Publishing the Forum
 

Hello,
After the recent discussions regarding authors and publishing in this field of study, I came to wonder whether information specifically uncovered or originally discussed on this forum has ever been published in hard-copies. This forum and the wonderful groups of people responsible for it have been a treasure of knowledge since the forum's conception. I understand there are Gigs worth of information in the archives, impractical to print them all, but could some of the stronger conclusions be published at some point? It seems to me that such an endeavour would greatly complement many of the existent literature on ethnographic edged weapons. I understand there are many complicated issues such as authorship and copyright, but perhaps some of the discussions could be published as collections of essays or some such format?
What better peer-review board than a group of people that spans the whole world, has access to most countries and their cultural institutions and comprises all age cohorts?

Regards,
Emanuel

That thought had passed my mind. Small books? East African Spears? Agree a coloured card background for pictures. All you need is a coordinator and the money, then what of the proceeds????? If any :D

Good Idea, would need some organising.

I wondered about a weekly/bi-weekly feature, where a particular type of weapon or a geographical area where edged weapons originate is discussed. Posting examples, info, and questions. What do others think?

Here Comes The Wet Blanket ...
 

Well , posts are considered as copyrighted by their authors so permission would have to be gained from all members past and present who's posts were utilised .

The collation would be a nightmare .

The publication would most likely receive a thorough savaging from some
quarters .

A subject of the week ; possibly in a sub forum ; in the main forum it would stifle general discussion of many disparate weapon forms .

Well said Rick.
Emanuel, this idea has come up many times over the years, and many of the threads included outstanding research, ideas and observations that brought about some great perspective on collected weapons. There was one monster thread on a Dutch naval (VOC) sword that went on for years!!!! Anybody remember Mikey and Shaver Kool !!! Auughhh!!!!
Although much of the material here is extremely informative, trying to encapsulate lengthy discussions would be horribly difficult. We always recommend that students of these edged weapons doing research or just trying to learn about a new acquisition simply use the search resource, or simply post. We never get tired of topics and always want to get those lurking to post....bring on the questions!!!

All the best,
Jim

Copyright is one thing. Another is to make such publish reliable, unitl you want make something for only small group of people. You should have science editor who should check all the informations to prove the author wasn't gone wrong. Please remember, we all have knowledge from very different sources. Some of them are from know or less known books, and aren't forum members authorship, but some of them are our and only our conclusions - there is a need to differ between those two and make appropriate notes. So I think that publish something from the Forum as it is, is quite impossible and dangerous for our reputation - don't get me wrong! Until we talk here everything is ok, but when you publish something even smallest error will be noticed and enhanced against us by critics.
But it would be good to gather us around some small periodic and publish some materials written as separate works by our members. Not forum texts but brand new written by exact members. Of course there is need of money, editors... etc, too, but then every author takes his responsibility for what is written, then would be a possibility to present systematic works, etc.
So the idea is brilliant but I would prefer to find other way then just gather internet texts.

In my case I used some of the thoughts from this forum on wider audience. I used mostly overall thoughts (many from know books I don't have, but quoted here) and only some of the individual conclusions, but I sent the emails to everybody involved with request of permission to do that. If someone wanted to stay in the shadow, I respected his decision.

And to be truth, I download some of the threads and I'm often returning to them refreshing my knowledge. I found this great forum very helpful so far and I always appreciate your comittment especially on my items :) especially when some of the informations are just unreachable for me. So let's work further and more!!!

Best
Michal

First of all, I doubt that there is a single large post-2003 publication journal in most modern university libraries that is not in the electronic form, i.e. I exagarate, but electronic publishing is a standard today.

Second, it is easy to find a "real" editor - a somewhat young,overly ambitious gentleman preferrably with a history or art Ph.D., who would like to have "blah-blah,blah-blah editor" on his CV.
Plus we will probably need someone really known in the community as a chief editor?
The tough part is to find qualified reviewers. There are a lot of topics for which it is impossible to find a good reviewer. I can write a review on magnetism since I am a reviewer at the corresponding IEEE section, but I am of too poor knowledge to be a review for anything else, am not I ?

However we may opt for the usual - reviewer not being from exactly the field of the submitted article, but simply someone who is respected in the community. He will check that the article looks ok, and then it is up to the author to swim with his work :).

On the other hand, I can't honestly say that big journals are doing any better job with respect to arms and armour - they often publish extremely strange ideas.

Finding authors is also tough - I mean even if we are to publish forum's ideas someone has to catalogue it and to write an introduction. Most of the research we do is looking at the stuff we bought, reading books, books and books, interrupted by googling around - nothing wrong with that, but how to avoid publishing essentially reprints from Astvatzaturjan ?

Last, but not least - ARMA, Oakeshott institute publications, Journals of arms collecting... We have some competition here, altough it is really strange that there is no arms and armour international journal per se... May be we really need to make one.

Slow down, I was was thinking something less bombastic more of simple catalogs with good but not necessarily all the argument, just the known facts, challenging ideas can be hinted at. Collation could be on agreement and contributing photos to an agreed format. If people are really worried about copyright why bother being a member of this forum, or is my world too simple?

Group Membership...(?)
 

Maybe, Group Membership could be introduced. ;) These can be broken down by different interest groups.

I assume that this forum software does support group membership. The Special Interest Groups could work together towards an objective set within the group.

For membership forum member need to be apply or recommend by another member. Published works could be accomplished within the forum topics of the special interest group. Just a thought. :)

I second that thought, something like the "Thai Weaponry group", "Arab Weaponry group", "Turkish Weaponry Group", "Japanese Weaponry Group", giving certain, well known members these traits and organising them into specialist groups by the site admin, and that way, more professional and specific descriptions and identifications can be made, while still these people would participate within discussions outside thier circle with no problem. Of course, mods and admin should also join such groups if any of them feels he has a certain field he's experienced with.

I would also support this idea, we could weekly discuss a new kind of weapon of a different culture and ethnic background, and this way, we forum members could enrich ourselves with knowledge on most weapons outside each of our interests.

Sub groups on the forum is not publishing. I think Sub groups narrow the learning process. Other forums have that.

I second that emotion. When this new board was created admins asked question about spliting that forum on few different groups, and the decision was against it.

Shaver Cool Jim !?! :eek:
"Slowly I turned ....... " :D
Man , that one would just not go away . :rolleyes:


Fellas , let's dump the idea of subforums ; as has already been stated they dilute rather than strengthen the discourse here .

As for publishing ; well it's not free ; it takes $$$$ .
Who's going to come up with that ; who's going to be the accountant and bookeeper , publisher , distributer and on ad infinitum ?

I think "mo' bettah" someone who wants to make a hard copy of info from here do all the work and finance it himself .
We are blessed to have this website that is of no cost to any member ; we are never solicited for funds.

Vikingsword is not a business by any stretch of the imagination nor does it want to be .

I do not support the idea of splitting the forum up, and creating tens of sub-forums, the reason why this forum is so succesful is that it is well administrated and moderated as it is, and no "blocs" can be created behind the scenes. As for "groups", I do support that idea, but if someone disagrees, its ok, Im not the owner of the forum you know ;) :)

Complicated Business this...
 

So it is too difficult and costly to assemble forum discussions into a coherent essay, hard to obtain the required authorisation and consent, and unwise to rely on non-academic and generally non-primary sources. At least the forum allows members to form their own ideas and potentially publish them.
I still like Tim's idea of a short periodical catalogue. A while ago there was a monthly calendar which presented a different weapon every time. Could that be expanded to present more information? It may remain in digital format or printed, and it wouldn't require a publisher -only a willing coordinator.
Michal raised a good point for me, how does one source/cite information from this forum? Does Vikingsword -or Dr.Lee Jones- hold copyright over the forum as well?

Regards,
Emanuel

Well, I would start with a small thing - all conferences publish their proceedings (again, I am talking about electronic publishing, not a hard copy). Can we start doing the same with Baltimore ?

Emanuel ,
What is your definition of "the forum" ?

Individual posts are considered the property of the member who made them .
Quoting within the confines of the forum itself is fine .

There are some though, myself being one, who might not enjoy having information they have imparted collated and condensed and presented as gospel on any subject due simply to the fact that much of it cannot be source verified or may be incorrect .

Now the forum requires no membership to read it ; it is open to all and therefore is open to criticism and or information mining by all .

There are some here who are currently writing books in various areas of arms study who would most likely cringe at having their information condensed and imparted to the world before they can do it on their own terms .

I personally see no reason to provide this stuff on a platter to be lapped up .
All the information imparted in this forum can be found with diligent use of the search function .

Kirill , the minutes of the Baltimore sessions are a whole different thing and I too would like to see them presented . :)

RE: SUBFORA
 

Hi Guys. It really comes down to what our needs are.

Multiple sub-fora are helpful (even necessary) on boards with large, diverse active posting memberships. Without them, you get so many discussions going in a single forum that the topics rotate off the first page faster than they can be read, and too many different topics to allow for easy, enjoyable reading.

This forum doesn't have the traffic necessary to justify multiple subfora. That day may come, but until then splitting up the discussions would have an undesired effect: I like being able to easily read threads about all different types of Ethnographic Arms and Armour.

After all, this forum's general topic is already specialized and represents a sub-group in the larger grouping of Arms and Armour. :cool:

Andrew, how about just creating one, non-academic pub. We currently have a few non weapon relaeted threads in the ethno-weapons forum which are off topic, but still, its fun to have these threads once in a while, and we do get them.

Copyright: As Rick said, the individual poster holds the copyright on what they each write. On the other hand, there is an overall copyright held by Vikingsword (AKA Lee Jones) on the overall forum in terms of its format and presentation.

Sub-forums: 'Nuff said.

Proceedings: A great idea. Artzi collated and distributed the papers presented at (I think) the second seminar, but it hasn't been done since because no one has had the time or resources to record "minutes." One thing we could do in the future is ask that each presenter provide at least a lengthy abstract of their talk, and preferably a paper, which we can publish here or to which we can at least link if the author wishes to host it elsewhere.

Publication in general: I see a need in the field for a collector-oriented publication on ethnographic arms and armor. I think that there is enough interest internationally for such a thing, and abundant author resources (perhaps for a quarterly publication). In fact, I would say that there is enough "backlog" just from what people have written here that several issues could be filled if people went back and put their postings into a more formal format. BUT, it is a huge commitment of time and energy even if it is to be published for free on-line. Personally, though I do write for a living (lawyers live by the written word, you know ;) ), I have no formal editorial or publishing experience and so wouldn't really know where to begin on a magazine. I think it is something we should continue discussing and brainstorming about, though, since I would love to see it happen.

Shaver Cool: :eek: http://www.vikingsword.com/ubb/Forum1/HTML/000140.html (then there was "Son of Cool:" http://www.vikingsword.com/ubb/Forum1/HTML/002059.html, and "Who's Afraid of Shaver Cool?:" http://www.vikingsword.com/ubb/Forum1/HTML/002059.html). The photos all seem to be gone, though.

Rick,
By forum I meant the framework that permits people to post their opinions and discussions, and the written words themselves. I wondered how the information gathered/posted on this forum was regarded legally and how it was/could be used, and you answered my questions.

I understand the concern of some members having their thoughts presented by others before them, and that is also why I started this thread. I fully appreciate the privilege we have of accessing the information on this forum free of cost or membership. I've been exposed to a world I knew only in fantasy and history, and for that I am grateful :)
I simply wanted to know if the information on this forum had ever been published on paper under the cover of Vikingsword or EEWRS and if there was any interest to do so. I now realise the many problems with such an idea and the futility of it.
So the Ethnographic Arms and Armour Forum is just an extended conversation between friends and it wishes to stay that way :D

All the best,
Emanuel

I am glad to hear the reaction to "proceedings idea" (I think it is repeatedly surfaces here).

First of all, publishing proceedings of once a year conference should be a very small job to do. You post submissions standards (accepted file formats, references, margins etc.), since our conference has only _invited_ talks it is not nessesary to peer review the submission, all is needed is a small editorial review, mostly technical in nature, lumping the submissions together and publishing them online. The editor will also be responsible for "reminding" the authors concerning sumbission deadlines etc.

I think that because we don't have an edged weapons journal, proceedings of this conference would be met with enthusiasm.

One more thing - there is such system as germanic publication model, where there are no referees, but each journal is a journal of certain society. Full fledge members of the society have the right to submit papers, both their own and of other people, with "... submitted by such and such" printed on the paper. This substitutes anonymous review process by a more personal interaction between the submitter and de-facto reviewer.

Concerning errors - a lot of Einstein's papers are highly erroneous. This gave him some troubles when he was young, but now - no one remembers these papers, only the ones that were right survived years of scrutiny.
In our community I think it should be the same - erroneous and weak papers will be forgotten, after may be a few angry debates here and there, but the interesting stuff shall preservere.

There is also the "letter/report/article" system used in some scientific journals (such as Science and Nature). "Letters" are pretty much published as-is, assuming they get past the threshold interest test of the editors; "reports" are published with only an editorial and internal review, but not outside peer reviewing; "research articles" go through the whole peer-reviewing process.

It is a way to get info out fast, basically, while at the same time conveying to the reader the degree of definativeness of the content.

This is pretty much the way I would handle it. I am the (so far) one-man committee for the speakers at the next seminar, and I am planning to float this among the invitees as an idea. There needs to be discussion first about what to do with them once they are in hand, of course. :) Stay tuned ...

This is all talk, I am a doer, I make things for my living. I cannot see why members cannot be invited to contribute pictures and knowledge to some kind of catalog. Obviously it would initially have to be electronic, I say am I with it :cool: Collectively we could produce some informative and impressive lists.

I believe we are overly complicating the exercise. To cover the breath of this forum in any sort of reasonable publication would mean to publish what amounts to an updated Stone's glossary. That does not require very detailed scholarly composition. We only need to catalog the examples on hand and hopefully prepare a short intro to each major area of interest. The key is to provide enough information and pictures, to adequately identify the relic; beyond that, the reader would be free to join on these forums for a more detailed discussion on their item.

n2s

Are you sure ? In my experience Science and Nature use the following system, which is btw somewhat atypical - first there is a 4-day or so long editorial review, which is usually based on politics (names on the paper, hotness of the topic etc.). Than if editor ok's the publication, it goes to reviewers, who will reply back in 3-5 months. These true for all types of articles.

Letter (aka correspondence), brief report and regular article define only the nature and length of the publication - in the first case for example it should be a response to something previously published in the journal and is being evaluated on such bases.

Rivkin: You may be right about the "reports," actually, but I am fairly sure "letters" don't get peer review. The peer input comes from the sometimes numerous and heated reply letters from others in the field. The editorial hurdle is still huge, however. If the editors don't think it is "good" enough or on a hot enough topic, or actually if they think it is too avante-garde, a submission dies an early death. Its like the fashion industry - the editors determine a priori what their audience wants. :rolleyes: Anyway, I just meant is to be an example of how there can be a teired approach to the publication process. There are, in fact, entire journals that are "pay to publish," where the paper receives virtually no peer review aside from whatever the editors feel needs to be changed.

Tim & not2sharp: I think what you are saying is that it would not be too hard to collate information from the forum into a more succinct and organized form, to be published however (on the web, or maybe as a compilation).

I agree, with one caveat. If that is to be done, it must be done by the original authors of the information. In other words, the people who have posted the information must be the ones to write it up in article form. Having a third party do it invites not only error and misinterpretation, but subversion of the original intent of the authors and probably (justifiably) resentment. But I actually would be happy to be a coordinator and editor for such an effort, if there is actual interest.

Here are a few possible topics:
-Wootz (several possibilities here),
-Tibetan weapons,
-Specific weapons or armor types, such as head axes, kris, pata, flyssa, barong, talibon, Moro armor, kampilan, mandau, kastane, laz bichac, etc., etc. (Lee has done good examples on takouba and kaskara, for example),
-keris, of course (there would need to be focus, though, such as on certain pamor or hilts),
-"Swords of the Prophet,"
-forging or smelting techniques,
-decoration techniques (inlay, koftgari, chasing, repousee', engraving, etching, etc.), both as unique to a particular area/culture, and as shared or separately used,
-Naga weapons,
-Taiwanese weapons,
-Ainu weapons,
-Cretan knives

There are of course, many, many other possibilities. Just think of the threads you have started, or questions asked by others to which you have responded (solely or along with others), and you basically could have a short article right there. And of course, co-authorship would often be appropriate. In a lot of cases it would almost just be a matter of finding a thread, and copying and pasting together what was written, with some editting to clean it up (again, with the cooperation, or at least consent, of the people who wrote the stuff if there was more than one). Voila', quicky info sheet on a discrete topic. I envision something meant to be informative and accessible, something to answer some specific or basic question, rather than an involved treatise or dissertation on a subject.

As an aside, if anyone were to start a magazine, I am sure there is already ample information right here on the forum for several focused articles.

Revising Stone: that is actually something I suggested years ago. :) I think it would be great to update the little pieces that Stone did on various weapons and armor types, but it would be a pretty big project. Still worthwhile, I think. There are any number of books in the field that are published under the original authors names, but are updated by others, sometimes by committees. "Remington's Pharmaceutical Sciences" is one example, "Bartlett's Familiar Quotations" and "Webster's Dictionary" are others. "Stone's Glossary" is a name recognizable enough to merit becoming part of the title itself. I think it would be a very cool project. One would need the permission and cooperation of whoever holds the copyright, however. Again, I would be happy & proud to be a general editor on that project. :D

In a real way, the Philippines and Continental SEA sections in the History of Steel catalogue are based on information that has been posted and discussed over the years on this Forum, since they were written by Forum members. Of course, the kinds of things I mentioned above don't need to be as comprehensive and elaborate as these are.

To be honest I don't know what their standard practise is, I can only state that my "letters" submissions have gone through some limited review. Concerning publication charges - most of the journals have them, although they are somewhat semi-voluntary novadays. The review process is still pretty much the same, whether you pay it or not.

P.S. On the other hand I am not really sure I submitted a letter. I remember I wanted to, but may be I just submitted a report...

Now, to "Revised Stone" and "collecting information in the forum" - what we can do is commision series of review articles (i.e. articles that are by definition focus on covering discussion already that already occured in the community) on the subjects covered in the forum, and then, if the number of review articles will be significant we can stich them together.
But in my opinion, it is better to start with review articles and in this case we will need a place to publish them.

Mark, Tim, n2s, and Rivkin, you guys really drew out in detail the sort of things I vaguely had in mind. :)
My impression of this forum was that it provided much more information than a glossary like Stone's. It seemed to me that a lot of new and unique conclusions were reached in the many threads on this forum and that many of them deserved publication (either by their individual authors or under the collective of this site if they so wished.)
One reason for my initial inquiry has to do with permanence -how long will we have access to this fine site and its digital content? I was thinking that a hard-copy journal or whatever such format could complement the archives of the forum and our downloads of the threads. Even if the journal were purely digital, its organized articles would perhaps be more easily read, printed and stored than long forum discussions.
I love this forum, but I would also like something tangible in my library that I can use without relying on my computer.

If these ideas meet further support, I gladly offer my help (for what its worth) with format, graphics or whatever is needed.
Emanuel