[meteorite-list] - "witness" to July 6 Fireball PA

[MeteorHntr at aol.com]

In a message dated 7/9/2009 4:46:27 A.M. Central  Daylight Time, 
drtanuki at yahoo.com writes:
Regarding what a meteorite is  worth.... it is worth what you or someone is 
willing to pay, so I suggest that  you re-phrase the question to the 
reporter when asked, and reply that "I am  willing to pay up to... (or a realistic 
price) range".   

Dirk,

The problem is that I am not willing to pay anything for a  meteorite, at 
least not now. I didn't come here to buy a meteorite. And as such,  I didn't 
talk to the media about buying one.  I was asking for people to  check their 
video and to come forward if they had any footage with the fireball.  

The reporters didn't ask me what I was willing to pay.  They asked  me 
somewhere in the context of "All this effort,spent time and money, to come up  
here and do all this work, are meteorites worth it?"  Which I answered with  
the normal response of how they can be valuable to science, bla, bla, bla, 
and  that museums and researchers and private collectors are interested, bla, 
bla,  bla.  And then I was asked "Well, what are meteorites worth?" 

And,  even if I was wanting to buy a meteorite, I still would not quote a 
price,  because I don't give quotes for purchase when I don't know how big it 
is, what  condition it is in, or the supply and demand factors involved at 
the moment of  making the offer.  All that can change, and about the only 
thing certain,  is that when the time might come to make a real offer on a 
real meteorite, I  would most likely be willing to pay more or less, maybe far 
more or far less  than any quote I would give back in the hypothetical 
stage.    

Again, the question to me wasn't what I was willing to pay, but what  
meteorites are worth.  

Now, I have some work to do, and some rocks  to go find.

Have a nice day.

Steve Arnold
of "Meteorite Men"  

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