RockMyAmadeus

You are, where I and some others are concerned, the very essence, definition, and embodiment of the concept of "bad faith." You are the very reason why people should never post contact details until a case is settled, because you will interject yourself and give aid and encouragement to the guilty, at best mischaracterizing, and at worst just plain lying, mucking up any chance of equitable negotiations, just for some measure of petty vengeance. Please stop trying to pick fights and MOVE. ALONG.

It's most bizarre. I've been around eBay a long time, and I've never heard that before. "That's not the box I shipped it in!" So, how did the item you sold me end up in a box with your name and return address on it, if you weren't the one who sent it? Did the UPS people take his box, remove the slab from inside, put it in a UPS express box, and then take it to the local post office and use his information to print a label and then send it USPS Priority instead...? I mean, I guess it's possible, but so far out of the realm of probable. It exposes UPS to serious liability. The account that paid for the label would tell all, I imagine. If it was shipped from his postage account, which the label can reveal, then it becomes even less remote. It looks like the postage was printed using an Endicia account. Whose? The label says, but I don't have access to that info. And then, on top of that, how did the tracking number get entered into the seller's order details, if UPS generated the label and sent it themselves? Did they have access to his eBay account AND his Endicia account...? Did he generate the label, and then just hand it to the UPS people? If so, why didn't he put it on the "box" he claims he DID send..? No, his story doesn't add up one bit. Entertaining to try and sleuth out, but it doesn't work.

For clarity's sake, those quotes are from the seller I'm dealing with, not me personally.

Ha ha ha ha, Greenham! Foiled again!

It awaits you. Ok, fine.

Stop trying to pick fights and move along, please.

Stop trying to pick fights and move along, please.

The MMs that aren't sold are so very, very tempting.... Especially that #85.

So you say. Let's not devolve into pointless arguments. You're surprised by the USPS accepting UPS boxes, because you think everyone ought to see things the way you do, and live by your personal morality which, if put into effect, would be tyranny. But it's no surprise at all for them to do so. Just like it's not my job, business, responsibility, right, or obligation to try and police all the shenanigans on eBay by hacking into their system and taking matters into my own hands, so is it not the USPS' job to police people using UPS materials to ship. That's tyranny, because its so easily abused. What's next? USPS refusing shipments from people who owe back child support? Who parked in the handicapped spot? Have unpaid traffic tickets? "Do unto others..." can be applied to ALL of those things, can it not...? Do you want ME deciding for YOU what you should do in life? Why not? Personal freedom comes with personal responsibility.

You might want to rewrite that sentence, because it doesn't say what you were trying to get across. If you're trying to say "So it's OK for someone to use another company's materials to ship with you, so long as they don't abuse your materials to ship with someone else" then the answer is no, not even close. Just because it's not the USPS job to be policing shipping materials other than their own does not therefore translate into "then it must be perfectly ok to do so!" In other words, the absence of "enforcement" does not translate to tacit approval. People aren't supposed to keyword spam, either, but does their doing so give me the right to hack eBay and end their listings on my own? Let's save the leaps in reasoning for the modern threads.

Nuh uh. (pout) Er, I mean, of course there are, Jolly! (don't hit me...)

In other words, it's not the USPS' job to be policing what kind of shipping boxes people use, nor should it be. That requires them to make decisions that are outside of their job descriptions, and could easily lead to tyrannical behavior on their part. For example, what if the box WAS recycled? It is up to the individual to "do unto others", and not abuse shipping materials in the first place. It's never anyone's job to make moral decisions on behalf of anyone else, unless that person is "mom" or "dad."

That's a personal credo, not a corporate one. The first leads to freedom; the second to tyranny.

+1 The bane of my war existence. Shakey fist!

DAMN YOU GREENHAM!!!!!!!!

Why would USPS care about some other company's materials?

Well, since the usual suspects complained about a potentially blocked user in the blocked bidder list, I'll post this here. You can't make this stuff up, folks. This week, amazingly after the botched shipping I received a few days earlier, I received this: Yay! Another broken slab! You can see the inner well from the hole in the slab. Sorry for the fuzzy. So, the slab was shipped in a UPS Express Box...which is free from UPS, though you ought not be using it for non-UPS shipments unless you're recycling used boxes...not the case here...and inside, the slab was put in a bubble envelope...that is, a single layer of bubble...and, well...that's it. Here's literally what the box looked like inside: No packing material, not even wadded up newspaper. Just the slab, envelope, and a large, verrrrrry empty UPS Express Box. So, ugh, another one to deal with. Really, folks, as the blocked bidder list attests, this kind of stuff happens all day, every day. It's not "bad luck", it's just the simple fact that people are lazy and want to do the least amount of effort for the most return. It's just human nature. *Most* of the time, it's ok. But, unfortunately, the book itself WAS a 9.8, and it WAS crunched very badly. So, no SS for this bad boy in the future, at least by me: Hard to see, but the book was jammed into the bottom lip of the well, and you can sorta see the bad indentation it left. Also: Here, you can see a piece of broken part inside the slab, right below the archery set, as well as the severe crunch at the bottom edge, directly below the electronic doohicky and the red and yellow target. In other words, a 9.0-9.2, that might be fixable, but won't be by me. So, hey, stuff happens, not a big deal. It's just a simple return because of bad packing. I send a message to the seller: "Hello. I received this book, but the slab arrived broken, with pieces broken off. Pictures included. The comic inside has, unfortunately, been fairly seriously mangled, and is, of course, no longer a 9.8. Please advise. Thanks!" The response: "Hi,I’m not sure how this is possible. I used a bubble envelope and brown outer box. I paid $21.00 for the shipping and materials. It’s impossible that this happened in transit with that packaging." (note the "brown outer box"...it's important for the scam later.) My response, because, well, it's me: "Not only was it possible, it's precisely what happened. Here's how: first, you put the slab in a padded envelope which is just one bubble layer thick. Then, you put that into a UPS shipping box that was much larger than the slab/padded envelope. Then....well, that's it. That's all you did. You didn't even stuff the box with wadded up newspaper. There was absolutely nothing preventing the slab from banging around inside the box. Did you think one single layer of bubble wrap would prevent the slab from hitting the box and breaking, especially when the slab/padded envelope was completely free to bang around inside the box the whole way...? Frankly, I'm surprised it wasn't more severely damaged.And no, you didn't pay $21 for shipping materials and postage. You paid for 1 lb (it's right there on the label), which means you underpaid the USPS (postage for a slab is a minimum of 2 pounds.) The UPS box was free, and the padded envelope was, what, $1+? The postage cost for Commercial Plus is somewhere around $8 for 1 lb, so what happened to the other $12 you claim to have paid? And...I'm not quite sure, but did you shill bid your listings? Is ***** (***) you? Did you set up some protection bids...?" Response: "Of course I would never bid on my own item. I paid UPS for the box and envelope as well as ground shipping. Please send me a picture of the box. It has 100$ insurance and I will try to claim it through them if I can show the box picture . I shipped a lot of comics and none of these have ever cracked which is why I’m shocked and surprised." Right. Shocked! My response: "Oh come on, now. The UPS box is FREE. Says so right on the UPS website. And the box was shipped USPS Priority, not UPS ground. The truth of the matter is, the slab wasn't protected adequately. It moved around freely inside the box, and got banged up. If you had just included some wadded up newspaper, this probably could have been avoided. Contents moving = contents damaged. If you shipped the other slabs you sold out like this, and none of them were damaged, you are verrrry lucky.Here are pictures of the box.This is of no use to me now, as my intention was to get the book signed. I'm not paying a 9.8 price for what is, now, a 9.0-9.2 comic. Whatever you need to do is on your end, but I will be sending this back for a refund." Because, frankly, I get tired of the "I can't BELIEVE this! This has NEVER happened to me before!" nonsense. Included were these pics, though not edited, as they are here: Note the "1 lb" shipping rate, which is common among thieves. Slabs weigh, at minimum, a pound plus, always, so the minimum rate to ship any slab is 2 pounds. This guy didn't think he should have to pay that, so 1 lb it is! The total weight, by the way, is 1 lb, 7 oz. Yes, I weighed it. Now, here's where we veer off into Twilight Zone...and, in just a couple months shy of 20 full years on eBay, I have NEVER, EVER heard this before: "That is not the box I used to ship. I used a cardboard box that I paid $5.00 for and have a receipt for. The box shows no crushing that would lead to that breakage on the comic case. I will not accept the refund. You have accused me of many things including bidding up my product. Something is very off here. I will not communicate with you further.If you would like to request a refund I will need more info. Communicate directly with eBay going forward." (Emphasis added.) Something is, indeed, very off, and it ain't with me. So, in other words...someone took the slab and bubble envelope, with my name and address written on it, OUT of the box he says he shipped it in...then created a label with his shipping information on it, shipped from his address, with all his information on it...? And not only that, he shipped it "UPS Ground" (for which he "paid for a box", even though the box it showed up in is free), but it ended up getting shipped USPS Priority mail instead...? And, from that picture alone, he is able to determine that "the box shows no crushing which would lead to that breakage"...? Wow! This guy's a forensic psychic! Nevermind that I already told him the slab was free to move INSIDE the box. The truth is out there! Also nevermind that I didn't accuse him of shill bidding. I just asked. Anyways, as amusing as this has been, it's really still quite bizarre, so back the book goes. I hope the guy can fix it, but really, if he can't, it's entirely his fault. This is what happens when you smoke too much ganja!

One of the best Batman stories ever.

It amazes me that the SS program lasted for well over a decade without all these jags trying to "exclusivise" these creators. There simply wasn't a need. If people wanted to facilitate books getting signed, great. But to attempt to control the market by convincing creators AND CGC to not let anyone submit to CGC except through them was an attempt to monopolize the market, based on false statements ("people are making FAT STACKS off your sigs!!!") and the promise of wads of cash. Nevermind that the program worked perfectly well for over a decade without them. Nevermind that, despite a few hiccups along the way, the vast majority of SS guys got in, treated the creators with respect and dignity, and got out. No, it's all about tying up those creators to YOUR "stable" and convincing CGC...unbelievably...to go along with your monopolistic plan to cut out everyone else from doing it on their own. No, I suspect, as has been the case in the past, that CGC is not responsible for this decision by Liefeld either. It's a shame they get lumped into it. But if there were no such thing as "exclusive" facilitators, this kind of thing couldn't be pinned on CGC.

Right...in those situations, there would be a "facilitator", who is NOT a CGC employee, and NOT connected to CGC in any official capacity, handling those signings. With Rob, it has almost (if not entirely) exclusively been handled by a single facilitator (company.) It's really just putting two and two together, from my perspective. CGC has gone out of its way to PROTECT relationships with creators, especially under Balent and Sam, so why would Liefeld cut off CGC, rather than just that facilitator...? Because someone who acted like they represented CGC when they didn't created a problem, right...?

Normally, I would agree with you. However, as someone who is at 8-12 national conventions a year, and has a network of people that I engage on a regular basis, I can say with a reasonable measure of confidence that this is almost certainly related to the actions of "exclusive facilitators." As has been revealed with the Stan and Max issue, there are a LOT of behind-the-scenes shenanigans that go on with some of these people, and CGC ends up taking the fallout. When Starlin cut off CGC last May, was it CGC's fault...? Ok, according to Starlin, there was someone at the booth who talked to him in a way that CGC wouldn't have endorsed. But was it actually the fault of the guy who couldn't be bothered to pay Starlin what he agreed to pay? Yes, clearly. The contention that it's a result of Liefeld's income going down doesn't make much sense. "I'm not making as much money as I was, so I'm going to cut off that revenue source entirely." No, I suspect this has to do entirely with the "exclusive facilitator" that "represented" Rob. It's not good for the fans, it's not good for the creators, and it's not good for CGC. It's only good for the "exclusive" guys, because, hey, it certainly doesn't cost THEM any additional money...and they get all sorts of goodies out of the deal (like, for example, free sigs.) It's all about the $$$, and everyone else pays. I would be surprised to be proven wrong, but knowing the CGC SS personnel, I'm going to go with "third party facilitator" as bearing responsibility here.

I'm quite certain others will disagree, but this is the end result of allowing and encouraging "exclusive" arrangements with third party "facilitators", instead of treating everyone as an independent contractor. These "exclusive" "facilitators" not only drive prices up for everyone, creating a "two-tiered" cost for signatures based on, at best, incomplete information, and at worst, flat out lies, they often represent themselves (falsely) as being, in some measure, "connected" with CGC in some official respect, and it leads to creators who have issues with facilitators...who are NOT part of CGC, and do NOT represent CGC in ANY capacity...cutting off CGC proper, as if CGC is to blame. CGC should never, in a million years, ever have allowed anyone to "exclusively represent" anyone. Now, unfortunately, the genie is out of the bottle, and this is the result. Granted...I do not know (all) the circumstances surrounding this...but I suspect that CGC, its employees, and their corporate actions had nothing to do with Liefeld's decision, stupid as it is. Liefeld's never been one for taking the long view, but he cuts off fans because of the actions of a few. Shame.