And validators do get credit for their work, but much less than submitters do. It's my own personal opinion that it's our duty as submitters to try to make it as good as we can before the validator gets it. Of course, that doesn't mean it has to be perfect. I strive for perfection, but if a book I scan isn't perfect but still highly readable, I still will submit it, but I try to clean it up as much as I can before the validator gets it. As submitters, we get $2.50 for that submission, while a validator taking it on would only get 50 cents. I think that just goes to emphasize that most of the work, if not all of it, in making sure the book is complete and at least mostly readable should fall with us as submitters. Take care. Julie Morales inlovewithchrist@xxxxxxxxxxxxx Windows/MSN Messenger (but not email): mercy0421@xxxxxxxxxxx Skype: mercy0421 ----- Original Message ----- From: "Mike Pietruk" <pietruk@xxxxxxxxx> To: <bksvol-discuss@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> Sent: Saturday, July 02, 2005 1:26 PM Subject: [bksvol-discuss] Re: Books on the List Patti Validation is somewhat an arbitrary process as it is done by individuals who may not necessarily agree 100% on what is fair, good, excellent or none of the above. Hence, one person might view a book as "fair" while a second would suggest that it wasn't good enough for BookShare. Just because you got enough out of the book -- and that implies that parts of it were unreadable -- isn't enough to make BookShare. Really, each page must be readable more or less. I am guessing that part of the problem with the "Leave it to Beaver Book" is that it has a lot of pictures which would produce garbage characters. A validator, seeing all that garbage, might take this to mean that the book was generally unreadable even if it was. Some editing, on your part removing this stuff, might create a better first impression of the book which is what validators often go by. Remember, a validator isn't required to read the entire book just check for things. If I happen to come across much illegible characters, I may make the assumption that the scan was poor. Some validators may choose to do clean up on their own. If, however, they later decide that the book proves more work than the effort would make worth while, they will either reject the book outright or send it back to the validation pool for someone else to deal with. Remember, that validating is being done by volunteers such as yourself; and you aren't going to find consistency in the process. So trying to figure out why one book made it and another didn't may prove an exercise in futility. Rather, consider how the book that got rejected might be improved cosmetically to give a better impression to the validator.