In a message dated 11/21/2004 2:07:20 AM Mountain Standard Time, traverso@dm.unipi.it writes:
- assume that you want to quote a book that you have >>only in a paper edition; to quote it in your style, you need to manually >>count the paragraphs, both when quoting and when checking a quotation; wouldn't the standard way of quoting pages of a >>reference edition (usually, the only edition) be better?
Of course, you said:
Anne> Would not this serve most purposes?
Yes, most maybe, but not all. And most is not enough.
You said also
Anne> to other texts as well. (I hope my underlining shows up in Anne> all email.)
No, it doesn't. Here too you are assuming that other >>people use the
same tools that you use. A good tool is one that adapts itself to an unknown situation, and does not make assumptions. >>Discarding page numbers in reference works makes assumptions on >>other people's working ??methods; the result is a less flexible tool.
There's another problem here, that YOU are missing, and it is this: PG does not have control of all etexts. Whether the total number of free etexts online is 40,000, as I estimate, or 100,000, as Michael estimates, the fact remains that PG does not have all etexts, or a majority of etexts, or even a plurality of etexts. I keep track of every etext site I hear of, and I check all of them out. Only those few that post page scans, and there are very few of them, make original page numbers available. If I am looking for a book and I can find only page scans of it, I won't download it unless I desperately want it and can't find it anywhere else, because I don't like to fiddle around with putting the pages together to read. Some years ago I wanted a specific edition of the Qur'an, and had to download it sura by sura. It took me a lot more hours to put it together than I wanted to expend on that task. So a documentation method that works only for page scans and/or full texts that include page numbers is unusable for more texts than it is usable for Also, I don't want to say that all, or even most, reference books come in only one edition. My Oxford Guide to American Literature is fifth edition, and I'm almost certain there's now a sixth edition available. My Granger's Index to Poetry is eighth edition and I think it is two editions old; I know it is at least one. My Larousse English/German dictionary is dated 2000 and MIGHT be current, except for the fact that it uses the "new" German spelling, and I think I read online that the "old" spelling is back in use. Most astronomy, physics, biology, geography, and geology texts are out of date by the time they roll off the press, and by the time they make their way online they are so hideously out of date that anyone relying on them would be in trouble. Of the solutions proposed, the one I like best is the suggestion that the person doing the paper could include with it the URL of, or a link to, the specific reference book used, and to make sure it doesn't change, that person should put the source on his or her own Website and link to it there. But even THAT won't work for purchased ebooks. I think we'll probably flounder around for another ten to twenty years before a workable permanent solution is devised. But all the flaming and/or condescension in the world isn't going to help a bit. I apologize for my flaming yesterday. I try not to blow up but sometimes I do it anyway. Anne