Warning:  "European Triode Festival" book. - Page 1
Forum section: electronics / general

author: TimFox
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: November 02, 2023, 09:11:23 pm
content: The European Triode Festival is a meeting of vacuum tube enthusiasts that was held roughly yearly in the first part of this century.I saw a book advertised with that title, which I assumed would cover the amplifiers that were exhibited there.Today it arrived from Germany: F P Miller, A F Vandome, J McBrewster (eds)European Triode FestivalAlphascript Publishing 2010 ISBN 978-613-0-77464-6.This isworsethan an AI-generated publication. The publisher fed keywords into a search of Wikipedia and excerpted the articles.1.5 pages on the actual festival.Followed by (among other topics)6 pages on "valve amplifiers"3 pages on "triode20 pages on "vacuum tube"6 pages on "audiophile"Then the best part: over that period, the festival was held in Aarhus (Denmark), Finland, and Langerargen (Germany).Therefore, we get the Wikipedia articles about35 pages on Finland11 pages on Aarhus29 pages on Denmark2 pages on LangerargenThey left out articles about the locations in the Netherlands.Avoid the publisher "Alphascript"!After being burned through the German bookdealer BuchWeltWeit, I found that Alphascript and Betascript (same company) are infamous for this practice.

author: Kim Christensen
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: November 02, 2023, 10:46:01 pm
content: Curious if it's a nicely bound hardcover book or just a cheap paperback. Could you post some pictures of this abomination?How much did it cost shipped to your door?

author: TimFox
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: November 03, 2023, 03:28:49 am
content: It was a normal paperback, well-constructed.I'm ashamed to admit how much it cost.

author: Kim Christensen
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: November 03, 2023, 04:40:56 am
content: Found a copy on AbeBooks UK for £50 shipped... Yup... that's pricey. At least AbeBooks admits that the content is copied from wiki articles:Quote

author: Haenk
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: November 03, 2023, 11:17:37 am
content: This sounds really awful.However, there is that nice little law implemented in the EU (and especially Germany) called "Widerrufsrecht".In short: You have a right to return an item within a certain timeframe, no questions asked. And yes, this is also valid for foreign buyers.If this "book" has been expensive enough, I would bite the bullet and return it to the seller. You will have to pay for the shipping though, but that's likely still better than a pile of paperjunk which will always remind you of having been riped off.(If you need help with the return, just ask...)

author: SiliconWizard
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: November 05, 2023, 12:12:02 am
content: Well, isn't that what all those "business coaches" teach their students to make quick money?Oh well, even PhD students do that these days.If anyone's curious to know what's behind Alphascript:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OmniScriptum

author: CJay
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: November 05, 2023, 06:18:24 pm
content: Perhaps the worst example was a 68000 CPU 'source book' I bought back when I was professionally involved in Mac/Amiga/ST/Other repairs and product development.Just shy of £100 and all it was was a collection of free Moto app notes and datasheets collated into a hardback with a few Byte and other magazine articles.Then there was PIC era 'Robot Builder' book which felt like the author had been given an advance, spent it, hit a deadline and just threw together whatever crap he could find to fend off legal action (I kid you not, one 'project' was some piece of cheap dollar store noise maker tat with what looked like coffee stirrers taped to it)Recently I found a listing for a Joe Carr RF book which arrived and turned out to be a similar collection of ripped off magazine articles.It's not a new thing, there's always been utter crap out there dressed up as original works which were little more than collections of articles ripped from tech press or even just app notes and datasheets, the 'net and Wikipedia has just made it easier.

author: TimFox
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: November 05, 2023, 06:35:44 pm
content: The link to "OmniScriptum" was useful.This crap doesn't even use AI.

author: SiliconWizard
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: November 05, 2023, 09:04:36 pm
content: Quote from: TimFox on November 05, 2023, 06:35:44 pmYep it's just pure "manual" copy of Wikipedia articles. This is a scam. Hopefully your bad experience will help people reading this not fall into the trap.