Is There a $100,000 Book on Your Shelf?

One lucky British family happened to see a photo of the spine of a first edition of "On the Origin of Species" by Charles Darwin. Don't we have that at home?, they thought.

They did. According to Reuters, the book was purchased for "a few shillings" in the 60s or 70s and has been sitting on the shelf, undiscovered, until now. Tuesday marks the edition's 150 year anniversary, and it will be auctioned off at Christie's. It is estimated that the book is worth £40,000 - £60,000 ($66,000 - $100,000).

If you've got a first edition or a very old book on your shelf, if might be worth searching it on abebooks.com and alibris.com to see if it's commanding a high price. The price of your book will be affected by the rarity of the edition, condition, and things like typos or signatures. Empty Mirror Books offers more insight here.

**Update 9:20 PM, 11/24/2009**
Guess what it fetched at London's Christie's? Including the buyer's premium, it sold for £103,250 -- about $172,000 -- almost twice the maximum estimated price. The AP reports that the shelf it was sitting on was a "toilet bookshelf." If you've got Darwin in your collection, you might want to note that British authorities are reportedly "searching for a leather-bound notebook Charles Darwin used in developing his theory of natural selection."

[via Reuters]

Filed under: Books

Is There a $100,000 Book on Your Shelf? originally appeared on Luxist on Tue, 24 Nov 2009 18:01:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Sebastian Coe rules out political role - Scotsman

Times Online

Sebastian Coe rules out political role Scotsman Lord Coe, a Conservative peer, served as William Hague's chief of staff during his leadership from 1997-2001, and there has been speculation that he might ... 2012 boss Coe rejects return to politicsAFP Coe rules out return to politicsBBC News For Seb Coe, Delhi trip was a quest to retrace Indian rootsIndian Express Times Online all 103 news articles »

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Luxist Giveaway: Swatch Automatic Chrono "Sign in the Sky" Watch

Enter to win this watch! Brand new from Swiss Swatch, comes the the new Automatic Chrono line in the Irony collection. Five good looking watches push Swatch timepieces up to a more luxurious level - but retain the light and airy character that they are known for. The watches house a brand new ETA automatic chronograph movement and retail for $370 each. Style is suitable for a man or a woman, but at about 45mm wide, the watch is sized for a man. Follow Swatch on Twitter here.

I have for you one of the pictured watches, known as the Swatch Automatic Chrono "Sign in the Sky." You can learn more about it directly from Swatch right here. You can see the nicely engineered automatic movement through the case back of the watch, while the dial has a mixture of textured white and brushed metal tones. The bezel is steel with lume dots, and the case is a tough semi-transparent plastic. I quite like the soft, white rubber strap. You'll like this watch too - perfect for snowy days ahead.

To enter, leave a comment on this post sharing why you'd like to win the watch. The giveaway ends on December 4th at 8:00pm PST. See additional rules below.

* To enter, leave a confirmed comment below.
* The comment must be left and confirmed before December 4th, 2009 at 8:00PM Pacific Time.
* You may only enter once.
* One winners will be selected in a random drawing.
* One winners will receive one Swatch Auto Chrono Sign in the Sky watch valued at $370.
* Open to legal residents of the 50 United States, and the District of Columbia, who are 18 and older.

GIVEAWAY IS NOW OVER. THANKS FOR PARTICIPATING

See full giveaway rules here.

Ariel Adams publishes the luxury watch review site aBlogtoRead.com.

Filed under: Timepieces

Luxist Giveaway: Swatch Automatic Chrono "Sign in the Sky" Watch originally appeared on Luxist on Fri, 27 Nov 2009 12:01:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Give your Dashboard a kick in the pants

Filed under: Productivity, Freeware

After reading through the comments on my post about Dashboard Widgets, I noticed quite a few people lamented the fact that the widgets have to go through a 'start-up' process every time you turn on your Mac or log out and log back in. Well, not anymore.

We actually covered this four years ago, back when it was an application named Dashboard Starter. Today it's called Dashboard Kickstart and its taken the form of a System Preference pane by Alwin Troost that runs in the background and reacts to the starting or re-starting of the Dock. Every time you log in or out, you restart the dock. When that happens, Dashboard Kickstart initiates the starting sequence of the Dashboard Widgets. This prevents the delay you'll experience when launching Dashboard the first time you want to use it.

I've used Dashboard Kickstart, in its different iterations, for years and its always worked flawlessly. Once installed, open your System Preferences and simply set how long you want the delay to be between the time your computer starts, or wakes from sleep, and the time you want your widgets 'kicked'. I set the sliders to the lowest time possible.

Dashboard Kickstart is free and requires 10.4 or above. Let me know what you think of Dashboard Kickstart in the comments!

TUAWGive your Dashboard a kick in the pants originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Mon, 14 Dec 2009 07:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Pokemon remake screens, now in English

ONM has posted the first English screens of Pokémon HeartGold and SoulSilver, coming to North America and Europe in spring 2010. The site highlights the newly redesigned Pokedex, which comes in both red and pink, and enables touchscreen-based obsessive browsing of your collection. Also visible: your starter Pokemon, who now follows you around like Pikachu in Pokémon Yellow.

There's still no mention of the PokeWalker accessory, unfortunately, making it increasingly likely that the Pokemon-training pedometer will be left out of the Western release.

Pokemon remake screens, now in English originally appeared on Joystiq Nintendo on Wed, 09 Dec 2009 17:15:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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The Bachelor weds HDTV in its fourteenth season

Likely as much of a triumph for the cost effectiveness of shooting in high-definition as proof of its mainstream acceptance, the fourteenth season of ABC's The Bachelor will be the first to air in HDTV. As viewers tune in for this weeks episode of stupid human tricks and absolute degradation, they can take comfort in knowing every tear, argument and rose ceremony on the way to wedded bliss will be captured in 720p. Hey, with Jon & Kate off the air we needed this one, don't judge us.

The Bachelor weds HDTV in its fourteenth season originally appeared on Engadget HD on Fri, 11 Dec 2009 10:56:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Video interview: Heavy Rain producer confirms DLC, talks game marketing

Last month we spoke with Heavy Rain executive producer Guillaume de Fondaumiere about Quantic Dream's upcoming PS3 adventure game. As a game far from the everyday, de Fondaumiere agreed that Heavy Rain has been a challenge to market. "It's a difficult game to market, because it's difficult for people to understand what it is unless they experience it," he admitted in our video interview above. "So we have to show it to them. We probably have to give them a playable demo for them to see and experience for themselves how different and unique this experience is."

We argued that a playable demo would simply reveal how unconventional the controls could be, to which de Fondaumiere responded: "You simply cannot use conventional game mechanisms when you want to create a unique experience. But I think that -- and user tests we've conducted show that -- you get used to it very quickly. It's quite intuitive. I'm not too concerned about this. At all, actually."

Finally, when asked if he had any final words to tell the Joystiq audience, de Fondaumiere advised fans not to sell the game back to GameStop after completing the story. "Buy the game, don't sell it. Keep it to yourself. You'll need it to continue and experience more episodes in the months following the launch of the game." So, DLC confirmed, right?

Video interview: Heavy Rain producer confirms DLC, talks game marketing originally appeared on Joystiq on Mon, 14 Dec 2009 14:01:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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