bayesian_acolyte

I feel pretty good about my score of 20 as someone who only started to learn how to grade ~4 months ago. A big thanks to everyone on this forum who has posted "grade is in" updates, as searching those and quizzing myself has been a lot of help. Also thanks to Mike for running the contest.

Pretty much all ASM 300 CGC 9.8s have similar white marks on the back. Here are some examples: one, two, three, four. I would guess it's from the printing process. I think this ASM 300 suffered the most from having the lower resolution images. From these pictures it seems almost impossible to differentiate between legit scuffs and the marks that you can see on those 9.8s.

I wasn't aware, maybe there should be something in the rules about it then? Although with a $500 prize and no way to prevent people from looking, not sure this is realistic, and you don't want to put the honest participants at a disadvantage. Anyways I think this case showed how it's not really a big deal since it's not much advantage if you can't trust the numbers.

I'm a bit embarrassed to admit I got burned by the census on Rex Dexter this round. I checked it on a lark and was surprised to see there was no books graded between 0.5 and 3.0, which is where I had it. I think I turned a 1 point miss (prolly had it 1.8) into a 4 point miss as I settled on 3.0. I'm not mad at all, my fault for trying to use an outside source instead of just grading the book. I'm curious why it didn't show up on the census? Maybe too recently slabbed?

I agree asking a pro chef how they make a proprietary sauce would be inappropriate, just like it wouldn't be cool to PM Joey asking for details of his technique. But there would clearly be nothing wrong with asking a generic question about sauce recipes (not addressed to anyone) on a public forum.

You called OP lazy and said they were trying to take shortcuts. Then another person chimed in trying to support them, and you put them down with a quip about wanting a diploma before they took classes. It didn't really make sense because they were trying to learn (like taking classes), not asking for some accreditation (like a diploma), but at least you put them in their place. Learning solely by trial and error without any guidance is a rather poor way to learn anything. It's usually a method of last resort. Most of the current best pressers learned that way because they had no other options. Most people learning now are also learning that way, because there still aren't much better options, because almost nobody with the knowledge wants to share. Which is fine, its their right. But someone trying to learn by seeking the knowledge of people with more experience isn't lazy or trying to cut corners, it's common sense. I've searched pressing technique topics on these boards before, and you seem to be on every post trying to stop any discussion by throwing out little insults and saying the only REAL way to learn is by experience. Clearly experience is necessary, like with literally any skill, but experience with some expert advice will beat amateur stumbling-in-the-dark experience every time. You claiming you are actually trying to help people by discouraging anyone from helping people comes off as very disingenuous. Quick edit: I want to add you do an awesome job helping people in lots of other areas that aren't related to pressing technique. You've even helped me before, and I haven't been here very long. You seem like a good dude and my issues with how you handle this topic aren't meant to be an attack on you personally. Also it's not only you doing this, there seems to be a whole gang of pressers who are trying to stop discussion any time this topic comes up.

There are lots of professional cooks who give advice on how to cook pizzas that are an easy google search away, including tell-all Q&As with expert pizza cooks. If someone went to a cooking forum and asked advice on how to cook pizza, there would be lots of people willing to help them. What is preventing normal people from making legit expert NY pizza isn't anything as basic as recipe or cooking time and temp, and time and temp is all that's being asked here. In this quote you seem to be defending your right to stay out of it. That was never in question. In the post you quoted I clearly stated it was totally understandable for you not to want to give up your secrets. But you aren't staying out of it. What you are doing looks very much like bullying anyone who wants to start a discussion of pressing techniques, calling them lazy and saying they want to cut corners, in an attempt to strangle that discussion before it starts. There is a clear pattern any time something related to this topic comes up. You shouldn't feel threatened by some amateurs wanting to have a discussion. Your secrets are safe and nobody is demanding you give them up. If professional pizza chefs started going on to message boards attempting to squelch any discussion of pizza making techniques, they would look absurd.

Asking the advice of more experienced people isn't taking a shortcut, it's common sense and best practice when trying to learn anything new. Imagine if someone was trying to learn how to build a deck for their house, and they post a question about deck building to a related online forum, and all the replies are deriding them for daring to try to take shortcuts instead of just experimenting building a bunch of practice decks. Like sure, there's no singular right way to build a deck, it depends on the type of deck you want, the budget, the local conditions, etc., and it's impossible to fully convey all the nuances of deck-building in a forum response. But there are still some general best practices that can be conveyed in text, and it's possible to point the questioner to some learning resources ("gems of wisdom") that are out there. I can understand not wanting to answer, maybe because someone is worried about their secrets getting out (gotta protect those 10 month wait times) or maybe because they just don't feel like taking the time to answer. That's totally reasonable, it's your time and expertise, you aren't under any obligation to teach. But pretending like this is a skill where teaching is of no help is not reasonable. Pretending like it's not possible to give useful advice on the question OP asked is not reasonable. Making fun of them for daring to ask a question and trying to improve is not reasonable.

The ratio of lurkers to active posters on any public message board is higher than many people realize. This is often known as the 1% rule: "The 1% rule is a rule of thumb pertaining to participation in an internet community, stating that only 1% of the users of a website add content, while the other 99% of the participants only lurk." There is even some peer-reviewed evidence supporting this. Cash prizes are something that can lure out lurkers, so I don't think it's surprising that there are a lot of lower post count entrants.

I'm in

I think you might have meant Detective Comics 583?

I'm in. Thanks for running this.

@toro Just to be clear, I have no problem with the term "drek" itself. I've used the term myself regarding books I own. My issue is when less valuable books are used as a scapegoat for TAT issues and CGC damaging books, such as these quotes: If people want to pay their hard earned cash to buy these graded books, then they are by definition not worthless. All this "profit seeking" talk misses the mark. The job of a comic dealer is helping people get books that they are willing to pay for, and I don't think they deserve vitriol for just doing their job. That demand is going to be filled one way or another. One dealer choosing not to send in 1000 books isn't really going to make any difference because it's a tiny percent of overall submissions. If all the dealers got together and formed a big cartel to judge which books are Truly Worthy of being submitted to CGC and which aren't, that might make a difference if they were sufficiently snobby. But it would be elitist and go against the interests of comic collectors.

The reason that more books are being sent in to get graded is that there is more demand for graded books. I don't think it makes much sense to blame those who are helping fulfill that demand. The delays are a predictable consequence of the rapid increase in demand and it's not really anyone's fault (yet), at least on the supply side. I wouldn't really blame the demand side either. In every rarified goods collecting community there are people who look down on those who collect goods that are less rarified than the goods they collect. To me this blaming of those collecting or helping fulfill demand for "trash" or "drek" is awfully close to elitism and snobbery.

The spine corners seem like pretty clear manufacturing bindery tears to me. I've seen multiple 9.8s with similar corners and I don't think you get knocked for them at all. Also the crease on the back should easily press out. I'll be a major outlier here and say 9.6 post-press.