Phill the Governor

See above discussion.

yeah this doesn't over complicate things. Sales recorded when the sale happened, period. How it was paid for is completely irrelevant. That it was actually paid for, is relevant and already discussed. Those instances of non-payment/completion are so few and far between the entire landscape of reporting sales should not change to accommodate them.

Yeah, that would be crazy! Just as crazy as any accepted offer for a comic reported a sale! Good thing myself (and no one else I can see) is or was advocating for that because I'm looking at sales not just accepted offers So your opinion is that any sale with time payments shouldn't be recorded. Unfortunately, the market exists in reality, so good luck isolating all those sales from auction houses and platforms. Thankfully (non-sales not paid off) as you say are in such a small minority, it would be counterintuitive to dismiss all other legitimate time payment sales at the sake of them. You do understand if this was such a large issue, MCS and auction houses wouldn't offer time payments because it would be against their best interest of getting paid (aside from the whole binding contract in certain instances).

This line of thinking has the appearance of making sense, but (and take note @Larryw7 and @Lazyboy ) it doesn't. Between these two scenarios, which is more misleading?: 1. Reporting the sale of a book when the final payment was made. The book was purchased for $100,000 6 months ago, and paid off today. However, today (6 months since the sale) the FMV for the book is now $60,000 instead of $100,000. So in 6 months the price dropped quite a lot. But reporting the sale at the last payment puts this $100,000 sale on GPA today and everyone else not associated with the sale says: "Hey look! the book just sold for $40,000 more than current FMV, it's going back up!!". Now you have a false sense of increased FMV which is... well, incredibly misleading. 2. Reporting the sale when the sale happens. The book was purchased for $100,000 6 months ago. Sale gets reported 6 months ago because that's when the terms and conditions of the sale dictate the buyer is agreeing to paying the price (see what I did there). But oh no! Now three months in, the buyer realizes they are in over their head and can't complete the sale. Since the sale isn't completely paid for, the seller contacts GPA and lets them know and the $100,000 sale is removed from GPA. But now (3 months later) the FMV is half way to it's $60,000 drop and the book is worth $80,000. So while the book is worth $80,000, the sale of the $100,000 is removed and has no effect on new sales of the book. IF anything, those who see the sale removed would see it as an indicator that the price is indeed $80,000 and falling. Imagine for a second that homeowners reported sale of a house happened 30 years after purchase. Because that's when it was paid off. Despite any allowance of abuse of over-reporting sales that aren't paid for, there are way more issues with reporting a sale when it was completed than there are reporting a sale when it actually happened. The market exists in real time.

Apparently you didn't read or understand my comment. An unprofessional response would be to become defensive when someone refers to misleading recorded sales data (which is what this is) as [engaging in specified behavior]. While MCS undeniably benefits from new sales of a book at new higher prices, I don't care about the benefit it affords you. The inaccurate reporting has greater consequences to everyone else that uses GPA. You and GPA are responsible if someone else bought a copy at a higher price because they viewed lagged information as a reflection of current prices - by a LARGE margin. As you should.

@mycomicshop should be reporting the sale when it happened, like other auction houses that report to GPA and have the sale updated there once the auction ends. Not 6 months later once the book is paid off. This should be common sense and any other scenario should raise questions. Period. If they don't want to report the sale, like comiclink, no problem. But if they do want to report the sale.. it's now not 6 months from now. With the price fluctuation on a book like this during the period of price change from 6 months ago to now, throwing a 6 month old sale into GPA becomes irresponsible at best and nefarious at worst. Imagine if all the books paid off with time payments by auction houses, or people using paypal credit on ebay, were recorded at the time of the final payment instead of when the sale really happened? To be clear, I know 100% other auction houses that have engaged in this behavior before, so this is not limited to MCS; they are just the one's here that got called out.

The issue here is the lagged recorded sale of a volatile book six months after purchase. The vast majority of people looking at GPA will not be aware of the specifics of the sale, as detailed by mycomicshop. Therefore GPA and mycomicshop are both misleading most people looking at the numbers since people can point to this sale as happening now and say that's what it's worth all of a sudden. So FMV of AF15 just jumped up. But it really didn't - it just did according to this misleading recorded sale.

First thrill bid win and first Fables art, by Craig Hamilton. Fables Family Christmas with Bigby, Snow White and family! Judging by the content I'm guessing it was drawn in 2007, referencing the "07" on the sweater. Just the sort of thing I'd imagine would be inked and colored for a holiday card, but I've never seen it published. Still cool, especially for just over $100

Booo. Had my eye on the Bermejo Joker piece all month and even knew a few ppl that were staying away from it. Guess there were several others who wanted it and were willing to go higher.. Congrats to the winner. It's an awesome piece!

Since you seem to post almost exclusively in Spider-Man threads, I'll be the first to nominate you for a name change to "Spidermanis#1".

Enough $ has been burned here it that it seems appropriate that someone buys a plane ticket and gives Enrico a visit. In person. With some friends and maybe a baseball bat or two. That should get him to cough up the art rather quickly.

Thank you. Piece in question is only a few hundred dollars, but can never be too safe

Please close.

Unless my memory is failing me, the cover to issue #2 most certainly exists. Much more art exists than is led on, specifically early Marvel art. Despite art routinely being "thrown away" as the stories like to go, what is often left out is that someone saved the art from the trash or that it was given away without mention instead. Almost all fine art, was commercial art at it's creation. Original comic art is no different: there were people from the start who had the insight to save it or give it away to someone who'd appreciate it because they knew it wasn't worthless.

You are correct, the black circle is covering the OCT date. Nov copies are technically part of the second print run. At this point, though, not sure if it has any real impact on price given the overall scarcity. I'm sure some savvy Marvel collectors could chime in. It's said often, but in this case (w/o seeing the BC) that sure is a pretty 2.5!

I hope to one day become jaded by a Ditko Amazing Spidey page of this quality

Here's my lone contribution:

As someone who's had the Batman from Tec 33 tattooed on my arm for over a decade (and my only one at that!) congrats on getting one piece closer to a complete copy!

Keep your expectations low. Many people here have expressed interest in only buying already graded book nowadays, because the cost and associated issues with getting books graded correctly and without damage are, unfortunately, at an all time high.

This is interesting. I am genuinely on board for a process like this if (like non-invasive baths) the light is only "removing" build up of dirt dust and grime, not altering the state of the paper. But the main concern (regardless of light-only) is that while there's no perceivable negative change in the after photo, that doesn't mean that there's no short/long term damage happening to the paper fibers.

I was referring only to the "immacuclean" solution/kit I pictured. The overlap to the thread title is that the seller of the solution also sells UV cleaning boxes among a few other items; so it seemed relevant. Dry cleaning and pressing are not restoration because they are non-invasive processes. That doesn't mean people have preferences, but the point is that dry cleaning and pressing never result in purple labels no matter how much purists dislike it. And it's because it's not restoration. The Immacuclean solution is a mix that's water-based to my knowledge. Any time a cover is cleaned with water, the effect on the paper's sizing is apparent and it will be deemed cleaned and result in a conserved or possibly restored label if other chemicals are included in the wash. So my question is: how is a water based wet cleaning of a cover not considered conserved or restored? My gut tells me it's because of the age of the book's that it's advertised to be use on.. but I may be incorrect. In my opinion, the "go for it" attitude should be reserved for things that have been around with a clear consensus, despite preference.

Aside from my own skepticism about the UV light bleaching... what are board thoughts on this? I've seen countless people on Instagram claiming to have used this and received only blue labels afterwards. My initial thoughts are that it's a wet-cleaning which should result in Conserved labels.. but don't? Any insight?

Something tells me we’ll see more posts in the “quality control” thread after this,

I believe that’s the consensus.

My takeaway was that Marcus admitted to commenting heavily on newly listed pieces in order to drive traffic and new comments to his gallery. There was a minority (really just one individual) who said some percentage of his comments felt contrived because of the admitted self-promotion. Based on this thread though that’s why it’s the minority opinion.