Hello

[GrimFinger]

Grim,

I think you should keep them. Also old pbm rulebooks and such. You could be the repository for all things pbm. The Smithsonian of sorts. I also have most all of the Paper Mayhems, some Gaming Universals a few 'Who's Who in PBM', all of which I am willing to give to you. Even the first 3 or 4 issues of 'Nuts and Bolts of PBM' if I can find them.

They're like old friends but I know when I'm gone they'll end up recycled or trashed. Then one day maybe you will find someone to pass the pbm torch to who will continue to collect and protect these 'artifacts'! You could be the first curator of the pbm museum. Can't be anymore work than you're putting into this already. Well, maybe it can...........

We live close enough that we can meet and hand off the magazines if you choose.

Nazareth

Back in 2011, in an editorial titled, "Will the real King Midas of Play By Mail please stand up?," I posted about a PBM Museum. Here is what I aid:

Maybe what we need is a PBM Museum, of sorts, an archive to preserve the DNA of PBM gaming. That's pretty much an exercise in wishful thinking, though. It would probably receive less visitors per year than the largest ball of twine. Perhaps the Internet shall have to suffice to serve as curator for the museum that never was.

There are a number of things that I would be willing to scan and to post online, that are PBM related, but I have no innate desire to step on anyone's copyright or trademark toes, if you know what I mean. But, the sum totality of all things PBM related that I possess in physical form would be smaller than a garden gnome.

SOURCE: http://playbymail.net/mybb/showthread.php?tid=314


In 2013, I mentioned a PBM Museum, again, in an editorial titled, "Where We're Heading." In it, I said the following:

It would be really nice, if there were the equivalent of a PBM Museum, even if it were only an online one. However, trying to look at things in a manner that is realistic, I suspect that none of us will ever be quite so lucky as to have a PBM Museum at our convenience.

Of course, there's no grand conspiracy to keep such a thing from ever happening. Rather, those individuals best suited to making it happen are either dead or disinterested or have simply never given such a thing a thought.

SOURCE: http://playbymail.net/mybb/showthread.php?tid=727

A little over a week later, I happened to encounter the start of a PBM Museum online, which I posted about in a PBM Probe announcement.

SOURCE: http://playbymail.net/mybb/showthread.php?tid=741

That PBM Museum is located here:

http://www.overthecable.com/index.php?p=...B-M-Museum

The key to a PBM Museum is, in my considered opinion, the museum containing electronic archives of PBM magazines. It's all fine and dandy for someone, whether myself or someone else, to be the recipient of a lost of old PBM magazines - but, if others can't enjoy the museum's "collection," then what good is it? It would be more akin to a doomsday archive than an actual PBM museum.

Who holds the copyright to such artifacts? Really and truly, I have no clue. If someone asserts that they hold the copyright, but then it turns out someone else actually does, it creates a precarious dilemma for the museum's curator - if someone wants to become a legal headache.

My current personal collection of old PBM magazines in hard copy format (paper) is the equivalent of about two good handfuls. To me, they make excellent food for thought. It's been very helpful to me, in creating this website, in creating the PBM Wiki, and in creating Suspense & Decision magazine.

The reason why the relatively few copies of Paper Mayhem magazine that I have in my possession have not long since been scanned and posted online, for one and all to enjoy, is due to the simple fact that no one who holds the copyright to them has granted me permission/authorization to do so.

I look at the BoardGameGeek website, and I cannot but help to stand in admiration at the resource for board gaming that it has become to the entire world. PBM gaming has nothing even remotely resembling it, to serve as a resource that promotes the hobby and the industry of PBM gaming.

In fairness, though, there's likely nowhere near enough old PBM magazine material "out there" to create an equivalent PBM related resource. Maybe I am wrong about this, but there is certainly ample material still in physical existence that at least a good portion of it could be electronically archived - provided a cooperative spirit and a willingness to make it happen transcended the individuals who hold the relevant copyrights.

But, I dare say that, in order for such to become a reality, numerous PBM personalities from PBM days of olde would have to be willing to communicate on this subject. Yet, even recent attempts to communicate with various PBM personalities from of old has met with, at most, mixed and limited success.

So, from my perspective, I tread an imperfect world. This site, the PBM Wiki, The Hyborian Tome, and even Suspense & Decision magazine is all, simply an attempt writ large on my part to craft a PBM resource, of sorts.

For some, PBM may bring bad bad or sad memories. For others, PBM may be part of a chapter that they have closed on their lives. David Webber and Carol Mulholland were more than just editors of PBM magazines. They were also informal ambassadors of play by mail. Me? I'm no ambassador. Accordingly, there are limits to what I can achieve, when it comes to crafting PBM resources for the public at large.