is now
going to make it even easier to pick out the good stuff in advance, but
also take some of the excitement out of the process. It'll also make it
even harder to find sleepers, as they can be looked up relatively easily
now.

I've heard of iPods but not of iPhones.

You're joking, right?

How does one use it to pick out
good stuff?

Nowdays many phones and PDAs have Web browers, but they are usually
mini-browsers which have to cut down drastically on the way information
is displayed, and in some cases cannot display certain sites at all, so
their usefulness for spot-checking prices at book sales is limited.

The iPhone has a full-featured Web browser and is zoomable, so you can
get to many of the other book sites to look up potentially valuable
books and find out what it's worth before plunking down your fifth of a
sawbuck.