How much is my
Strad worth?
A lot of people write in to say that they have found a violin in their attic
with a Stradivari label in it and want to know how much it's worth.
Unfortunately, almost all violins with Stradivari labels are cheap copies made
in the late 19th- or early 20th century, and the vast majority are of little or
no value today. There are only about 600-700 authentic Stradivari instruments
that still exist and virtually all of them are catalogued in our database, so if
you don't see your instrument already listed on our site, it's almost certainly
not an authentic Strad. That goes for Giuseppe Guarneri del Gesu, Carlo
Bergonzi, Domenico Montagnana and most of the other great Italian makers. There
just aren't that many undiscovered instruments out there.
I have an instrument I would like to sell. Can I list in on the "For Sale" page?
Yes, as long as it was made by one of the 300+ violin makers in our database.
To have the instrument listed, please send as much information as possible
(including digital photos if you have them) to
info@cozio.com. If the instrument is already included in our database,
identify it by its ID number and include any additional information that you
have. Make sure you include some contact information so that potential buyers
can contact you. There is no fee for individuals listing their own instruments for sale.
Dealers and auction houses pay a annual fee of $495 to have their instruments
listed.
Do you
perform custom research projects?
Yes. In addition to the information we publish on our site, we have access to
many more photos and other information that we're unable to publish due to
copyright restrictions. However, we can use this data to identify instruments or
to conduct other specialized research projects. If you have a need, let us know
by contacting us at info@cozio.com.
I would like to
list my instrument in the database....
Great! We offer a 3-month free subscription to anyone who helps make the
database complete by registering his or her instrument. Take a look at our
Registry page to
see what information you should send us.
... but I don't
want anyone to know that I'm the owner.
No problem. We understand and respect owners' desire for anonymity and
promise not to publish owners' names without their consent. The only exception
is if we find the owner named in another published work. In that case, we
consider it public knowledge and will publish the name here as well.
How do I
list an instrument in the "Stolen Instruments" section?
Just send an email to info@cozio.com
with as much information as you can about the instrument and the circumstances
under which it was stolen.
I
found an error. Who should I tell?
Please let us know about any errors you find. We want to make this resource
as accurate as possible. For more information about reporting errors, please
refer to the Error Reporting
page.
Why isn't the
Luthier xxx included in the database?
Because of the enormous amount of data that needs to be processed and
organized, we are currently limiting the registry to French & Italian luthiers (with a
few exceptions, like Jakob Stainer and Vincenzo Panormo) and their
instruments made before about 1900. Over time, we hope to extend the database to
include additional luthiers.
Why is
the site called Cozio.com?
In honor of Count Ignazio
Alessandro Cozio Di Salabue (1755-1840), arguably the first collector and
connoisseur of stringed instruments. Upon inheriting his father's estate at the
age of 18, Cozio became fascinated by the art of violin making. He was one of
the first to recognize the genius of Stradivari, and later became a sponsor of
J. B. Guadagnini in his last years. He amassed a large collection of valuable
instruments, but was forced by financial problems to sell most of them before he
died. He also kept detailed notebooks of makers and instruments, which have
proved extremely helpful in understanding the violin-making world in the latter
part of the 18th century.
Advertising on
Cozio.com
Cozio.com is a very popular site, with more than 20,000 unique visitors per
month. As of June, 2009, the site was displaying more than 600,000 pages per
month. The audience is predominantely composed of professional and amateur string
players, and violin makers. For companies wishing to reach this very targeted
audience, we offer a number of sponsorship opportunities. These include banner
advertising, newsletter sponsorships, and sponsorship of the "Featured
Instrument" box that appears on the home page. For more information about these
opportunities, please download our
media kit and contact us at
info@cozio.com if you have any additional
questions.
Who publishes
Cozio.com?
Cozio.com is published by Cozio Publishing LLC, a small, specialty publisher
with offices in Boston and Switzerland. The company was founded in 2003 by
Philip E. Margolis. For 15 years, Margolis was a technical author who wrote
numerous books about computers, including
C: A Software Engineering Approach and the
Random House Webster's Computer and Internet Dictionary. In 1996, he
launched the PC Webopedia, which was
acquired by Internet.com in 1998. Over the next few years, Margolis launched a
search engine technology company and worked as a partner of a Warsaw-based
venture capital firm called E-Katalyst. In 2002, he became interested in
the violin market through his wife, who is a professional violinist. Amazed at
how difficult it is to find basic information about antique instruments,
he began collecting data and storing it in a database. In 2003, the web
site www.cozio.com was launched as a way to
make this information available to the wider public.
Lots of people ask whether we are associated with any particular dealer or
auction house. The answer is an unequivocal no. We are completely independent,
though we try to maintain good relations with those in the industry and we sell
advertising space to a variety of dealers, auction houses, and vendors. Also, we
do not deal in instruments. Our sole function is to publish information. For
more about us,
send an email to info@cozio.com.
About the
Cozio Search Engine
The Cozio search box integrates two search engines. The first searches
through the Cozio database of instruments, makers, owners and musicians. The
second searches the Cozio digital library, containing more than 2,000 scanned
books, magazines and catalogs. Searches entered in the search box on the top
menu, or on the advanced
search page, will search through both databases and list the results in
separate sections. If you only want to search through the digital library, go
directly to the Digital Library
page and enter your search there. Note also that you can search within a
specific document by selecting the document from the results list and then
entering your search on the document's page.
Both search engines support syntax similar to other search engines,
especially Google. This means that if you enter multiple words separated by a
space, the search will return records containing ALL terms. In the case of the
digital library, it will return all documents where all of the terms appear
appear on the same page. You can also search for a multi-word phrase by
enclosing the phrase in double quotes. For example:
"Violin Iconography of Antonio Stradivari"
You can exclude words by preceding them with a hyphen, and you can search for
words beginning or ending with the specified characters by using the '*'
wildcard. This is especially useful for names that have multiple spellings. For
example, if you enter the search:
"Francesco Rug*"
the search engine will return all records containing the name "Franceso
Ruggeri," "Francesco Rugeri," and "Francesco Ruggieri". Likewise, searching for:
Landol*
will return all records relating to both "Landolfi" and "Landolphi".
You can also accomplish this by using the OR operator. For example:
Serafin OR Seraphin
For complete details about the search engine syntax, take a look at
Google's description.
We do very little advertising and rely primarily on word-of-mouth to let
people know that about the web site and what it offers. Our greatest resource,
therefore, are the 1,500+ people who have already signed up to be Cozio members.
To encourage our existing members to spread the word, we offer a free 3-month
subscription extension for every new member brought to us. If you're a Cozio
member and you persuade a friend or colleague to sign up, let us know by sending
an email to info@cozio.com. We'll then
extend your own subscription by three months. There are just three rules:
1) You yourself must be a Cozio member with a non-expired subscription.
2) You must tell us about the referral within 3 days of its occurrence.
3) The offer is valid only if your friend signs up for a 1-year or 2-year
subscription.
Cozio Publishing ("we") are
committed to protecting and respecting your privacy.
This policy (together with our
acceptable use policy and
any other documents referred to on it) sets out the basis on which any personal
data we collect from you, or that you provide to us, will be processed by us.
Please read the following carefully to understand our views and practices
regarding your personal data and how we will treat it.
Information We May Collect From You
We may collect and process the following data about you:
- Information that you provide by filling in forms on our site
www.cozio.com
("our site"). This includes information provided at the time of
subscribing to our service, posting material or requesting further services.
We may also ask you for information when you report a problem with our site.
- If you contact us, we may keep a record of that correspondence.
- We may also ask you to complete surveys that we use for research
purposes, although you do not have to respond to them.
- Details of transactions you carry out through our site and of the
fulfilment of your orders.
- Details of your visits to our site including, but not limited to,
traffic data, location data, weblogs and other communication data, whether
this is required for our own billing purposes or otherwise and the resources
that you access.
IP Addresses and Cookies
We may collect information about your computer, including where available
your IP address, operating system and browser type, for system administration
and to report aggregate information to our advertisers. This is statistical data
about our users' browsing actions and patterns, and does not identify any
individual.
For the same reason, we may obtain information about your general internet
usage by using a cookie file which is stored on the hard drive of your computer.
A cookie is a text-only string of information that a website transfers to the
cookie file of the browser on your computer's hard disk so that the website can
remember who you are. A cookie will typically contain the name of the domain
from which the cookie has come, the "lifetime" of the cookie, and a value,
usually a randomly generated unique number. Cookies help us to improve our site
and to deliver a better and more personalised service. They enable us to
recognise you when you return to our site so that you don't need to enter your
login information each time.
Two types of cookies may be used on this website, session cookies, which are
temporary cookies that remain in the cookie file of your browser until you leave
the site, and persistent cookies, which remain in the cookie file of your
browser for much longer (though how long will depend on the lifetime of the
specific cookie).
We may use a third party to serve advertisements on our site. Cookies may be
associated with these advertisements to enable the advertiser to track the
number of anonymous users responding to the campaign. We do not have access to
or control of cookies placed by third parties.
You may refuse to accept cookies by activating the setting on your browser
which allows you to refuse the setting of cookies. However, if you select this
setting you may be unable to access certain parts of our site. Unless you have
adjusted your browser setting so that it will refuse cookies, our system will
issue cookies when you log on to our site.
Where We Store Your Personal Data
Where we have given you (or where you have chosen) a password which enables
you to access certain parts of our site, you are responsible for keeping this
password confidential. We ask you not to share a password with anyone
Unfortunately, the transmission of information via the internet is not
completely secure. Although we will do our best to protect your personal data,
we cannot guarantee the security of your data transmitted to our site; any
transmission is at your own risk. Once we have received your information, we
will use strict procedures and security features to try to prevent unauthorised
access.
Uses Made Of The Information
We use information held about you in the following ways:
- To ensure that content from our site is presented in the most effective
manner for you and for your system.
- To provide you with information, products or services that you request
from us or which we feel may interest you, where you have consented to be
contacted for such purposes.
- To carry out our obligations arising from any contracts entered into
between you and us.
- To allow you to participate in interactive features of our service, when
you choose to do so.
- To notify you about changes to our service.
Newsletters
When you register for a Cozio.com account, and at any time
afterwards, you may choose to subscribe to one or more Cozio newsletters, which
are sent out periodically. You will receive these newsletters only if you
specifically ask to receive them. You may opt out of these mailing lists at any
time by modifying your account information.
Disclosure Of Your Information
We may disclose your personal information to third parties:
- In the event that we sell or buy any business or assets, in which case
we may disclose your personal data to the prospective seller or buyer of
such business or assets.
- If Cozio Publishing LLC or substantially all of its assets are acquired
by a third party, in which case personal data held by it about its customers
will be one of the transferred assets.
- If we are under a duty to disclose or share your personal data in order
to comply with any legal obligation, or in order to enforce or apply our
acceptable use policy.
Your Rights
You have the right to ask us not to process your personal data for marketing
purposes. We will usually inform you (before collecting your data) if we intend
to use your data for such purposes or if we intend to disclose your information
to any third party for such purposes. You can also exercise the right at any
time by contacting us by email at
info@cozio.com.
Our site may, from time to time, contain links to and from the websites of
our partners, advertisers and affiliates. If you follow a link to any of these
websites, please note that these websites have their own privacy policies and
that we do not accept any responsibility or liability for these policies. Please
check these policies before you submit any personal data to these websites.
Changes To Our Privacy Policy
Please note that this Privacy Policy may change from time to time. We will
not reduce your rights under this Policy without your explicit consent, and we
expect most such changes will be minor. Regardless, we will post any Policy
changes on this page and, if the changes are significant, we will provide a more
prominent notice (including, for certain services, email notification of Policy
changes).
If you have any additional questions or concerns about this Policy, please
feel free to contact us any time through this web site or at Cozio Publishing,
Hanflaenderstr. 41, 8640 Rapperswil.
This acceptable use policy sets out the terms between you and
Cozio Publishing ("we" or "us") under which you may use our products
and services ("Services").
Your use of our Services means that you accept, and agree to
abide by, all the policies in this policy.
Prohibited Activities
You may use our Services only for lawful purposes. You may not
use them:
- in any way that breaches any applicable local, national or
international law or regulation.
- in any way that is unlawful or fraudulent, or has any
unlawful or fraudulent purpose or effect.
- for the purpose of harming or attempting to harm minors in
any way.
- to send, knowingly receive, upload, download, use or re-use
any material which does not comply with our
Content Standards.
- to transmit, or procure the sending of, any unsolicited or
unauthorised advertising or promotional material or any other
form of similar solicitation (spam).
- to knowingly transmit any data, send or upload any material
that contains viruses, Trojan horses, worms, time-bombs,
keystroke loggers, spyware, adware or any other harmful programs
or similar computer code designed to adversely affect the
operation of any computer software or hardware.
We reserve the right to remove any Forum posts which might be
held to be defamatory or otherwise in breach of our
Content Standards, as
determined in our sole discretion.
If, while using our Services, you post any material on a website
or newsgroup, it is your sole responsibility to ensure that:
- you have the rights to make use the material in that manner;
and
- such use will not infringe the rights of any third party or
any law.
We do not endorse any material posted by you or any other third
party, or any opinion, recommendation or advice expressed therein,
and we expressly disclaim any and all liability in connection with
such material.
Our Content Standards
These content standards apply to any and all material which you
contribute to our site ("Contributions"), and to any interactive
services associated with it.
You must comply with the spirit of the following standards as
well as the letter. The standards apply to each part of any
contribution as well as to its whole.
Contributions must:
- be accurate (where they state facts).
- be genuinely held (where they state opinions).
- comply with applicable law in the U.S. and in any country
from which they are posted.
Contributions must not:
- contain any material which is defamatory of any person.
- contain any material which is obscene, offensive, hateful or
inflammatory.
- promote sexually explicit material.
- promote violence.
- promote discrimination based on race, sex, religion,
nationality, disability, sexual orientation or age.
- infringe any copyright, database right or trade mark of any
other person.
- be likely to deceive any person.
- be made in breach of any legal duty owed to a third party,
such as a contractual duty or a duty of confidence.
- promote any illegal activity.
- be used to impersonate any person, or to misrepresent your
identity or affiliation with any person.
- give the impression that they emanate from us, if this is
not the case.
- advocate, promote or assist any unlawful act such as (by way
of example only) copyright infringement or computer misuse.
Take Down Policy
All material posted on our site must comply with our Acceptable
Use Policy. We reserve the right at all times to take down any
material we consider to be unacceptable or illegal.
If you consider any material on our site to be illegal or
unacceptable and wish to complain, please send an email to
info@cozio.com outlining the
nature of your complaint, quoting the content in full and specifying
the URL of the page the content is on.
On receipt of your valid notice, we will investigate the
complaint and may, as a result, remove or edit the content about
which you are complaining. In any event, we will endeavour to
respond to your complaint within 5 working days.
Cozio Publishing disclaims any and all responsibility or
liability for the accuracy, content, completeness, legality, reliability, or
operability or availability of information or material displayed in the Cozio
Publishing web site. Cozio Publishing disclaims any responsibility for the
deletion, failure to store, is delivery, or untimely delivery of any information
or material. Cozio Publishing disclaims any responsibility for any harm
resulting from downloading or accessing any information or material on the
Internet through the Cozio Publishing web site.
THE COZIO.COM WEB SITE, AND ALL MATERIALS, INFORMATION,
PRODUCTS AND SERVICES INCLUDED IN THE COZIO.COM WEB SITE ARE PROVIDED "AS IS,"
WITH NO WARRANTIES WHATSOEVER. COZIO PUBLISHING AND ITS LICENSORS EXPRESSLY
DISCLAIM TO THE FULLEST EXTENT PERMITTED BY LAW ALL EXPRESS, IMPLIED, AND
STATUTORY WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, WITHOUT LIMITATION, THE WARRANTIES OF
MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE, AND NON-INFRINGEMENT OF
PROPRIETARY RIGHTS. Cozio Publishing AND ITS LICENSORS DISCLAIM ANY WARRANTIES
REGARDING THE SECURITY, RELIABILITY, TIMELINESS, AND PERFORMANCE OF THE
COZIO.COM WEB SITE. COZIO PUBLISHING AND ITS LICENSORS DISCLAIM, ANY WARRANTIES
FOR ANY INFORMATION OR ADVICE OBTAINED THROUGH THE COZIO.COM WEB SITE. COZIO
PUBLISHING AND ITS LICENSORS DISCLAIM ANY WARRANTIES FOR SERVICES OR GOODS
RECEIVED THROUGH OR ADVERTISED ON THE COZIO.COM WEB SITE OR RECEIVED THROUGH ANY
LINKS PROVIDED BY THE COZIO.COM WEB SITE, AS WELL AS FOR ANY INFORMATION OR
ADVICE RECEIVED THROUGH ANY LINKS PROVIDED IN THE COZIO.COM WEB SITE.
YOU UNDERSTAND AND AGREE THAT YOU DOWNLOAD OR OTHERWISE OBTAIN
MATERIAL OR DATA THROUGH THE USE OF THE COZIO.COM WEB SITE AT YOUR OWN
DISCRETION AND RISK AND THAT YOU WILL BE SOLELY RESPONSIBLE FOR ANY DAMAGES TO
YOUR COMPUTER SYSTEM OR LOSS OF DATA THAT RESULTS FROM THE DOWNLOAD OF SUCH
MATERIAL OR DATA.
