Waffen-SS Pictorial History 01 - Photo Albums of Waffen-SS in Eastern Front

Waffen-SS Pictorial History 01 - Photo Albums of Waffen-SS in Eastern Front
Alex Lau
ISSN: 1671-1645

I came across this cheap book churned out of China of shoddy quality while looking through a bookstore. It is further proved by the error in the title, which is supposed to be 'Front', yet is misspelled 'Fornt'. Since with my knowledge it had already stolen copyright, I was curious to check out how, so I bought it.

Needless to say, the publishing company, which churns out large amounts of books and magazines with information downloaded from the internet, is a wannabe of the good photo books of RZM and J. Fedorowicz, by blasting in huge amounts of photos, on glossy paper. Needless to say, they stole a few images from classics like 'Wenn Alle Bruder Schweigen', or 'Das Reich in Bild' by Otto Weidinger, without permission, as with most of their products. Many scans are of noticeable poor quality throughout the book. But the stolen photos are not the bulk of them.

The bulk of them, more than 50 per cent, come from a thread on the AHF with lots of screenshots showing Waffen-SS soldiers from 'Der Deutsche Wochenshau', the weekly German newsreel during the war. Sure, it doesn't violate copyright, using those photos. However it tells loads about the company that used them. Why should a person pay to buy a cheap book with most of it's images that are available on the internet, or the small amount of poorly scanned photos that are available in much more better and serious publications and books?

Yet at the same time they say at the beginning of the book that they own the copyright to the book. LOL! This book fortunately, is not readily available, but one might see a copy or so surfacing on Ebay, etc. Don't waste your money.

K