Gentle Reader – 
The first 6 volumes of the Baen CD-Rom Library were bound into hardcover books and carried obvious markings allowing them to be copied and given away freely.

Volume 7 was bound into marketing material, not available to the general public, but was also openly labeled allowing free non-commercial redistribution.

Volume 6.022 x 10 ^ 23 was stealth released, bound into some marketing material between the official release of volume 6 and 7.  Volume 6.022 has only the statement "All Commercial Rights Reserved".  It was originally never intended for any kind of distribution beyond a few publishing industry folks.... but plans fail.

Word of the existence of this 'un-numbered' CD became common knowledge in the spring of 2005. After a round of "Oh Please Jim May We?" the response received from Jim Baen was 

"It is issued from us, it's distributable. Go ahead, _be_ our promotions department." 

So.... We Are.

I have unofficially numbered the un-numbered CD as # 6.022E23 or 6.022 for short. Why? Well, for a couple of reasons. First, 6.022E23 is a mouthful… Oh. Not ‘Why 6.022 for short’? Ok. Moving on. Why 6.022E23? Well, for a couple of reasons.  First it was released very soon after volume 6. (According to Jim’s signature block on the orientation, about a month after). Second, it was released between volume 6 and volume 7. Thirdly (because most things come in threes), because Avogadro’s Number (The number of items in a Mole) is the first universal or mathematical constant number that popped into my head.

You can thank my wife. She first suggested Volume # ‘SHhh!’ followed by Volume # ‘pi’ and I ran with it from there.

Now About Volumes 6.022 and 7:  These were never bound into books.  Some of the things included are rough draft material. They were created to sell books to bookstores, not to sell books to you and me, so take their contents with that warning.

Enjoy

Kevin Pulliam
March 23, 2005

