I am rater amused by all the messages about this subject. <s>

It seems that some people think that these magazines should be given away for free. Personally, I do not care if someone thinks they want to sell them. I'd rather they are sold than thrown away. This assumes that they came from a dumpster of course. We would certainly be rather unhappy if someone sold issues we sent out as free samples ;-) - Generally free samples go to user groups.

A number of people here mentioned that we should be getting unsold issues back. This is in fact not the case. We do not get unsold issues. Unsold issues (or at least the ripped off cover) generally gets returned to the distributor(s), but publishers actually would have to pay to get them back. This is generally rather expensive so small publishers like us usually rely on the "big boys" as well as random and surprise buy-backs to keep distributors honest. The cost of doing this however is so great that it would be cheaper to buy them from Bill ;-)

Also, individual stores would not get boxes of magazines that they would throw out. Quantities ordered by individual stores are generally relatively small and bundled together with other magazines from the same distributor. So this had to be a promotional batch somewhere. (How did a store get a promotional batch... hmmmm....?)

In any event: It amuses me that someone would search through dumpsters to find CoDe Magazines. <s> (Did they leave Visual Studio mags behind? <s>). One can order the magazines of eBay and buy 5 bucks (shipping included) or go to the next Barnes and Noble and pay $5.95. Of course, one could always buy a subscription and therefore get a subscriber discount.

But this of course is a back issue. Back issues are $7.95. So this makes Bill's offer a bargain. Although one always has to live with the fact that the copy on the shelf came out of a dumpster <s>.

But perhaps Bill has a good business idea here. Perhaps we should pick it up and do CoDe Magazine special collector's editions: The "Out of the Dumpster" edition. The "Been in the Bathroom" edition. For only a small premium, these could be yours. (We'd could even do a little dumpster or outhouse style cardboard collector's box that comes with them <s>). Personally, I seem to have developed a preference for the "Fallen into the Pool" edition.

But seriously: Having CoDe Magazine promoted in all kinds of ways is in our interest, and they will certainly do more for us on eBay than in a dumpster.

Markus