Post by EXO on Dec 30, 2017 9:17:48 GMT 8
I have just released Volume II of BLESS 'EM ALL, The 503rd Parachute Infantry Regiment.
The web is both strangely permanent and deeply impermanent, often in exactly the way you don’t like.
Websites are ephemeral, transitory beings, likely to disappear at the slightest wisp of late payment of their hosting fees. (It looks as if my attempts at getting a long term hosting guarantee have fallen in a heap, so no plans exist at this point for continuity of my websites. This proboards forum is hosted by a commercial provider, and so there's no guarantee of them staying around either - look at what happened to GeoCities when Yahoo! bought them out - Yahoo! succeeded in destroying the most amount of websites in the shortest amount of time, certainly on purpose, in known memory. Millions of files, user accounts, all gone. Pffft! GeoCities was for millions of people the first experience dealing with the low-cost, full-color, world-accessible website and all the possibilities this contained. That's where Corregidor Historic Society started. Phfft, gone in a commercial world. In more recent times, consider what Photobucket did to us all. So it's a commercial world, we understand. For that reason, I decided that I should make a permanent version of the BLESS 'EM ALL website, something that could survive a few decades on your bookshelf. Something you'd be proud to leave on your coffee table. Something you could read without the necessity of batteries.
That's what prompted me. But as is often the case, the reasons we start something often change in the course of our doing it.
“BLESS ‘EM ALL” is taking on the character of a hardcover reference series. It’s part of a major event in my semi-retired life to establish in print the history of the 503d PIR to fresh generations of "ROCK REGIMENT" veterans, their families and their friends.
VOLUME II, now released, follows the Regiment to Leyte and Mindoro, and sets up the preparation for the retaking of Corregidor.
It is now part of a Regimental Combat Team.
In the course of creating my websites, I've acquired images and copies of documents relevant to the 503d. Volume II contains most all of the Orders packet for the Corregidor Operation, and the Battalion's S-1 Journals 21 September 1944 to 31 January 1945. Plus a lot else besides!
Vol II is published in Blurb’s large landscape format, 13 x 11 in (33 x 28 cm) and comes in at a whopping 308 pages. At this point, it is available ONLY in hard copy versions.
I have just released an Adobe PDF File Version of Volume II. The cost is $9.95. The pdf version is created in a screen resolution file size which is suitable for internet delivery, but not suitable for high-quality paper printing. It will show as good as your screen can show it.
If you are considering getting a hard cover version but are choking at the price, I suggest you get the pdf version and see if you like it. If you want a hard copy for your library shelf, then you can get one later. Couldn't be fairer than that!
I have no plans to release it as an ePub version at this time. The book's layout, fonts and layouts are designed and produced for high-quaity print production, and it would look completely crappy if converted to ePub format. This is because E-Versions must change the fonts to a limited selection of licensed fonts, and the new fonts all have different line spacings. It's theoretically possible to produce the book as a series of graphics, yes, but it would take me months - and it would interfere with my preparation of the next volume. If you're a cheap Charlie, read the website.
Now, about the price. $222. Yes, it is unreasonable. Here's why. "BLESS 'EM ALL" is released as print-on-demand product by the Blurb printing company based in San Francisco. The cost of print-on-demand books depends on their physical size and the number of pages which they contain, the type of cover, end-pages, etcetera. It's not so much like a book produced in their hundreds but 150 double-sided color prints hard bound. This book is hardcover, full color on quality paper, and presented in a large coffee-table size of 13 x 11 inch (33 x 28 cm) format, and delivers in at 306 pages. Blurb's actual printing costs are 95% of the price that you pay. You heard that right! To that, they add shipping. Complain to them, not to me, I have to pay their prices too.
I suggest you look for blurb coupon vouchers. These range from 10% to 50%. (I scored a 50% voucher on Black Friday, and a 40% voucher for Christmas/New Year. No one knows what they will have next week, you've got to hunt.)
Still interested? There's a teaser preview HERE. It can only be purchased through the publisher.
Websites are ephemeral, transitory beings, likely to disappear at the slightest wisp of late payment of their hosting fees. (It looks as if my attempts at getting a long term hosting guarantee have fallen in a heap, so no plans exist at this point for continuity of my websites. This proboards forum is hosted by a commercial provider, and so there's no guarantee of them staying around either - look at what happened to GeoCities when Yahoo! bought them out - Yahoo! succeeded in destroying the most amount of websites in the shortest amount of time, certainly on purpose, in known memory. Millions of files, user accounts, all gone. Pffft! GeoCities was for millions of people the first experience dealing with the low-cost, full-color, world-accessible website and all the possibilities this contained. That's where Corregidor Historic Society started. Phfft, gone in a commercial world. In more recent times, consider what Photobucket did to us all. So it's a commercial world, we understand. For that reason, I decided that I should make a permanent version of the BLESS 'EM ALL website, something that could survive a few decades on your bookshelf. Something you'd be proud to leave on your coffee table. Something you could read without the necessity of batteries.
That's what prompted me. But as is often the case, the reasons we start something often change in the course of our doing it.
“BLESS ‘EM ALL” is taking on the character of a hardcover reference series. It’s part of a major event in my semi-retired life to establish in print the history of the 503d PIR to fresh generations of "ROCK REGIMENT" veterans, their families and their friends.
VOLUME II, now released, follows the Regiment to Leyte and Mindoro, and sets up the preparation for the retaking of Corregidor.
It is now part of a Regimental Combat Team.
In the course of creating my websites, I've acquired images and copies of documents relevant to the 503d. Volume II contains most all of the Orders packet for the Corregidor Operation, and the Battalion's S-1 Journals 21 September 1944 to 31 January 1945. Plus a lot else besides!
Vol II is published in Blurb’s large landscape format, 13 x 11 in (33 x 28 cm) and comes in at a whopping 308 pages. At this point, it is available ONLY in hard copy versions.
I have just released an Adobe PDF File Version of Volume II. The cost is $9.95. The pdf version is created in a screen resolution file size which is suitable for internet delivery, but not suitable for high-quality paper printing. It will show as good as your screen can show it.
If you are considering getting a hard cover version but are choking at the price, I suggest you get the pdf version and see if you like it. If you want a hard copy for your library shelf, then you can get one later. Couldn't be fairer than that!
I have no plans to release it as an ePub version at this time. The book's layout, fonts and layouts are designed and produced for high-quaity print production, and it would look completely crappy if converted to ePub format. This is because E-Versions must change the fonts to a limited selection of licensed fonts, and the new fonts all have different line spacings. It's theoretically possible to produce the book as a series of graphics, yes, but it would take me months - and it would interfere with my preparation of the next volume. If you're a cheap Charlie, read the website.
Now, about the price. $222. Yes, it is unreasonable. Here's why. "BLESS 'EM ALL" is released as print-on-demand product by the Blurb printing company based in San Francisco. The cost of print-on-demand books depends on their physical size and the number of pages which they contain, the type of cover, end-pages, etcetera. It's not so much like a book produced in their hundreds but 150 double-sided color prints hard bound. This book is hardcover, full color on quality paper, and presented in a large coffee-table size of 13 x 11 inch (33 x 28 cm) format, and delivers in at 306 pages. Blurb's actual printing costs are 95% of the price that you pay. You heard that right! To that, they add shipping. Complain to them, not to me, I have to pay their prices too.
I suggest you look for blurb coupon vouchers. These range from 10% to 50%. (I scored a 50% voucher on Black Friday, and a 40% voucher for Christmas/New Year. No one knows what they will have next week, you've got to hunt.)
Still interested? There's a teaser preview HERE. It can only be purchased through the publisher.