[meteorite-list] Fw: Re: Surface Area or Weight
-Forwarded Message- From: Count Deiro countde...@earthlink.net Sent: Feb 12, 2011 8:09 AM To: Martin Altmann altm...@meteorite-martin.de Subject: Re: [meteorite-list] Surface Area or Weight List and mein guter Freund Martin, Martin has said One of the most important points, which overrules most of the others...availability.. I agree and that factor was in my assumptions where I mention current availability. Regards to all, Count Deiro IMA 3536 METSOC -Original Message- From: Martin Altmann altm...@meteorite-martin.de Sent: Feb 12, 2011 3:20 AM To: meteorite-list@meteoritecentral.com Subject: Re: [meteorite-list] Surface Area or Weight Hello Count, one of the most important points, which overrules most of the others would be in my eyes: Availability It's in principle the same as in philately, numismatics ect... That what is most difficult to obtain, no matter what it is, or of which quality, fetches the highest price. It's funny - you know me, I am very worried, how some bushed minds these years are trying to bring national and World meteoritics to a halt in introducing legal bans of ownership, export, hunting and trade - and their main argument is unison, that private collecting would have made meteorites unaffordable for science. (In fact historically just the opposite had happened, like any curator, who takes his job seriously, knows). But what are by far the most expensive meteorites on the market? Those where most of the tkw is locked in museums and institutional collections and where almost no grams are available on the free market. And that independently from the histrorical meaning or the type of the location. Hence just these locations and meteorites those protagonists already do have and always had at hand in their collections. Historic example - India. India - with the exception of a short episode in czarist Russia, was quite the only country, which had a strong protectionism and a ban of private ownership of meteorites, in very early times. Consequence - already in 19th century, at Cohen's times, Indian meteorites where by far the most expensive meteorites of the world. For an ordinary chondrite from India, one had to pay 10, 20, 40 times more than for an ordinary chondrite falling in Europe or Northern America. So still today, a meteorite, from the same period, a fall from the same historical year, can cost a fraction of a meteorite fallen or found in the same year, even if it has a much lower tkw and is of a much rare type, than the latter locked in institutional collections or from a country banning ownership and export. Other modern more instantaneous example. Due to certain circumstances only small amounts of Tagish Lake were firstly allowed to leave the country and to be sold on the free market. The availability was therefore strongly and artificially limited. Therefore - an quite unique event - it was unnecessarily insanely priced. It had cost four, five times more than any historic Ivuna or Orgueil at that time. ...with very bad consequences, as the eyewitnesses and others were not allowed to rescue more material, but those, who forbade them to do so, then omitted to save most of the tkw, the national geological survey had to buy from the finders in the end material at this extremely high price, which they by their own had created in not allowing material leaving the country - and in the end the Canadian tax payer paid 800,000 CND - with inflation 1 million USD today - for samples, which without that intervention of the Canadian survey to restrict the availability would have cost 200,000 USD - and if they would have allowed the normal people to rescue the main load of that meteorite in a timely manner - perhaps only 50,000$. ...well, a sad accident, But other than the Australians, Omani, Argentines, Danish, Algerians and so on, the Canadian meteoricists are intelligent and reasonable people, and other than the Bevanists of our days, they sat personal narrow-minded motives and that almost folkloristic hatefulness towards private collectors aside, and decided for the need of science to ease the legal practice. With very convincing success. Remember Buzzard Coulee - because private collectors and professional hunters were not only allowed to collect them, but also got export permits - it was cheaper than any Whetstone or Mifflin. And that, what Arnold Notkin did with historical Brenham in USA, became then suddenly possible at all with historical Springwater in Canada. Or think to the now still growing tkw - after years - of the newer Canadian crater iron (where I always forget the name). Or third example, how decisive availability is for a meteorite price and how fast a changed availability will change the prices. Sikhote-Alin. When it firstly became a little better available in the 1990ies, Sikhote was paid up to 9$ a gram (then). After 2000, when our industrious Russian colleagues brought huge amounts
Re: [meteorite-list] Fw: Re: Surface Area or Weight
Yes Sir, I wanted only to outline that again. Was btw. always the main factor. Cohen made his huge price compilation... (a pity that many curators of today don't know it, because those were the prices their antecessors still had to pay, and knowing that, they would avoid such painful demonstrations of incompetence in public media, that meteorites would be so much more expensive today. In fact it would be even sufficient, when they would check in the archives, what all their antecessors had spent for sums for the meteorites. For me, if I would have the privilege to be even paid to be a curator of a famous collection, it would be a matter of course for me to do that and to know the history of my collection, how it was built up, from where the particular specimens were acquired ect..). Cohen made his price compilation only to see if Wuelfing's trade formula for meteorites (which based on the two factors: tkw and type) would be reflected in the market prices. But Wuelfing's values weren't. Those meteorites, where the dealer's and private collectors had good access too, had a tendency to remain below these values, those meteorites kept mainly in national collections or from countries with legal obstacles were more expensive than the formula predicted. So that what the Bevanists don't get, is since 130 years no secret anymore. And Cohen was one of the really greatest meteoricists of his times. A pity that he died too early. And now I'm out of office for a while, No worries in case, Count, you still want a framed R-slice, (the other 14g are gone too), we serve strictly according the chronology of incoming emails. Best! Martin -Forwarded Message- From: Count Deiro countde...@earthlink.net Sent: Feb 12, 2011 8:09 AM To: Martin Altmann altm...@meteorite-martin.de Subject: Re: [meteorite-list] Surface Area or Weight List and mein guter Freund Martin, Martin has said One of the most important points, which overrules most of the others...availability.. I agree and that factor was in my assumptions where I mention current availability. Regards to all, Count Deiro IMA 3536 METSOC -Original Message- From: Martin Altmann altm...@meteorite-martin.de Sent: Feb 12, 2011 3:20 AM To: meteorite-list@meteoritecentral.com Subject: Re: [meteorite-list] Surface Area or Weight Hello Count, one of the most important points, which overrules most of the others would be in my eyes: Availability It's in principle the same as in philately, numismatics ect... That what is most difficult to obtain, no matter what it is, or of which quality, fetches the highest price. It's funny - you know me, I am very worried, how some bushed minds these years are trying to bring national and World meteoritics to a halt in introducing legal bans of ownership, export, hunting and trade - and their main argument is unison, that private collecting would have made meteorites unaffordable for science. (In fact historically just the opposite had happened, like any curator, who takes his job seriously, knows). But what are by far the most expensive meteorites on the market? Those where most of the tkw is locked in museums and institutional collections and where almost no grams are available on the free market. And that independently from the histrorical meaning or the type of the location. Hence just these locations and meteorites those protagonists already do have and always had at hand in their collections. Historic example - India. India - with the exception of a short episode in czarist Russia, was quite the only country, which had a strong protectionism and a ban of private ownership of meteorites, in very early times. Consequence - already in 19th century, at Cohen's times, Indian meteorites where by far the most expensive meteorites of the world. For an ordinary chondrite from India, one had to pay 10, 20, 40 times more than for an ordinary chondrite falling in Europe or Northern America. So still today, a meteorite, from the same period, a fall from the same historical year, can cost a fraction of a meteorite fallen or found in the same year, even if it has a much lower tkw and is of a much rare type, than the latter locked in institutional collections or from a country banning ownership and export. Other modern more instantaneous example. Due to certain circumstances only small amounts of Tagish Lake were firstly allowed to leave the country and to be sold on the free market. The availability was therefore strongly and artificially limited. Therefore - an quite unique event - it was unnecessarily insanely priced. It had cost four, five times more than any historic Ivuna or Orgueil at that time. ...with very bad consequences, as the eyewitnesses and others were not allowed to rescue more material, but those, who forbade them to do so, then omitted to save most of the tkw, the national geological survey had to buy from the finders in the end material at this extremely
