Let me add my thoughts on the matter, since, as usual, there are things going on in the background that can lead to misunderstandings.
First of all, I have known, and worked with, Mauro for a couple of years now and I trust he will handle this legacy of which he is the current custodian correctly.
In fact, referring to Klaus his remarks on sharing information amongst collectors, that is exactly how we established a good working relationship. At the time Mauro was considering doing a book on the post war Mauser pistols and Joop van de Kant was working on a book on the 1930s commercial Mauser series. Experts in the field know that there is an overlap: The French occupation 1945-1948. Since I was in contact with Mauro and Joop and knew about both projects I knew that it would be a good idea to bring both authors together and let them compare notes.
This in turn got some other balls rolling, including my involvement in both projects, co-authoring with Mauro on his book. Since together we were able to cover the German, English, Dutch, French and Italian languages it opened up a number of contact opportunities for all of us. In fact, it worked so good that after an introduction meeting at a guest house overseeing Oberndorf am Neckar, the foundations were laid for a series of events that none of use would have foreseen, including the formation of the already legendary "Kü Club"
It was exactly this sense of needing to open up the access to information, especially preventing situations like the Weiss-incident, that led to extensive contact and an exchange of information between the ‘old generation’ and the ‘new generation’ (hey, I’m 40 give me a break
). Prof. Dr. Gminder told us he had a lengthy conversation with mr. Kornmayer and said that both felt that it was time to start sharing their archives with a new generation of collectors in order to make sure they survived. The immediate effect was that Gminder allowed us research access to his personal archives from his time at Mauser and that Kornmayer transferred part of his archive to Mauro. Alternatively, the original Swiss acceptance gauges were transferred to Joop.
I spent a couple of months indexing, digitizing and analyzing my ‘share’ of the “Gminder Files”, as they have been unofficially named and the consensus is that other parts of the archives will be treated in the same way. We are still looking for the best way to protect the original documents the best we can, several locations for storage have been suggested but no good location has been chosen yet. For the sake of our oncoming books, and as a thank you for the work we did, Prof. Dr. Gminder allowed us exclusive access to his archives for the time we needed to finish the manuscript (roughly a year), which has almost come to an end now. Information about alternative subjects, like the links to a Dutch company involved and the HSc pistol has been shared with collectors and experts.
But Klaus certainly has made a very good point and I understand him fully. It will certainly be a subject that will be discussed during our following meetings and I trust we will all be able to reach a consensus on the matter. Today’s electronic media offer enough possibilities to allow access to information without fear of loss or damage to the original media, but on the other hand we will have to prevent any derailed commercial exploitation (‘put it on Ebay for a fiver’) of the material as well (apart from proper research & publication, of course).