By keeping the original 1997 page layouts unchanged, Pocket's production costs for the new edition were dramatically lower, bringing the cost of the book down quite a bit for the new trade paperback edition. Ironically, because of the weird way in which the book business works, it turns out that adding a small number of additional pages brought the price down even further. This is because the sales projections were higher if we added some new material, enalbing Pocket to charge an even lower price.

If they had simply done the supplement as a separate book, the price would have been higher than you may think, because there are certain costs that do not get significantly lower for a smaller book. Additionally, the projected sales would have been quite a bit lower, meaning that the price would have been higher.

In the end, I hope you'll agree that Pocket did do the best thing for the fans by adding the new material, but keeping he ulk of the 1997 edition unchanged. In doing this, they were able to price the trade paperback edition at only $27.50, which is about half the price of the 1997 hardcover edition, and less than half the price of the 1999 hardcover. I definitely agree that the split-text design makes the book harder to use, but we think it's worth it, because a lot of fans who could not afford the 1997 edition at $50.00 can now afford the $27.50 trade edition.

Mike"

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"All is full of love, all around you" - Bj�rk

Other wishful thinking includes new images, not just using the exact same images from the 1997 edition. Also, no supplement, all information in contained into one entry. New starship diagrams and charts.

Any other ideas on what the next encyclopedia should include? Perhaps this should be a separate topic.