jimbo_7071

Bingo. But that's changing. I think you'll see some prosecutions over the next few years for fraud / shill bidding / tax evasion.

Well, @VintageComics, you got a long sentence, but at least you didn't get completely booted like poor, hapless Bob Beerbohm.

I think that it might have fetched $30K in 2021 or 2022 during the hot Covid market. Now? I don't even think it would hit $20K at auction. Nobody under 65 cares about that character, and it isn't a horror cover, a GGA cover, or a WWII cover.

Well, it is priced at at least 10 times what it's worth—I was serious about that—but I'm sure it wasn't an accident on his part. I doubt he's actually insane enough to think that it's worth anywhere near that amount, but he probably priced it that way as a marketing gimmick—and I guess it's working because it's gotten him attention here.

I don't Josh wants too many people working there. The more employees there are, the more eyes there are on all of CLink's business dealings.

It's a nice book, but it looks like he fat-fingered an extra 0 on the price. Someone should let him know.

I guess you guys who think it's bad now don't remember the pre-internet days when the only way to move comics was to take them to a comic shop and get 50 cents on the dollar versus what you had paid—and that was for the good stuff that they cherry picked out of your collection.

All of that tells me that it's business as usual at CLink. It's comforting.

I might trust them with a check, but I wouldn't trust them with a credit card at this point. I had an expired credit card stored on the site. I just deleted it, but even though it was expired, I'm going to be watching for suspicious activity on that account. (For my last order, CGC was able to bill my account even though I had not updated my expiration date and security code on the CGC site; the initial charge was incorrect because they had not deducted the $150 grading credit that I had with them, but they fixed that promptly when I brought it to their attention. What concerns me is that they were able to bill my account at all after my card had expired. So now I really don't trust expiration dates.)

Man, does that burn me up. And only 6 months for stealing tens or even hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of items??? (I don't recall how many books were stolen, but it wouldn't have taken too many of your comics to hit six figures.)

This situation must really be stressing out the shill bidders. I feel so sorry for them—psych!

Books may down in general, though. On both HA and eBay I've bought books at auction this year for significantly less than what the same copies had sold for in the past. There have also been a couple of times where I've thought, "Man, if I I'd known the book was going to go that cheap, I would have tossed a bid at it." My tiny amount of anecdotal info doesn't mean much, but I'm curious whether others have noticed the same thing.

They're on the CLink. The CLink site is down right now, but you can see them on that site once it's back up. (They're still showing up for me.)

Here's an example of a 9.8 with the CVA sticker. The book has noticeably fanned pages (which to me suggests possible cover shrinkage from pressing), the staples are off-center on the back cover, and the coupon on the back cover makes it obvious that the book was cut slightly crooked. It may be a 9.8, but in what way is the book an exceptional 9.8?

Got it! I had never heard of that series or those actors. (I don't watch much T.V.)

Is the joke that they're wearing masks, or are those two people famous for something?

Sidekick being gotten rid of for cramping a hero's style to a sidekick who should have been gotten rid of for cramping a hero's style.

To me the biggest question is, have any CVA submitters garnered preferential treatment for their books? I did not know until reading this thread that one of the owners used to work for CLink. It seems like that situation could create a conflict of interest with respect to books being submitted by CLink or by regular CLink submitters like Steve Ritter. We know that CGC has some anonymity built into their process, although with very large submissions—like the Promise Collection—the graders must surely know who the customer is. Is there any anonymity built into CVA's process, or is it one guy who know which books come from CLink and which ones belong to important CLink submitters? I have seen some CVA-sticker-adorned books that did not appear to be strictly graded but may have had good centering, registration, etc., so it's unclear what the criteria actually are or how things are weighted.

The registration and colors are fantastic; I think you have a very good chance of landing a coveted CVA sticker! As awesome as those stickers are, to me, the risk of damage in shipping would ever-so-slightly outweigh the never-ending euphoria that comes from owning a CVA sticker, but every collector has to weigh the risks and make that call for himself or herself.

I wouldn't bet on that. There are plenty of defects, like water marks and interior cover tanning, that are not visible through the slab, not always mentioned in the notes, and not pressable. I appreciate that perspective, but you might be in the minority. Every book I've ever had slabbed has been for my personal collection. I have actually dropped things on comics in 4-mil Archives and had books get dings through the mylar, so I see the slabs as offering better protection from my clumsiness. I also trust them to keep out those damned silverfish better than anything else. The peace of mind is worth the cost of a slab for any book that I care about even a little. However, what you do isn't relevant, nor is what I do for that matter. Clearly, many collectors prefer their books in slabs—for whatever combination of reasons.

No, not unless it's orphaned from one. Anyway, some very nice original-owner collections were sold off before the idea of a comic book pedigree gained traction, so there are quite a few very nice non-pedigree books out there.

It has nice cover colors and appears strictly graded because the mis-wrap wouldn't affect the grade (and is slight by GA standards). But I think the real answer is, someone paid for the sticker. I won't be surprised if I eventually see one of these stickers on a remaindered copy. I mean, you could have a remaindered copy with nicer eye appeal than other remaindered copies, right?

Sidekick with a bat, man, to sidekick with a Batman.

I have 3 books with CVA stickers, and in no case did the sticker make any difference to me. The books have nice eye appeal, but I didn't need a sticker to tell me that. Do you have any idea how many defects can't be seen when a book is in a slab? The stickers are meaningless. (I didn't even notice the sticker on the Mystic until after I bought it; I had asked CLink for large scans, and the sticker wasn't on there yet in those pictures). I still drink water from the tap a brew my coffee at home (in a pan on the stove because my coffee maker broke during the pandemic and I haven't gotten around to replacing it).

Vigilantism to police brutality.