Just one more small note. Since I am personally creating these CDs, I have the ability to write things on them. For example, If you want I'll autograph the CD, or I'll write something else; something personal. The choice is yours.

And in this corner, we have Mr. John "Jakob Nielsen" Rhooooooodes!

Are you ready?

Are you r-r-r-r-r-ready?

And now, ladies and gentleman, let's get ready to rumbbbbbbbbblllllle!

Does the 3$ pay for international p&p ?

MadMan, I'm just throwing something else against the wall! All my material is available free and clear...for now. Ha! I've been toying with the idea of doing more "rich media" work and perhaps selling that. Stay tuned. For now, I'm just selling some convenience.

Mac, the $3.00 does pay for international shipping. I'll obviously take a small loss on this, but that is fine. The margin on the CD-ROM itself is fair enough to absorb the difference.

You know MadMan the difference between JR and JN is the last initial....no joking...the difference is JR is not writing lengthy articles with the final sentence being the sales pitch and not the conclusion.

Subtle, but as of yet, significant.

I can't think of any web site that would be convenient to have on CD.

Nix my workstation because it's always connected to the Internet. Therefore, a CD would only be of use when I'm on my laptop and happen to be without an Internet connection... but when I don't have a net connection, I'm usually not working.

And besides, what kind of information does a web designer / usability specialist need offline? I've read all the old WebWord articles I'm going to read. The usefulness of WebWord in an archival sense is its collection of links, and they're only useful with a live Internet connection, so...

CDs are useful for large files, so it would make more sense if it contained things like applications, video/audio and large reports, with some CD-only content thrown in to appeal to completist tendencies.

Keep chucking stuff at that wall though!

Matt, the CD is nearly 8 MB, so it isn't exactly small. Also, since it is many files, it would be a pain to rip and set up. As I said, I'm selling convenience. The bonus link in the Webword Addiction is worth some money too...perhaps more than the CD to some people.

By the way, at least on person has bought the archive CD. Cool.

Hi John, I think it's nice of you to offer yet another service to readers. Of course, the more you offer, the more you put yourself out there for critical comments, but hopefully it's helpful. I appreciate all these ideas. I don't think I'll be buying a CD just because I don't want more stuff. I like digital stuff, but only as long as it stays that way, once it materializes into a CD it takes up physical space which becomes a problem for me. But I appreciate that the option exists. (It may also work for people who have slow connections or for those who pay by the minute for connectivity.)

Regaring your text ads, perhaps it's only worth it for you to be selling them in $20 chunks, but that's a bit of a stretch for me. I bought $10 worth of ads on kuro5hin.org not because I necessarily wanted to advertise but because I wanted to support their site and they were in need. So I figured I could contribute that much and it was cool that I'd get 10,000 impressions for it. (I realize you don't have quite their traffic which changes things.) But there I got 10,000 impressions for $10 (I think). I didn't need the 10,000 impressions per se, but that minimum I was willing to pay. $20 is too much to contribute not because I don't think your site is great, but because it's just too much for me right now to any site.