you cant sell what nobody wants

[P Prentice]

nonsense - a good dba is a piece of p**s, but turning that into something that resonates with joe public is the hard part -otherwise we would all have done it already

[Marc Berger]

Landowners don't have any choice though do they ? Either pay for any potential Archaeology or don't do any development.

No they have no choice which is great for us and we charge them for "doing" the archaeology. In this model http://planreg.towerhamlets.gov.uk/W...df&pageCount=1 society not only pays for the archaeology to be done but also pays the archaeologist that created the archaeology to make it available for society. That's part of the conditions of the job for which the archaeologist was paid. That was the public service economic model which society tried to make more efficient by commercialising archaeology in the planning regulations. Its that last bit about paying the archaeologist for their product when it was archived that society conveniently left out of the equation.

[Dinosaur]

nonsense - a good dba is a piece of p**s

Try telling that to the people who just regurgitate HER info - oh, and I've a corker where someone has concluded that its fine to build a motorway services in a field with part of huge Neo/EBA pit scatter across one end of unknown extent (and extensive IA/RB settlement just over the road, also of unknown extent), and a EBA barrow-field at the other, since cos the geophysics is a bit blank there's unlikely to be any significant archaeology in the bit in between - geophys is sh*t around there if they'd bothered checking (hardly any of the big IA/RB ditches showed up, for instance, despite being full of the usual stuff), and the pits wouldn't show anyway. How do these guys get away with it...

[Marc Berger]

good dba is a piece of p**s, but turning that into something that resonates with joe public is the hard part -otherwise we would all have done it already

Prentice "something that resonates with joe public is the hard part",really! Do you know of any example where somebody has tried? What's odd is that they are given away for free! You would have thought that that would be part of a winning formula with good old josephine public.

How do these guys get away with it.

how much dino were you charged to use the information in this wonderful DBa? In the real booky world normally somewhere like on the back cover is a recommended price along side gushing reviews. Did you ask for your money back? Did you write a review yourself and send it to the publisher or put it up on facebook that the author was a charlatan?

Now if the DBa had been a cd full of copied music tracks whoever had sold it would have been done for music piracy but you might have been able to move a ton of them before being caught. Maybe thats what we should do. There must be some music either because of their title or some turn of phrase that could be interfaced amongst the good stuff

Introduction: you ain't seen nothing yet

Author: Bob

Location: Watford gap

Bibliography: Prentice & Dino (eds)

[Dinosaur]

The DBA in question is on ADS actually - the author/author's company has already been paid for it, although I can't imagine why!

Cool! Me and PP getting published? :face-approve:

[Marc Berger]

How much did you pay for this regurgitate HER info dba is the point? What did you expect from something that is free on ads or where ever? It wasn't Caveat emptor.

[Marc Berger]

If you do a pre application evaluation and the client asks you to keep the results confidential Should you charge the client for your archive?

[Jack]

Jack - what's a cross-disciple and where can I recruit some? }

Grin, funny typo.

An angry follower?
A follower of many teachings?

You can usually pick up a whole variety at any student union bar for a couple of pints}

[Jack]

nonsense - a good dba is a piece of p**s, but turning that into something that resonates with joe public is the hard part -otherwise we would all have done it already

I agree, yet disagree (as usual).

Turning synthesis into a product for mass sale is the difficult step that a) would raise public awareness of what we do and b) be very lucrative.

Unfortunately archaeology largely seems to not only out-source this step but pretty much give it away to TV production companies, Movie producers, English Heritage, the press and authors of both fiction and fact.

Those doing the work don't seem to have the will or expertise to monopolise on their in-house expertise/knowledge. Where are the commercially-funded profit driven literature/TV shows/ DVD's etc etc?

As an industry have we given away the profit-making end of the process to the sharks?

Is that what your getting at Marc?

Could a large archaeological contractor make a mountain of profit from producing in-house books for a number of segments of the market? Why don't they, or do they? If Disney can make a fortune from producing cartoons.....why can't say 'X-Arch-Services' branch out into producing coffee table books for the hoy-purloy or educational cartoons for the National geographic channel?

For that matter why not an archaeology channel on free-view? (or is that a step too far?).

[Marc Berger]

have we given away the profit-making end of the process to the sharks?

I think that you might need to split the we bit into two. The salaried and the self employed. The salaried no and the self employed yes. The salaried are paid for their archive to be donated to the public and the self employed have their archive taken off them and given to the public for nothing. it's not only profit but all of the effort of producing the stuff which is not being paid for. A possible way to look at it is that the self employed are working for half the pay of the salaried.