marktrade's work in progress

[marktrade]

32 minutes ago, kitsunebi77 said:

I'll shamefully admit I don't actually contribute anything useful to the Magazine Database.  I mean sure, I add the basic stuff like country, editor, page count and price whenever I add a cover or link a download to the mag DB, but I never take the time to add anything useful by typing up the magazine contents.  It's not something I look for myself (if the mag is available to download, I download it and find out the contents for myself; if it isn't available, knowing the contents does me no immediate good).  Still, I'm amazed by some of the detailed contents descriptions some people type up, and agree that doing so is an invaluable addition to the site.  Unfortunately, I'm too lazy (or too busy adding other content to the site, usually).

I'd say you've contributed quite a lot, particularly with Famitsu. I think you even agree that we have the most comprehensive Japanese magazine DB on the net, and we've just started!

[Areala]

2 hours ago, kitsunebi77 said:

I'll shamefully admit I don't actually contribute anything useful to the Magazine Database.  I mean sure, I add the basic stuff like country, editor, page count and price whenever I add a cover or link a download to the mag DB, but I never take the time to add anything useful by typing up the magazine contents.  It's not something I look for myself (if the mag is available to download, I download it and find out the contents for myself; if it isn't available, knowing the contents does me no immediate good).  Still, I'm amazed by some of the detailed contents descriptions some people type up, and agree that doing so is an invaluable addition to the site.  Unfortunately, I'm too lazy (or too busy adding other content to the site, usually).

I think the main difference is that anybody can add to the database. Not everybody can scan magazines. I'm happy to type up and index a magazine because it's really the only way I contribute to the site. My flatbed takes far too long to scan images for me to be a contributor of more than cover scans and the occasional little thing like the Tomb Raider Hint Book I did earlier.

Bottom line: if you're scanning, you're doing so much more than the rest of us it's not even funny. I don't care if you never touch the DB except to link a new upload and cover image. You guys can "set your own hours" in that regard.

*huggles*
Areala

[Phillyman]

16 minutes ago, Areala said:

think the main difference is that anybody can add to the database. Not everybody can scan magazines. I'm happy to type up and index a magazine because it's really the only way I contribute to the site.

Exactly, everyone can choose their own path at Retromags. If you want to scan, scan.....if you want to edit, edit.....if you want to upload missing covers, index a magazine, add db info, upload adverts, post new topics on the forum, help new members get started.....it all helps in the end.

[Sean697]

On 2/10/2017 at 11:53 AM, marktrade said:

I've been experimenting with using my iPhone camera on a stand to "scan" some pages. I was thinking it might be useful for pages that are printed in some special way, like holograms or reflective coloring, or with posters that don't go through my scanner well. It's actually possible to use the panorama feature on the iPhone to get a picture of a long poster by keeping the camera stationary and just moving the poster underneath the camera. It takes some practice and I'm still working on it.

However, I'm definitely going to start using my camera more often to document the appearance of magazines still sealed in their original bags. @Sean697 recently sent me some he wanted scanned and I've been procrastinating on them, but I know for sure that before any scanning I want to get good pictures of them before taking them out of their bags. What sort of standard should I be shooting for, though? Natural lighting? Midday or dusk? Black or white background? I don't know, there's definitely an art to it with room for differing perspectives.

I did this to properly capture a shiny foil card page on a recent scan. I'm sure you can get some nice results. I used an LED desk light (around 6500K? Maybe, I'd have to check.) to get adequate lighting. There are plenty of panorama and stitching programs out there. Do I think a magazine in a sealed bag needs documenting? Probrably not. But it doesn't hurt right? For me a sealed bag means all the inserts will be scanned and it's a definitive copy, and the pages will be generally pristine requiring little editing barring printing issues. I have quite a few bagged issues of EGM to scan.

[KiwiArcader]

According to marktrade's Patreon page he's finished scanning for good as he no longer has the desire nor will to continue.

@Phillyman - Are there any magazines you sent him that have not been scanned and made available even in raw format on Archive.org?

If YES I would think you should contact him asap and try and get them returned to you if you want them as he looks like he was going to give them away and Jason Scott over at Archive appeared to be making noises about acquiring them. 

It looks like he made this decision late October so the horse may have already bolted but it's worth checking.

It's a shame it's come down to this but I think we all were expecting this given just how long he has been AWOL. At least he could have come here and offered his magazines/ scanners here at the time he made his decision though given the fact he had been sent magazines by Phillyman.. Of course, maybe you already know this as I haven't really been keeping across everything going on here in a while myself ......

[Phillyman]

11 hours ago, KiwiArcader said:

According to marktrade's Patreon page he's finished scanning for good as he no longer has the desire nor will to continue.

@Phillyman - Are there any magazines you sent him that have not been scanned and made available even in raw format on Archive.org?

If YES I would think you should contact him asap and try and get them returned to you if you want them as he looks like he was going to give them away and Jason Scott over at Archive appeared to be making noises about acquiring them. 

It looks like he made this decision late October so the horse may have already bolted but it's worth checking.

It's a shame it's come down to this but I think we all were expecting this given just how long he has been AWOL. At least he could have come here and offered his magazines/ scanners here at the time he made his decision though given the fact he had been sent magazines by Phillyman.. Of course, maybe you already know this as I haven't really been keeping across everything going on here in a while myself ......

Yes I sent Marktrade two boxes of A3 sized magazines. I am unsure of what has been scanned thus far, because I sent those magazines back in March 2016. I believe Marktrades last upload to Retromags was in December 2016, and then he started only uploading to Internet Archive, which I have not kept up with. As for magazines he has not scanned, if Jason is going to scan them great, but how long will they sit before that happens? Jason seems to have his hands filled with other preservation projects, so personally I would rather see if we can get them shipped off to you (KiwiArcader). I still have no way to preserve A3 magazines, perhaps between You, MarkTrade and myself we can do a three way split to get the magazines into your hands?

Just a thought

[KiwiArcader]

It depends on how many over sized mags he has and if he hasn't already got rid of his collection.

He put his comment up late October but never mentioned anything here at all, so it's quite possible they're already gone. That would be a bit rude given if they came from you, you would think he'd have made some attempt to see what you wanted done with any remaining issues still to be scanned.

At least you only sent a couple of boxes. Meppi has received dozens of donations going by his website forum over the years and what with his ongoing health issues and scanner problems there's likely ZERO chance of people ever seeing their donations scanned in full, or even part thereof. That's the problem with one man bands and I include myself in this comment (Meppi is NOT a target of this comment) but if something happens (illness, lack of desire to continue, hardware problems etc) and they decide to give up THEY end up with physical mags while the donators never see the digital versions they thought they would. And in a worst case scenario, as is playing out with marktrade at the present time, they may sell off, ship on, or even dump their collections including those received as donations.

That is rude in my opinion. Unless the person dies in which case that really is GAME OVER!!  

[kitsunebi]

3 hours ago, Phillyman said:

As for magazines he has not scanned, if Jason is going to scan them great, but how long will they sit before that happens?

Oh, does Jason Scott actually scan magazines?  I thought he just uploaded mags he downloaded from other sites.  None of the mags he's uploaded at archive.org have himself listed as their creator.  For the record, Jason Scott's post on marktrade's Patreon page made no statement of intent to acquire the mags for the purpose of scanning, he simply said he'd be happy to take them off of marktrade's hands.

[KiwiArcader]

2 minutes ago, kitsunebi77 said:

Oh, does Jason Scott actually scan magazines?  I thought he just uploaded mags he downloaded from other sites.  None of the mags he's uploaded at archive.org have himself listed as their creator.  For the record, Jason Scott's post on marktrade's Patreon page made no statement of intent to acquire the mags for the purpose of scanning, he simply said he'd be happy to take them off of marktrade's hands.

All Jason Scott has done as far as I am concerned is rip off my websites magazine content and upload them himself to archive.org without once acknowledging where he got them from so yeah, fat chance he'll scan them himself going by that modus operandi......

[kitsunebi]

I agree that taking donations and not scanning them would be rude, although I suppose it's up to the donor to decide how promptly they expect them to be scanned before they get annoyed.  These things take time, so as long as the person accepting donations appears to be continuously making some progress, I see no reason for alarm.  I seem to recall pictures of a trunkful of boxes full of mags donated to Philly a while back, most of which have yet to be scanned, I believe.  But presumably they will be at some point, and certainly Philly hasn't announced his intentions to abandon scanning entirely or a desire to give away his collection, so there isn't any cause to be offended like in the case of marktrade.

I could be reading too much into it, but I felt that marktrade sort of wrote us off for some reason once his Patreon was up and running.  He stopped posting in our forums, and throughout the entire ordeal with his injuries and ultimate decision to give up scanning, he never once checked in to share his problems with us or inform us of his intentions (not even to assure us that he was, in fact, not dead, in the "whatever happened to marktrade?" thread ).  So he may not be amenable to organizing anything with us, even if he hasn't already given everything away to someone else.

[KiwiArcader]

Yeah, I don't know what happened that made him give up on Retromags but I personally surmise it may be because almost no-one other than myself took any of his raw scans that he made of PC Gamer, Super Play, Play and other titles and edited/compiled them into finished product until recently when a couple of Game Player issues were processed.

That might have been a kick in the teeth as far as he was concerned hence concentrating on archive.org. As you say, we've had no contact from him at all since March 2017 so he's certainly miffed about something!!

[kitsunebi]

49 minutes ago, KiwiArcader said:

Yeah, I don't know what happened that made him give up on Retromags but I personally surmise it may be because almost no-one other than myself took any of his raw scans that he made of PC Gamer, Super Play, Play and other titles and edited/compiled them into finished product until recently when a couple of Game Player issues were processed.

That might have been a kick in the teeth as far as he was concerned hence concentrating on archive.org. As you say, we've had no contact from him at all since March 2017 so he's certainly miffed about something!!

If that's the case, I feel he vastly overestimated helpfulness of the general public.  The few of us willing to scan/edit are already doing so, and don't have time to be editing other people's scans as well.  Expecting some random Joe Leecher to pause from their downloading to edit a batch of raws would be madness.

The only way I would ever upload raws would be if I needed to dump my collection fast for some reason.  Since scanning is so much faster than editing, I could scan a bunch in a hurry, but editing it all would be an impossible task, so I might well just upload the raws and hope for the best.  But I would certainly never expect any of it to actually get edited, unless I did it myself, that is.

[KiwiArcader]

I continue to edit and release scans of his issues of Play and will continue to do so until they are all done but yeah, it's certainly been the case that almost no-one else has fronted up. Pretty pathetic when you look at the volume of people taking from the site that none have the resilience to edit a magazine. That's typical of the leeching public though.... continue getting something for no effort even if the place collapses due to burn-out of the few members doing the work.

If it gets to that point with my site I will simply take it down or make it private while continuing scanning for my own benefit and the other scanning members only. At the end of the day I owe nothing to leechers who contribute nothing towards the site. This year is make or break for me too I think.

[kitsunebi]

I actually have no problems with people downloading without ever contributing anything.  I don't expect them to - this @%$# is hard work - only a crazy person would do it

I just wish more leechers would take a second to say thanks now and then, or even just say "hey" in the forums.

[KiwiArcader]

Like I said, this year might be the one that breaks the camels back for Kiwis.World.

Donations are negligible and if my scanner bellies up I have no financial means to replace it so it will be game over at that point as the idea of going back to a flatbed scanner sends shivers down my spine!!

I agree with you, doing this stuff is not a walk in the park. It's also expensive when equipment is factored in (just replacing pick/brake roller consumables on the scanner is nearly $200) and it's getting to the point now where I'm struggling to justify the costs to my wife when we have a mortgage to pay and not enough donations to cover expenses.

[kitsunebi]

Yeah, but you've got enough people scanning for you that it would be worthwhile keeping the site up even if you yourself stop scanning.  It still won't be any cheaper to keep it running, but at least you'd have a $#$%load more free time.  The wife wouldn't mind that, at least.

If you truly do decide to shut down, hopefully you give fair warning so that I have time to use my super shape-changing powers to become this guy before it's too late:

[KiwiArcader]

Hahaha!! Yeah .... no worries although as you have provided scans you'd be on the list of people that could access the closed site anyway if I went down that path. That's a last resort. I'm hoping I get a few donations to assist with scanner consumable costs and that the scanner keeps going.

Any donations of mags from people will get scanned one way or the other.

I don't believe in cutting and running while having outstanding copies of magazines someone has paid postage costs to get them to me. Currently that amounts to approx 13 issues of Computer Games: Strategy Plus, 15 or so of Computer Pilot, and 25 issues or so of PC Gamer (USA) from a Retromags member sent after such a long time that I lost track of who it was that sent them to my brother in MD who then forwarded them on to me (I paid the shipping costs of that lot ($150.00US)) with another box still to come.

Those are my absolute priority at the present time as you can probably tell from the recent releases of PC Gamer on my site. Expect to see releases of these titles almost exclusively from me until I have them all finished and online.  Of course, any other magazines donated and sent to me while be added to that list as well.  Hopefully, variety on the site will come from scans from the other guys.

[kitsunebi]

While vacationing in the states, I picked up a package of 20-something donated mags, so I'll also be focusing on those for the most part in the year ahead.  Even if I decided to quit and burn all of my Japanese mags in a giant bonfire, I'd at least finish those donated mags before I do.  To act otherwise would be a pretty dick thing to do.

[marktrade]

On 1/1/2018 at 12:14 PM, Phillyman said:

Yes I sent Marktrade two boxes of A3 sized magazines. I am unsure of what has been scanned thus far, because I sent those magazines back in March 2016. I believe Marktrades last upload to Retromags was in December 2016, and then he started only uploading to Internet Archive, which I have not kept up with. As for magazines he has not scanned, if Jason is going to scan them great, but how long will they sit before that happens? Jason seems to have his hands filled with other preservation projects, so personally I would rather see if we can get them shipped off to you (KiwiArcader). I still have no way to preserve A3 magazines, perhaps between You, MarkTrade and myself we can do a three way split to get the magazines into your hands?

Just a thought

I believe I've scanned all of them, but not edited them.

I contacted Phillyman in October and asked him to let me know if there's any unfinished business I need to take care of and I never received a response. 

As for my lack of engagement here, I faced my mortality multiple times in 2017 and it was extremely disquieting. Figuring out how to live when I may die tomorrow and move forward from scanning is very difficult because it means giving up on a childhood dream and letting some people down, but I will do it because I have to.

Sean697's Playstation mags are still in my possession and I will take care of those. Most of Areala's magazines have already been uploaded and I will deal with those responsibly as well. I can't think of anyone else who has sent me mags that I haven't scanned. If there's anyone reading this who has unfinished business with me, please get in touch by PM'ing me.

[KiwiArcader]

Hiya mate.

Great to hear from you!!

I saw your posts on Patreon and understood your issues so it didn't worry me unduly that you were taking time out. It was just the last one that got me worried you may have still had some of Philly's mags yet to be scanned (only he could tell if that was the case) but I have to admit to a pretty bad attitude towards Jason Scott thanks to his tireless efforts at ripping off my sites mags and not acknowledging that at all when re-uploading them to Archive.org that I was miffed that he might have acquired Philly's mags sent to you.

I hope your health is or gets better really soon!! Life is short and sometimes the surprises it throws at you can leave a bitter taste in your mouth. I've lived and am living that dream too.

Ironically it the website and the magazines I leave behind when I pass that I hope will remind people that there was a scanning kiwi once upon a time who made a small mark on the magazine preservation world.

[marktrade]

For what it's worth my advice is to talk to Jason and establish a formal means of recruiting his help instead of continuing bitterness and antagonism. I've managed to work well with everyone— you, Jason, Retromags, anyone willing to help. I have felt very lonely in that regard. It's depressing to see people ignore and resent each other's resources toward a common goal. Instead of seeing someone sharing your scans as a "ripping off," I invite you to see it as an effort to share the responsibility. You are regularly looking for better hosting. That is exactly the advantage Jason offers. Make an OldGameMags account on archive.org and drop a link in the description of every upload along with a donation link. You wish me good health, but it challenges my sanity that you bring such a grievance to me.

Maybe I am wrong and it is to your advantage to maintain a negative attitude. Maybe your name really will go down in history as a leader against other people trying to share your scans. I do not remember offhand the names of any scribes or librarians in history, or any monk that painstakingly copied the Bible by candlelight in medieval Europe. I tell people about about my scanning hobby and they're very bored by it. Even the people who are interested in gaming and gaming magazines look at me and wonder why I would put so much money and resources into it. After doing it for a couple years, I wondered the same and am finished. Game journalists are not exactly heroes to be remembered either (although they may have looked that way when we were younger) so, no, I don't think anyone will remember any of our names. None of us even use our personal names except for Jason and he's still very behind the scenes. He doesn't take personal credit and has publicly admitted to a kind of digital kleptomania. Frankly I'm thankful for it because it's a healthy trait in a librarian.

I have tried to lead the way toward legitimacy. There is legal precedent for earning money from scanning game magazines and transforming them into a searchable digital database. The only barrier is practicality. Do what you gotta go. Start patreons. Register as a nonprofit. Deduct your expenses from your taxes. This is neither immoral nor illegal. You're doing a lot of work and should get credit. You should also work together.

[Trinity]

10 hours ago, marktrade said:

(long time lurker, first time poster{I think}, before I start I'd like to thank RetroMags, Old Game Mags/Kiwi's World, MarkTrade, Out of Print Archive, RetroPDFs, Archive.org and every person who contributed and continue to do so!)

Mark, I could not agree more with your tidings of sharing towards a common goal. I also agree with Kiwi's need for some sort of credit for being the original source. Honestly, when it comes to getting these mags in digital form, I think that sharing towards a common goal wins out. That said, and I'm not trying to get anything going with the mods, if anyone out there would like to share with me any scans of GameFan and/or Game Informer, I am more than happy to take that hit(should it ever come) and post them over at Archive.org. Granted, what I've got up so far are just what I could find online(mostly from Scott P's collection on Flickr, which I cannot describe to you how long it took to acquire page by single page and then put back together, lol), but in doing so I know that a few other sites{wink} have their own scans they aren't or simply can't share. With RetroMags and Old Game Mags/Kiwi's World doing what they can on the safer side of the tracks, and our common goal of just getting these mags out there digitally, I'm happy to contribute by posting them on the other side of the tracks should someone have anything they'd like share.

https://archive.org/details/@trinity_mileena

[KiwiArcader]

I admire your candor and respect your willingness to say how you see things from your perspective. It's obvious that the last year has had an impact upon you and no-one really understands what a person is going through if they haven't been in a similar situation themselves.

You make an interesting point about legitimacy yet the fact is that we, you and I, and anyone else scanning magazines are committing copyright offences under current law. Unless we receive permission from the rights holders to do so we can be held accountable under said law if they decide to prosecute. I'm guessing you know that or else you would have been happy to use your real name. Jason gets away with that as he isn't running or doesn't own Archive.org and there exists some sort of Library of Congress umbrella protection for that particular site. There have been many cases of sites being prosecuted for making music files, ROMs, video available via 3rd party links where the owners of the sites have been handed down hefty fines and ordered to pay rights holders for theoretical losses. Most people use nicknames because of these and internet privacy issues. I know I do but anyone who has posted magazine donations knows my real name just as I know the real names of many of the scanning members of my site with whom I converse on a semi-regular basis and they know mine.

There are very few people doing what we do in the pursuit of magazine preservation. Forgetting about the sites that simply rip other sites content off and make them available and produce no original content themselves you would think at the very least that the people spending significant effort scanning content themselves would have the basic decency to acknowledge where the scans originated from when using other peoples scans. It's just pure decency and politeness. I could use scans from Retromags on my site and I have systems in place to identify where they came from should I choose to do so. Any scans of yours I make available I acknowledge you as the scanning person. I cannot stop people like Jason doing what they are doing using scans from my site elsewhere but I don't believe I should be happy that they choose to show no respect towards the scanning members of my site. In all fairness to Jason, others like David Haynes over at Bombjack.org do exactly the same thing and when asked won't let you host any of their scans either. Same goes for Meppi over at OoPA. We are indeed a fractured group, much like estranged family members......

Lastly, I have no issues whatsoever with how you choose to move your magazine collection on. They are your property and if you decided to burn them I'd happily say go for it. I've done that myself although they didn't burn well unless ripped apart first. My questions were purely around Philly's mags sent to you. I agree with you. He isn't the best communicator so my query was around whether there were any you hadn't scanned that could be returned IF required. That was all.

[Phillyman]

19 hours ago, marktrade said:

I believe I've scanned all of them, but not edited them.

I contacted Phillyman in October and asked him to let me know if there's any unfinished business I need to take care of and I never received a response. 

 

 

As I stated I am rarely over at Archive so I was unsure of what had been done. My only goal is seeing them digitized, whether that was via you and Archive, or KiwiArcader and Kiwis.world, it makes no difference to me. Of course I would love for them to be offered via Retromags, but I never force anyone to submit to this site. The magazines were paid with funds from the Retromags Slush fund, so as long as they became available, I was happy.

Yes, we did speak in October of 2017 once a member sent me what you had posted on your Patron page. However I felt it would be rude of me to immediately jump to "Did you scan everything I sent you, if not can you send it back?". I figured let me first check in with you, see how you are doing health wise, and then come back to the details of what you may or may have not scanned, and your plans. UNFORTUNATELY about 4 days after our chat via PM, my job of 3.5 years started bouncing paychecks. I was getting the run around from them, delays on a replacement check, then the replacement checks bounced. All in all I went 27 days without pay and had to finally pull out the "If you can't pay me for last week, why am I doing work for you today?". Well they did not like that and told me to scram, the rest of November was me calling attorneys and the Department of Labor to recoup my pay. I lost my health care, dental, everything. So I was scrambling to get doctor and dentists visits out of the way before my coverage lapsed. Then I went thru all our bills and canceled a ton of stuff so I could stay afloat.

Losing a job in October is bad because November and December are dead months for hiring, no one wants to start someone when most people are taking vacations. I just landed a job on the 28th of December and today was my second day. So with all of that, Retromags has plummeted to the bottom of my list at the moment. Even now that I have a job, my concentration is going in there and doing the very best I can, even if that means bringing work home to show my work ethic. Again Retromags is just on auto pilot at the moment until I get some checks under me and my job becomes more natural.

So I apologize for being absent and not responding earlier, but sometimes real life just gets in the way.

[KiwiArcader]

American healthcare is just about the worst in the world if you can't pay or your job doesn't include it. Okay, third world countries are possibly worse, but then again some are probably better.

Glad to hear you are finding your feet again Phillyman. Having been made redundant ... twice ... I know all too well what that's like. And when you are my age (55 yrs) I've found it doesn't matter what time of year you are looking for a job. Companies tend to want younger staff. I think they are prepared to trade age and work experience/wisdom for youth and the ability to make them work for peanuts.