actually in the book publishing realm a trade refers to the size of the product, not it's content. The paperback has a certain height and width. A trade paperback is bigger, typically it has the height and width of a hardcover not a paperback. It has nothing whatsoever to do with what is between the covers, only the size of the covers. Simon and Shuster would have considered both Son of Origins and The Silver Surfer: The Ultimate Cosmic Experience as trade paperbacks even though one was reprints and one was original material (unless it was the hardcover versions, in which case they were just books or hardcovers and not trade paperbacks. 

-M

Is this the Legion book?



If so I have the same one. 

I also have this WW book...



These are the only 2 Tempo books I currently have. 

-M

It's the same exact size and shape as most every other trade paperback on my shelf.

It's TPB sized, it's TPB shaped, it collects material from comic books, and was bought in the TPB/GN section of an online book retailer. It's a TPB, not a strip collection. No matter how you twist it. I've never had to take so many photos, count pages, cite the source of material collected, or count the pages of each story to "prove" something wasn't a collection of strips like this before, but here you go. It's not a strip collection, and is absolutely in every way the equivalent of a modern TPB put out by Marvel or DC.



Did Simon and Shuster even work on X-Men or Silver Surfer?

If I walk into a bookstore and ask where the trade paperbacks are, will they point me to large format prose books or comic book reprints?

If I go into a copy center and ask for a Xerox of something and they make me a copy on a machine that is not a Xerox, it doesn't suddenly become a Xerox. And if I need to a store and ask where the Kleenex is and they point me to the paper product aisle where the tissues are even if they aren't Kleenex, those tissues aren't suddenly Kleenex. Sometimes people accept errors because it's convenient, not because it is right. 

If I call a tomato a vegetable because I buy it with the vegetables, I am wrong. It is a fruit. Being with the vegetables doesn't define what it is. 

If I think a whale is a fish because it swims in the sea like a fish, I am wrong, swimming in the sea doesn't define what it is. 

So, many trade paperbacks having comics reprints in them doesn't mean that is what defines what a trade is. 

When many people perpetuate an error, it doesn't make the error correct, it makes many people wrong. 

-M

Yes I can, but my problem was with the term "graphic novel" not TPB or whatever. (I don't consider collections graphic novels unless conceived as a whole.)

Also, probably showing my age, but I'll use "strip" and "series" or "character" interchangeably. Pretty common usage, as from this obit of Infantino (first thing i could find):

He earned this title with his absolutely modern delineation of the first true Silver Age hero, super-speedster The Flash, in '56. His two-dimensional depictions of speed and motion—among many graphic innovations Infantino displayed during his eleven-year run on the strip—remain benchmarks in the medium.

Any discussion of the meaning of a word is a discussion of semantics, trying to dismiss an opposing view of what a word means by claiming it is just semantics is disingenuous and usually is the last defense of someone who has no other defense for their position. You're basically saying "we are discussing the meaning of a word but I refuse to accept your position because the definition of the word is irrelevant" which basically means you don't care what the actual meaning is, you just want to use it the way you want to use it and have people accept it.  

And when you accept mistakes, you are lowering the standards. Language does evolve, but disregarding what a word actually means, especially when it is a technical term related to a specific field (in this case publishing) and has a standard accepted definition within the industry destroys the commonality necessary for any discussion. Communication can only occur when there is a commonality of meaning of words and how they are used. That's why we have dictionaries and standard usage in the first place. Language does evolve, but accepting of mistakes devolves a language, not evolves it. It's why we don't conversate about things, we have a conversation or converse, even if people want to accept conversate, it's not an actual word, it's an error, regardless (not irregardless because that's not an actual word either) of how commonly it is used.


And specifically in this instance, If you want to have a discussion about a field or expertise, industry or what have you, you need to be able to use the terminology of that field correctly. Accepted usage outside the field doesn't change the meaning of the terminology within the field. And since this was a discussion of why did publishers choose the format to print the Tempo books in that they did, and not the more common form of trade paperback (i.e. large format rather than mass market trade) any discussion of the formats is a technical discussion that uses the field's standard definitions, not usage outside the field that accepts errors because it is convenient. Until such a time as the publishing industry changes what they mean by a trade paperback, any discussion of trade paperbacks as a format in publishing needs to use the standard usage, not an alternate accepted usage from outside the field. 

-M