89 lines
5.0 KiB
Plaintext
89 lines
5.0 KiB
Plaintext
Freedom:
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Use It or Lose It
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[Fred Woodworth]
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AFTER CONSIDERABLE thought, I have decided to begin a policy of not
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publishing reviews of books that carry ISBNs (International Standard Book
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Numbers). The reason is that these numbers, as I've been warning for
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several years, amount to a virtual license to publish (or at least to
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distribute what you intend to publish, which is the same thing) .
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In the issue for Winter 1989-90, I wrote that: It's easy to foresee
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a time when, in order to get an ISBN, you have.to pay a $5 fee. No one will
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complain very much. 'The fee is necessary for processing. ' Then it's $25.
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Tiny music magazines and newsletters perhaps can't pay it, but then their
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distribution is strictly local and free anyway, so they don't put up a
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fuss. Some time later, the fee becomes renewable every year, and goes up to
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$40, with some paperwork. Perhaps in time of war there's suddenly a loyalty
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oath on the paperwork, or in time of peace the publisher agrees to a review
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by the Local Anti-Pornography Committee or Mothers Against Drunk Driving,
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just to make sure that the valuable PRIVILEGE of using the ISBN isn't
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handed out indiscriminately to people who ENDANGER SOCIETY via their
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IRRESPONSIBLE writings...
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Two and one-half years later, the ISBN's presence not only is an
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imprimatur whose absence bars a book or magazine from over 90% of
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bookstores, but moreover, as predicted, the company that assigns the
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numbers is starting to demand
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hefty fees for doing so. A publisher of radical books and pamphlets, See
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Sharp Press, recently requested the granting of some additional numbers
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from the R. R. Bowker company, for some of See Sharp's upcoming issuances.
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Bowker responded that for this there would now be a fee: one hundred
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dollars.
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As a result, See Sharp had to drop the numbers on future pamphlets;
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but it will bite the bullet and continue to request numbers for its book
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issuances. Why? I asked See Sharp's proprietor, Chaz Bufe, this question
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and his answer was: "Fred, if I don't put the numbers on them, I can't
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distribute them. Bookstores will not take them."
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"A few bookstores still will," I replied. "Don't you think it would
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make sense to encourage those few, and show we're willing to boycott the
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others? Maybe if everybody in the alternative, radical, and small press
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would stand shoulder to shoulder on this, we could force them to back down
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before the thing gets so powerful that we won't have any way to resist at
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all."
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"Fred, I just can't. If I take the numbers off. I won't be able
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tosell any books."
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"Sure you will! Maybe not as many, but if we can beat this before
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it gets any worse. then you'd sell more again, AND have the pride of having
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fought and won against a truly arrogant kind of imposition, instead of
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meekly compromising principles. "
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"Look, Fred-do you have a driver's license?''
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"Yes."
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"Then you've compromised, too. What's the difference? "
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"The difference is that if I'm caught driving without one, I'll be
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arrested and, when they find out who I am, possibly beaten up or even
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killed 'resisting arrest' or 'assaulting an officer'. But nobody can arrest
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us for not using the ISBN- at least not YET."
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We had to agree to disagree. However, for this magazine (and, for
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that matter, my own LIFE), my absolutely unshakable policy is this: No
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compromise with any authority: that is, no giving in to mere threats of
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ostracism or economic hardship. Yes, if a cop points a gun at me and says,
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"Stand over there with your hands against the wall," I will stand over
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there with my hands against the wall. But I will not bow and scrape before
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people who don't even carry a gun.
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It may come to pass that every single bookstore, library and
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magazine-stand in the world requires an ISBN. The Post Office may demand
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that periodicals transmitted through it have the numbers. But even if I
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have to personally carry these publications to the doors of the readers,
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one by one, The Match will forever refuse to grovel as some corporate
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schemers grinningly hand out licenses to publish.
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Here then, is the policy of The Match on reviews: In the case of
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materials from allegedly radical publishers (anarchist, libertarian,
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atheist, freethinker, socialist, etc.), we will review only items that do
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not carry the ISBN. In the case of magazines or books from non-radical
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publishers, we may sometimes review (the difference being that alleged
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radicals ought to know better, and are therefore held to a higher standard)
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.
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If sufficient acceptable new issuances are not forthcoming, we will
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review older books that the reader can find in used-book stores. After
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all, the general practice of reviewing only new things, is fairly
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arbitrary, and is probably just a detestable excrescence of consumerism in
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any case. Reviewing old books then gives us a chance to really RE-view-or
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see again-works that may well have been too hastily set aside to make way
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for the galloping mediocrity of the latest fashion.
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from The Match! (Issue number 88, Summer 1993;
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Fred Woodworth, PO Box 3488, Tucson, AZ 85722; $10 / 4 issues)
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