miraclemet

Do you see what Bill did in the reflection of the surface blade?

 

as an interesting comparison, here's Bill Sienkiewicz inking the same pencils:

 

Anyone know which new rule was added today?

13.Threads selling digital codes or digital versions are not allowed.

Anyone know the rationale behind it? Does it say that the digital codes are non-transferable? They are 1 time use, so its not like they are getting "shared"

It'd be no different than selling just one page from a comic book. You are just selling part of the comic

Marvel ups the price on some books but includes a digital copy, but for those who dont read comics digitally they just get stuck paying the upcharge w/o the benefit

of course you could just give them away when someone purchases one of you other $1 books...

revat played the Pay it Forward game to perfection!

Well packed, good communication... a scholar and a gentleman!

the only game he plays better than PIF is Baccarat. I myself dont understand the rules but one night in Monte Carlo while I was on my 5th G&T I think I saw revat win a 50 ft yacht and then lose it and something called "The Ruby of the Nile" all within 30 minutes. Revat walked away cool and collected, and with the girl I came with... that !

Via the Pay it Forward thread... now Im thinking about trying to collect SS examples of all of the various Green Lantern artists thru the years...

Signed by Ron Lim & Bernie Wrightson

Lady in White Double sig what?

Alex Nino and Wrightson again.

PM sent

Great book...

sure its low grade, but its SS so its about the sig not the condition! (Ok thats what I'm telling myself). I've had quite a few chances to chat with George Perez at Dragon*con the last few years and he's a fun guy who was front and center one of the main artists of my childhood (CoIE most notably). This is my favorite cover he did for Green Lantern, and he didnt do many. Im thinking of next years con season to be focused on getting Green Lantern SS from all the GL artists I can afford/find!

Thanks to Harley Troy for passing this one along at a nice price

Ok all this talk has my retro toy juices flowing...

I always was partial to the blister packs, the MOC toys from the 80s...

Besides the big boys (GI Joe, Star Wars & their like) and the Transformers, Go-Bots, ThunderCats and Silverhawks (so basically all the ones that were big on TV)...

what am I missing from my 80s retrospective of some of the main carded type action figures?

I would like to nominate " Edwin (WINTER SOLDIER) " who agreed to purchase $410 worth of comics on 11/7/12. No response to various PM's, total waste of my time.

 

Man...this probation list just keeps getting longer and longer. Maybe we should just post a list of those buyers and sellers who AREN'T on the list.

 

I know post count or join date isn't a perfect criteria for buying or selling here, but more and more I'm thinking we need some way to regulate sales here. Wintersoldier has 7 posts.

 

A reasonable post count at least represents some skin in the game and some knowledge of board behavior and etiquette.

 

I'm not sure, but I think as a seller you can place restrictions on your sale that you think are reasonable.

 

E.G.

No international

No paypal/only paypal

No probation or hall of shame

No one with less than 250 posts

etc.

 

You might lose SOME business, but its really up to you. Just be up front and clear.

And as a seller you always have the right to decline an offer. (as long as you state that in your rules). I've seen others state it in their sales threads "I have the right to not accept offers from anyone I deem not worthy" or whatever....

Debating pressing is just a red herring. The real issue is whether having an in-house restoration/conservation/pressing service is a conflict of interest.

It is not a conflict of interest.

It is a source for the perception of a conflict of interest.

it is the potential for a conflict of interest

thus leading to the perception of a conflict of interest

if they can protect against this potential

then the perception decreases (and an 80+ page thread becomes a 5-10 page thread that shows up a few times a year when someone says "hey isnt it a conflict?" and everyone else says "no, because..."

Scenario of concern.

[*]CGC giving preferential grades to their in-house conservation/restoration efforts since they know the better rep a restorer gets, the more business they get.

 

If you knew CI was your best bet to bump a book from 9.6 to 9.8 wouldn't you use them? ( if you were going to go the pressing route)... and thats where (one of) the conflict lies.

Scenario not of concern.

 

The books go into the grading process blind, devoid of information regarding source, submitter, pressing history etc.

Is this something you are sure of following the process of bring one of those pressing/restoring groups IN HOUSE?

I'm a happy as the 10 clams that fell off the fishing boat

 

 

[font:Book Antiqua]Wow 9.9 ss octuple cover !

Well done Sir...[/font]

 

wow.. never seen a multiple cover 9.9, much less a multiple cover 9.9 Sig Series. and TWO covers were 9.9s wow...

Scenario of concern.

100 Books gets pre-screened as a CGC 9.6 with a chance for 9.8 with a press by CGC owned CI. Book gets pressed and submitted. 99 of the 100 get the 9.8

100 books get pre-screened as a CGC 9.6 with a chance for 9.8 by a non-CGC owned restoration/conservation group. Books get pressed and submitted. 80 of the 100 get the 9.8.

Was this:

• CI being the best at what they do
  
• random variation in the universe
  
• CGC giving preferential grades to their in-house conservation/restoration efforts since they know the better rep a restorer gets, the more business they get.

If you knew CI was your best bet to bump a book from 9.6 to 9.8 wouldn't you use them? ( if you were going to go the pressing route)... and thats where (one of) the conflict lies.

 

No wonder they couldn't afford another encapulation machine! They were saving up for a pressing/restoration business.

 

this is actually a very good point... If the encapsulating was the bottle neck (which I think I heard at one point, but made me go cause really? isnt it the grading part that is the most time consuming? but whatever) then why not spend the money to address it?

At the end of the day they arent in the business for us, they are in the business for them (and their wallets) so Im guessing the profit margins on the CI business made it a good buy from the bottom dollar perspective, more so than improving efficiency and cutting down on their time to grade numbers.

I'm quite familiar with a chinese wall, as an attorney. But there is zero transparency at CGC. So all you're gonna get is, "We've taken steps to make sure nothing bad happens. If you think otherwise, prove it."

I dont think they have to do this, I just think doing it would shut this (and future versions of this) thread down.

And as someone else said a few posts back, CGC is built in part of consumer confidence. If they see something they are doing erodes that confidence, then they should look for ways to shore up that confidence.

Chinese Wall.

That's what there needs to be.

In finance it is the term used for the information/system barrier within a firm to keep investors seperate from information that may influence those decisions.

if we change some words:

In finance comic book grading it is the term used for the information/system barrier within a firm CGC to keep investors graders separate from information (i.e. conservation/pressing/restoration work) that may influence those grading decisions.

If CGC explains how they keep the restoration/conservation work walled off from the grading work then we could feel a little more comfortable with the relationship.

Granted there are no federal laws hanging over their heads like there are for financial institutions.

but it would be a start.

If books going thru conservation before grading are in anyway noted to the graders (even just in the way they arrive at the graders table/room), then we have a clear path of concern for conflicts of interest.

Got this one back from the frame shop! Scooped at an estate sale some time ago! Has the lettering overlay too.

[/img]

I gotta go to some of your estate sales!

Mine just have moldy magazines...

How big a deposit can you make in that thing?

trying soo hard for an out of context quote... or maybe Im just overly perverted.

When Dr X heard that I rare disease caused by reading too many 90's comics that could only be cured by a complete transplant of my lower torso he quickly found me a suitable match, had the "lucky" donor dealt with via some sort of Iron Fist pressure point punches and mailed me the necessary body parts.

The packaging was phenomenal. The body arrive completely undamaged and was far from my wildest hopes and dreams.

I have since made a full recovery I cant reccomend DiceX enough. Buy all of his comic books and anything else he ever has to sell, if for nothing else just to get the amazing packaging.

(ps Dice, I know beggars cant be choosers, but did the replacement parts have to come from a horse?)

signed

miraclemet

and play.com or any other online retailer may provide fast cheap service (cost/timing) but quality metrics are a far cry from what was expected from a retailer 10, 20, 30 years ago...

"quality" from amazon (or Play.com or any other pure online retailer) means they sent the thing I told them to send and it wasn't damaged. And if I have to return it they aren't complete tools about it.

Quality (of service) from a brick and mortar, or con dealer or freakin' Bloomingdales means a lot more cause the expectation is higher. So sure play.com meets the three vectors, mostly cause we as consumers have really really lowered the bar for expectations.

and I'll second the McDonalds is delicious but I wouldn't say "quality"

 

maybe, maybe not. Who makes the cases? Do they buy them? Are they made in house? And if even the cases are bought, they are 'sort of' like a manufacturer.

 

A comic book comes down the 'line', and a person (or two or more) carefully inspects the book for quality. They track the quality, then proceed to customize a case for the book, then encapsulate the book. Then on to the next book. Sounds a lot like the back end of a line at a manufacturing plant. Then they are processed for shipping. Not exactly the same as a manufacterer, but not too for off from a certain point of view.

 

They need to hire an efficiency expert, who will tell them that they need to specialize. Any one who is trained in grading should be JUST GRADING, all day every day. You can hire other staff relatively easily for EVERY other function from receiving to shipping, to accounting, to collecting comics at shows and witnessing sigs at shows, to customer service to answer emails, to running the website, to answering phones, to management, to admin, to marketing, to safety, to HR. When a company grows (and this one has grown and is growing), you HAVE to start specializing.

 

This should be simple, although painful, but management needs to take the longer view and push it if they really want to be successful.

 

So please CGC, consider hiring a consultant if you can't get these things done on your own (which I know isn't easy). If its a matter of facilities and space, start different shifts. People can be receiving and shipping all night long, managing web orders and the web site, answering emails too.

 

fair points above by others and Revat. Yes my choice of word was not right on target. I worked in manufacturing, they arent a full on manufacturer like at Santa's Workshop up in the north pole. I guess the cruxt of my point is that to boil it down to "you need to treat me the way I want to be treated like these retailers treat me" over simplifies the business of CGC, and it irks me.

I think you make a good point Revat. CGC is already the leader in terms of market adoption when it comes to comic book slabbing/certification. So now if they want to increase their market share they dont need to take from their competition, they need to convert those raw books on the market to slabbed books. CGC still represents a very small % of comics on the market

ebay #s

Platinum Age (1897-1937) 2338 1.03%

Golden Age (1938-55) 75977 4.06%

Silver Age (1956-69) 237557 3.13%

Bronze Age (1970-83) 258856 3.60%

Copper Age (1984-1991) 150128 2.47%

Modern Age (1992-Now) 840943 1.76%

Thats era, total # of listings by era, and what % of those listings show up in my CGC filter search. Not exact, but a decent ballpark. And that doesnt even get into how many of those books are actually WORTH CGCing..

I think the only way they add to the market is dropping costs and decreasing turn around times. (All things we'd love, but for our own reasons). The only way they do that is by potentially decreasing quality of grading service (hiring more people), but a good quality control manager, and some efficiency evaluation should be able to counteract some of that...

To all our customers:

 

All of us at CGC take pride in what we do. In order to accurately grade books they must each be given a certain amount of time and attention. We can’t shorten the grading process in order to move things along more quickly. We understand your frustration regarding grading turn around times and are doing everything in our power to reduce the time between submitting and receiving your graded and encapsulated books. Although being overwhelmed with submissions is a great issue that we don’t want to complain about, it is still an issue none the less. We’d like you to know that we are working 10 hour days and have been working six days a week in an attempt to alleviate the issues with turn around times. We are also looking to hire additional Graders. If you’d like more information or are interested in applying, please check the Careers page of our website for all the details.

 

Please be patient and keep in mind that we are doing our best to get your books back to you properly graded and encapsulated in order to maintain the integrity of what we do and the hobby we do it for.

 

Shill.

You sir owe me a new monitor, or at least come clean the coffee of the one I spit all over.

I would be happy to use someone else who offers a service comparable to the CGC, and since we all know that it isn't PGX, perhaps you might offer a recommendation.

 

I have already found an alternative to the Registry, so I'm basically sitting on G and waiting for O.

 

So you want the same (or better) quality, at the same price with a faster turn around time?

Or are you willing to pay more for faster and better?

 

Just wondering what your acceptable metric is...

My acceptable metric would be a grading service that runs their business like Richard Evans runs Bedrock City Comics, like Joe Grisolia runs CFP Comics, like Andrew Cretella runs GACollectibles, and like Dale Roberts runs Dale Roberts Comics. A business where everyone is treated professionally and with the same level of respect and courtesy. A business where if you have a problem they are working to an end where both the business and the customer are equally satisfied instead of admonished like a child in school or taunted with phrases such as, "Well, yeah, prove it." That would be my acceptable metric.

 

There's a difference between being a good retailer (which your examples may be and do what they do very well) and being a good MANUFACTURER.

 

CGC is a manufacturer of product (the product being a combination of grading, restoration check and slabbing). It is a far more complex process to manufacture than to retail (not saying its easy, just different and not necessarily as complex).

 

I agree that customers should be treated with respect and courtesy, and I haven't had any experiences with CGC to the contrary. And I dont recall seeing CGC on the boards telling people to "prove it" (not sure what "it" is, do you have some specific beef?)

 

CGC don't manufacture anything. They offer an opinion and guard against it being tampered with.

They have raw materials, takt times, slabbing equipment, quality control processes (Im assuming)... sounds like they manufacture something to me.

Will you grant that they are a different business type than the referenced comic book dealers?

 

Hi-Def - Blu Ray. The market didn't choose Blu Ray for its superior quality.

 

 

Sure it did. Audio was better than HD-DVD, and more info could fit on a Blu Ray disc. The people chose and then the studios followed suit.

 

Jim

 

Wasn't Blu Ray backed by Sony from the start? HD (if I remember correctly, I could very well be wrong) was on a hiding to nothing from the very beginning so the market didn't have a choice to make. At least that's the way I remember it. I'll happily stand corrected.

Yup, but Sony also backed BetaMax back in the day so it wasn't a sure thing (though back then Sony wasnt a studio, so I wonder what would have happened if they HAD been a studio back in the 70s). Pretty quickly Sony/BluRay had 4-5 other studios agreeing to product movies on the BluRay technology and it just got worse from there for HD-DVD.

I would be happy to use someone else who offers a service comparable to the CGC, and since we all know that it isn't PGX, perhaps you might offer a recommendation.

 

I have already found an alternative to the Registry, so I'm basically sitting on G and waiting for O.

 

So you want the same (or better) quality, at the same price with a faster turn around time?

Or are you willing to pay more for faster and better?

 

Just wondering what your acceptable metric is...

My acceptable metric would be a grading service that runs their business like Richard Evans runs Bedrock City Comics, like Joe Grisolia runs CFP Comics, like Andrew Cretella runs GACollectibles, and like Dale Roberts runs Dale Roberts Comics. A business where everyone is treated professionally and with the same level of respect and courtesy. A business where if you have a problem they are working to an end where both the business and the customer are equally satisfied instead of admonished like a child in school or taunted with phrases such as, "Well, yeah, prove it." That would be my acceptable metric.

There's a difference between being a good retailer (which your examples may be and do what they do very well) and being a good MANUFACTURER.

CGC is a manufacturer of product (the product being a combination of grading, restoration check and slabbing). It is a far more complex process to manufacture than to retail (not saying its easy, just different and not necessarily as complex).

I agree that customers should be treated with respect and courtesy, and I haven't had any experiences with CGC to the contrary. And I dont recall seeing CGC on the boards telling people to "prove it" (not sure what "it" is, do you have some specific beef?)

 

Hi-Def - Blu Ray. The market didn't choose Blu Ray for its superior quality.

 

 

Sure it did. Audio was better than HD-DVD, and more info could fit on a Blu Ray disc. The people chose and then the studios followed suit.

 

Jim

Insiders think it was more the other way around (Studios/Retailers were swayed and the market followed). BluRay spent a lot of effort getting the front end (Studios) and the backend (Retailers) to agree to exclusive contracts for the sake of good pricing... I only know of HD-DVD being able to get one studio to agree to use their format during the wars, and thus the death knell.