comicwiz

The two rounded/circles look like what are referred to as "hickeys" in printing - for those who have never heard this term before, for brevity here's a quote from Google: "occurs when a piece of dust or random mote sticks to either the plate or blanket of the offset printing press or the printing medium, which causes an imperfection on the printed page"

I can't decide what's more impressive, the Cage "squint" or the copious pizza hand appearing out of thin air

Mad props to CGA for releasing their population reports again. This is leaps and bounds better than the previous iteration, and is really slick. It can be a little clunky in terms of trying to figure out the correct criteria to improve relevance matching, and as such, I'd imagine this will increase the amount of search attempts until users figure out which are the best keywords or combinations of search fields to use. The person who gave me the heads up was locked out for suspicious activity, so I'd recommend giving at least 30 seconds between each search to avoid this, as I'm certain it's meant to eliminate bots scraping data from their site. However, what they have done to federate the search across four different subsiadaries, which includes AFA, and especially, how they integrated the serial-look-ups with the population data is a massive improvement, and one that other graders should emulate (that includes CGC). The unknown of course with any pop reports is that you really don't know how quickly the data will populate after grading, but this is a welcome upgrade to be able to perform simple verification for graded toys under the CGA umbrella.

It's a 3D representation of Logray and Chief Chirpa that were blacked out on the back of the card to avoid spoilers.

I posted this meme in that thread (IYKYK)

Let's hope it's light speed distance away. If people truly believe this serves the consumer/collectors best interest, it never works out that way with monopolistic practices such as what's unfolding here. Walmart is the perfect example of this. If anyone has ever tried to enter into any service or product agreement with them, they'll know exactly what I mean. Years ago, they wanted to use my company's services, but when we began talking about price to carry out our service, their approach was to eventually do the job for them without even considering wages of workers. Basically, if we wanted the contract with Walmart, we had underpay our staff and/or work for free. And they wondered why we didn't answer their calls after our first meeting. So it's not just how they eliminate competition locally by under-pricing other businesses, then slowly increasing their prices once they've killed off every mom and pop, but it's a direct attack on the local economy because they target living wage. People who work there don't earn enough to afford shopping at the retailer. In this instance, it starts with upcharges on fees for listings, grading, auctioning (final value fees), storing. The confluence of consolidating 75% of the grader market for PSA/SGC, and rubbing out the rest (that includes CGC), thinning margins for sellers, and bearing similar earmarks of the horrors that came with "offerings" such as the global shipping program and taking a percentage of shipping cost. It's the perfect recipe for consumers getting hosed at every step of the process. Competition is the way consumers keep businesses fighting for their loyalty, this deal is meant to eliminate that possibility. It doesn't effect me, and there would be no way in the world I would ever surrender any cards under this agreement to either PSA, eBay or their "vault," Over the long-term, this will have a negative impact on the trading cards hobby and any appearance of a one-stop umbrella of service offerings is the kind that still leaves you wet in the rain.

Worth a read: Why did the 'King of Collectibles' cast doubt on their million-dollar LeBron James card? https://www.yahoo.com/news/tried-sell-million-dollar-lebron-100057785.html

Amazing! The hollow cheeks is a killer find!

Sweet haul!

He's back at with his lies. If you haven't already, read the post I quoted above. Yesterday, he posted in a FB group called Bespin Prime, stating his "Hungarian Y-Wing" was the "only example." I responded showing info/photographic proof that revealed his "limelight of lies for likes" campaign. He removed the post. Then proceeds to post in a group I'm not able to respond in because he's a liar and would rather peddle misinformation than confront soemone that can call out his lies for what they are. This is the self-proclaimed VSW hobby segment weapons expert?? Variant Villain indeed!

This story eerily overlaps with something that happened in another collecting category I'm involved with. Last April, a Kentucky teacher was arrested after he was found to be sending texts to a 9 year old. The arrest led to 17 counts (ten counts of distribution of obscene matter to a minor and seven counts of use of a minor under 16 in a sexual performance). The school he worked for put him on leave. When this first hit the news, many of us who knew this person were shocked. I had only conversed with this person via PM, but many of my friends in the hobby had spent time at conventions with this person, and he'd been known for a very long time. It was an extremely strange time, because while some were "vaguebooking" about it, whenever his name came up, there were a contingent of folks who simply did not want to see his name disparaged, often devolving into a "let the courts decide on whether there's any legitimacy to these claims." In November of last year he pleaded guilty and in February he was sentenced to 30 years in prison. Now as a parent of two children, but also as someone that has volunteered with coaching duties in minor youth development in hockey, the idea that someone in the position of educator would not understand how poor a choice they made is difficult for me to reconcile. I can't tell you how many seminars I've had to sit in about best practices we need to uphold as mentors. And yes, as a volunteer, I found the instruction/direction to sometimes be excessive, but they leave no room for someone to question if their actions would be considered to deviate from protocol. I also recognize that many of the people defending the school teacher did not want to accept the eventuality of what he had done because their friendships told them this person was someone different than what had been portrayed by the media. On the other side of this specific situation, the Pittsburgh reporter who demanded the alleged's elderly father to speak on the allegations was a horrible decision made by that news channel, and represents how people can sometimes get charged up and overstep boundaries when situations of this nature arise. We are seeing some of it unfolding here in this very thread. The outcome, whether it be jail time, or taking ones life, is part of the eventuality as observers of how things are managed in real time. There is very little middle ground in these situations, and I think that is one of the worst parts about social media is the speed at which information travels, often at breakneck speed. And with this, the often too rash or knee-jerk reactions that occur. There's no enjoyment from any of this, no matter what side or position that's assumed. That said, I feel discussing it out in the open (albeit sometimes very difficut to do) is something that can help us all better understand the dangers of user behaviour in social media or news literacy, which is far too often absent of facts being checked.

I collect comic racks, and metal detect. The latter led me down the path of conserving metal, and I've worked on everything from Roman coins, 14th/15th Century Biscayne trade axes, environmentally damaged coins, and everything in-between. I bring a unique perspective to this, but at least you will have a different perspective to the advice you'll hear from others. I don't ever work on anything unless there is a need to. I've recovered ancient artifacts dating between 8,000-10,000 years old, and those I would never dare touch. The main thing is to identify when there is degradation occurring, and unfortunately in your case the rust is something that you will need to address. Rust never sleeps. I've worked on trade axes that came out of their conservation session almost new, and within minutes began oxidizing and rust beginning to return. Non-ferrous metal requires proper stabiization techniques. A clean-up and repaint is not something I would ever recommend, and if you decide to go that route, you should disclose it as such. The cost to properly "stabilize" something like this will be considerable. However if you are going to do it, go to people that know how to work on these sorts of projects. Pay the money, and get it done right. Those folks should also know how to recondition/repair and recreate (as required) the header or sign. As a comic rack collector, the DC publisher rack is one I'd like to someday add, but unfortunately as is, it's a very, very tough sell because anyone that's ever had to restore one of these the right way will know it won't be cheap. A metal artist, antique resto expert, and miracle worker in one is what you'll need here.

It seems pretty obvious in this instance, the call was made to Len Wein's widow to tell her Roy Thomas is NOW in on the action from the upcoming movie.

The issue as most see it is that he was an EIC when this would have occurred, as Larry Hama puts it: Larry Hama "I was an editor at Marvel, and I always understood that if I created stuff as a staff employee, it belonged to the company. No editor should get further renumeration for coming up with material for their freelancers to work on. That is part of the job. They got a salary for that." Him suggesting the character should be Canadian, and to call him Wolverine, isn't enough to establish he created the character. Add to this the EIC component mentioned above, and you end up with a co-creator grab because he's the last one standing. Then there's also this: “There's another piece that is interesting because it points out that Roy's "contribution" of nationality had already been pitched by a fan in FOOM [Marvel’s fan magazine, "Friends of Ol' Marvel”]. And Dave Cockrum had claims that his character presentations/designs that led to the New X-Men included a Wolverine character."