MathWorld website down!

http://mathworld.wolfram.com/

Ahhhgh! Looks like Weisstein is being sued by his own publisher! When I
first saw Wolfram hosting the site, I wondered what had happened to his
book, and the original site with its partial access setup. Wow.

-Carl

Carl Lumma wrote,

>http://mathworld.wolfram.com/

>Ahhhgh! Looks like Weisstein is being sued by his own publisher! When I
>first saw Wolfram hosting the site, I wondered what had happened to his
>book, and the original site with its partial access setup. Wow.

Ouch -- the Internet collides with the law. Does the free market dictate
that ultimately, the only stuff available for free will be junk?

>>Ouch -- the Internet collides with the law. Does the free market dictate
>>that ultimately, the only stuff available for free will be junk?
>
>Paul, I would challenge you: if you think [TROTS] has been a terrible
>thing, that your life and your access to powerful tools, free and
>otherwise, would be much improved without [TROTS], how about let's start
>up another list to debate the question?

It depends on how we define "free market". By probably the most common
definition, the answer to Paul's question is "no", since it is not the
_free_ market, but _the man_, which dictates that Eric take his site down.

OTOH, one could consider everything a free market, since _the man_ couldn't
survive if he wasn't doing something to compete. In that case, I believe
the answer to Paul's question is still "no". In fact, I think _the man_ is
on his way out, and a new value system where currency is highly abstracted
is on its way in... but it's just an educated guess.

The moral seems to be: never accept offers from publishers who turn web
sites into expensive paperbacks. For example: accustomed to the digital
domain, you get unsatisfied with the speed at which print media can be
updated... but your publisher will not allow you to put a newer version of
your work online... meanwhile, the book flops, and the publisher, believing
it can minimize losses, becomes downright territorial with your work...
leaving you with the mahogany kitchen set you blew your advance on.

-Carl

Paul H. Erlich wrote:

> Does the free market dictate
> that ultimately, the only stuff available for free will be junk?

No, it dictates that the only stuff available for free will be bait on the hooks of smart marketers. But this is OT. (Hey, "OT" was
not on the official list of acronyms. It means "Old Testament," of course.)

--
David J. Finnamore
Nashville, TN, USA
http://personal.bna.bellsouth.net/bna/d/f/dfin/index.html
--

It seems to be still available in various reproductions, such as
http://neuronio.mat.uc.pt/crcmath/math/math0.htm.

Shhhhhhhhhh!!!!