PROBATION DISCUSSIONS 21 21

[Dr. Balls]

This is just a WAG, but I bet there are 300-400 transactions that go through with no problem at all for every transaction that starts a PL discussion, regardless of whether someone lands on the PL or not.

 

That's what I was thinking - the PL list is a tiny fraction of the sales, and the problems shown here may not justify an across-the-board action. Remember, I am only saying a post count minimum to SELL on the boards:

 

Another example of why we should have a minimum post count for sales. mrmaha shows up to make a sale, he goofs up, gets higher PM offers and (assumingly) has no qualms about calling off his arrangement with Miamiknight to take a back-alley deal and then leaves the boards, most likely to come back under a different name at a later date when things cool down.

 

Granted, a sleazeball *might* do this regardless of post count - but the odds go down the longer they are here and part of the community. It's human nature to feel obligated to do the right thing when people know who you are and you know they are watching. That obligation diminishes when you are in a room full of strangers you can bilk and never worry about seeing or hearing from again.

 

I think people have lost sight of that fact and are thinking there should be a minimum for buying AND selling. I am not saying that.

[thehumantorch]

This is unequivocally a probation worthy act of douchebaggery by a regretful seller, period.

 

The terms were hammered out through a volley of PM's. Another clown shoes member, either a typical washer woman gossip or a spiteful buyer who thought he deserved the book, sticks their wet nose in the anus of this transaction.

 

Buyer graciously, yet unwisely, agrees to compensate for a portion of shipping costs. Seller continues raising his handjob status until reaching his climax and canceling transaction.

 

Done deal, and the 30 days should be waived in the event either party clearly states they have no intention of completing a mutually agreed upon sale. Stop being such bleeding hearts, not everything requires extensive debate, some facts are clear and actions should be swift.

 

In my CALtopia my will is severe and punishment just.

 

Yeah, this.

100%

[thehumantorch]

Another example of why we should have a minimum post count for sales. mrmaha shows up to make a sale, he goofs up, gets higher PM offers and (assumingly) has no qualms about calling off his arrangement with Miamiknight to take a back-alley deal and then leaves the boards, most likely to come back under a different name at a later date when things cool down.

 

Granted, a sleazeball *might* do this regardless of post count - but the odds go down the longer they are here and part of the community. It's human nature to feel obligated to do the right thing when people know who you are and you know they are watching. That obligation diminishes when you are in a room full of strangers you can bilk and never worry about seeing or hearing from again.

 

What about those handful of board members that have been registered for like 4 years but barely post?

 

My old saltwater fish forum had a minimum 90 day AND 90 meaningful( no "nice tanks" or "SWEET!" posts counted) posts requirement before you could even view the buying/selling forum. A lot of people whined and moaned that they had been there for years but just lurk and dont post. Admins response was basically "this is a community and if you want the benefits of buying/selling to the community, you have to participate in some meaningful way. Just reading posts for years doesnt entitle you to these benefits".

 

A lot of people were upset but it DEFINITELY helped cut down on the buying/selling problems.

 

How could you possibly monitor "meaningful" posts and who is going to count them up before they reach the invisible line?

 

Oh, the mods over there were WAY different from here! They had no problem whatsoever going thru the forums and adjusting peoples post counts that they thought were just padding them with "nice tank" posts. Happened all day every day.

 

nice tank dude

[DR.X]

This is just a WAG, but I bet there are 300-400 transactions that go through with no problem at all for every transaction that starts a PL discussion, regardless of whether someone lands on the PL or not.

 

Prove it.

[crassus]

I think the answer is simple, if you are worried about selling to noobs, explicitly state a rule in your sales thread that you reserve the right to deny a sale to anyone for any reason. Heck, specify that all noobs must PM you ahead of time and prove that they are a worthy buyer.

 

My first post here on the boards was a and frankly most of my 100+ posts have been

 

I buy here. I read here. I'm sorry I don't post all that often. But I have a solid track record and most people who find these boards will too.

 

Limiting someone's ability to buy or sell because they are new is stupid and will cause more harm than good in the long term.

Agree with all (and in fact, I sold to Kyle here right when he just joined up).

 

I always say the same thing every time this issue comes up. I've had dozens of successful sales to single-digit-posters (and even members with literally 0 posts). My only unsuccessful transaction here was to someone with 1500 posts who went south and didn't finish a time pay. For me there is little to no correlation between reliability and post count, and in the broader picture I'd be unhappy with excluding newbies who just joined up and are testing the waters.

 

There is obviously risk involved in buying from someone with no references who just joined up. When has that ever not been true?

 

 

+1 and I was one of your single-digit-sales, 2 posts I think, always grateful Jon (thumbs u

[AJD]

I think the answer is simple, if you are worried about selling to noobs, explicitly state a rule in your sales thread that you reserve the right to deny a sale to anyone for any reason. Heck, specify that all noobs must PM you ahead of time and prove that they are a worthy buyer.

 

My first post here on the boards was a and frankly most of my 100+ posts have been

 

I buy here. I read here. I'm sorry I don't post all that often. But I have a solid track record and most people who find these boards will too.

 

Limiting someone's ability to buy or sell because they are new is stupid and will cause more harm than good in the long term.

Agree with all (and in fact, I sold to Kyle here right when he just joined up).

 

I always say the same thing every time this issue comes up. I've had dozens of successful sales to single-digit-posters (and even members with literally 0 posts). My only unsuccessful transaction here was to someone with 1500 posts who went south and didn't finish a time pay. For me there is little to no correlation between reliability and post count, and in the broader picture I'd be unhappy with excluding newbies who just joined up and are testing the waters.

 

There is obviously risk involved in buying from someone with no references who just joined up. When has that ever not been true?

 

 

+1 and I was one of your single-digit-sales, 2 posts I think, always grateful Jon (thumbs u

 

My first ever post on the boards was 'I'll take it but can't work out how to post the icon' in a PointFive thread. I also didn't say what it was I was taking, but still...

[Dr. Love]

We won't need any more input from Soup, his eBay handle, or the WayBack Machine.

 

Some new information has come to light.

 

Follow with me to see if you agree with my conclusion.

 

3) GPA data for Certification # 0200514001

 

Soup stated that he sold this book on eBay.

 

GPA tracks eBay sales, and GPA shows no record of the sale.

 

He either lied about the sales venue, or he still has the book. I think it's the latter.

 

 

I know this matter is a dead issue. There is one aspect though that needs clarification. It's important that we understand how GPA derives it's reported sales from Ebay, and I would say most of us don't. Though Soup changed his story and so was flushed out, I'm pretty sure the logic Shellhead used above is not necessarily true and didn't necessarily mean at first that Soup was lying. That is, GPA does NOT track all Ebay CGC sales.

 

The critical concept: If the string (or text as most would say) "CGC" is not included in the listing title, the sale data will not be captured. This is my understanding at the moment - I'm seeking confirmation and will get back to you all.

[loadstone]

Purchased a comic from longdillon1 and paid in full on the 28th of February.

 

Received a reply to my messages around once a week. The payment was picked up fine via WU and seller acknowledged picking up the payment. Said he will ship on Monday Mar 11 2013.

 

Still no explicit confirmation that he shipped the book to me.

 

I propose placing him on the probation list if I do not get a reply within a week or the book does not arrive within the same time.

I brought up this person earlier. He placed a deposit of $70 on about $1500 worth of books, with 3 months to pay the balance. He wasn't able to. He lost his deposit, and I resold the books.

 

Hmm...was he by any chance pre-selling some of the books that he was supposed to be buying from you?

I came across his sales thread in February interested in the ASM 5 3.0 he had. I PM'd him on 2/27 at 1:46am for a back cover scan and he responded 13 minutes later at 1:59am that he would get it to me first thing tomorrow.

No update to his sale thread and no PM to me by 2am the next day so I sent him a reminder. Didn't hear from him for a full month!

 

Last week he PM me on 3/27 at 2:24am telling me he "Finally got a pic of the back of the asm 5 posted. Let me know what you think.". What do I think!?!? It's been a month! I'd totally forgotten all about him. I actually snagged a better looking raw copy of ASM 5 during that month of no communication. What do I think? I think he'd better get a better internet connection that dials up on days other than the 27th and 28th of the month! Glad his lack of communication caused me to lose interest. sheesh. I hope you get your money back Jo Seph. That really sucks.

[Ditch Fahrenheit]

The critical concept: If the string (or text as most would say) "CGC" is not included in the listing title, the sale data will not be captured.

I don't know where you heard this, but it isn't true.

 

 

[Dr. Love]

The critical concept: If the string (or text as most would say) "CGC" is not included in the listing title, the sale data will not be captured.

I don't know where you heard this, but it isn't true.

 

 

Yeh, it is. But I'm interested - what conditions do you think drive the capture of sales data by GPA? What do you think they search for and where?

[Ditch Fahrenheit]

The critical concept: If the string (or text as most would say) "CGC" is not included in the listing title, the sale data will not be captured.

I don't know where you heard this, but it isn't true.

 

 

Yeh, it is. But I'm interested - what conditions do you think drive the capture of sales data by GPA? What do you think they search for and where?

 

I'm interested in why you think GPA won't capture a sale if "CGC" isn't in the eBay title.

 

Have you seen eBay? There are hundreds of CGC books for sale right now that don't have "CGC" in their title, and orders of magnitude more in their completed listings. You think all these books aren't tracked by GPA? Their service would be worthless if this were true.

 

GPA has stated that they use a combination of different software tracking methods in conjunction with human ones. I'm guessing that they track images in addition to text, but that's just a guess on my part.

 

If your point is that they aren't infallible, and that some books may fall through the crack, then I agree. I think they stated that they capture 99.9% of all CGC books sold on eBay. So it's unlikely that a sale isn't captured, but not impossible.

[mikenyc]

The critical concept: If the string (or text as most would say) "CGC" is not included in the listing title, the sale data will not be captured.

I don't know where you heard this, but it isn't true.

 

 

Yeh, it is. But I'm interested - what conditions do you think drive the capture of sales data by GPA? What do you think they search for and where?

 

"My father would womanize, he would drink, make outrageous claims like he had invented the question mark. Sometimes, he would accuse chestnuts of being lazy."

[Dr. Love]

OK I want to make sure this conversation doesn't get away from me. Meaning I first want to commend you Shellhead - your post gave the "case" a push in the accountability direction on top of the determination of one or two others, Soup got caught dodging again, and then rolled over. So good work! I just knew that your premise was based on somewhat faulty logic and didn't want to see anybody rush to judgement or get embarrassed in the future by not more fully understanding GPA's methodology.

 

So. I know it because I've checked with GPA, and double checked their specs against ebay listings. The reason why GPA captures 99.9% of CGC books sold on Ebay is because the listings almost all have CGC in the title. If they don't, they (a) will not show up on the Live Auctions Links and (b) most probably won't have the sales data captured if they sell. I say most probably because you are correct, GPA has various capture methods.

 

You can check (a) for example by looking up Item # 181112268621, #181112266053, # 111044531382. You can check (b) by looking up globallifeafair's sold Spidey's from 3/16-3/25. Four slabs, none of which made it into sales data. Or dave_48030's XMen #2 which sold on 3/25 but didn't make it into the recordbook. Does it matter? Not so much really - unless you're claiming the irrefutable smoking gun in a particular board matter is no gpa record of a sale. Then it might make a difference.

 

Now this next part is important, because if you're a GPA subscriber, you probably care as much or more about the marketing aspects of having your listings show up in the Live Auctions Links as you do about having your sales data captured.

 

If you have an auction listing that runs greater than a 10 day duration, and many of us are going for the cost effective 30 Day or Good Till Cancelled BIN approach, then even if you have "CGC" in the title it will not show up in the Live Auctions Links unless you have the 10 digit cert # in the title as well. MyComicShop understands this concept well and presents their data accordingly - others not so much. Until recently I did not understand why my long term listings weren't showing up on GPA's site. Now I know.

 

Clarity in this area is beneficial to us all.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Bosco685]

The critical concept: If the string (or text as most would say) "CGC" is not included in the listing title, the sale data will not be captured.

I don't know where you heard this, but it isn't true.

 

 

Yeh, it is. But I'm interested - what conditions do you think drive the capture of sales data by GPA? What do you think they search for and where?

 

"My father would womanize, he would drink, make outrageous claims like he had invented the question mark. Sometimes, he would accuse chestnuts of being lazy."

 

Dr. Evil?

[comix4fun]

The critical concept: If the string (or text as most would say) "CGC" is not included in the listing title, the sale data will not be captured.

I don't know where you heard this, but it isn't true.

 

 

Yeh, it is. But I'm interested - what conditions do you think drive the capture of sales data by GPA? What do you think they search for and where?

 

"My father would womanize, he would drink, make outrageous claims like he had invented the question mark. Sometimes, he would accuse chestnuts of being lazy."

 

Dr. Evil?

 

"In the spring we'd make meat helmets. When I was insolent, I was placed in a burlap bag and beaten with reeds...pretty standard, really."

[Ditch Fahrenheit]

OK I want to make sure this conversation doesn't get away from me. Meaning I first want to commend you Shellhead - your post gave the "case" a push in the accountability direction on top of the determination of one or two others, Soup got caught dodging again, and then rolled over. So good work! I just knew that your premise was based on somewhat faulty logic and didn't want to see anybody rush to judgement or get embarrassed in the future by not more fully understanding GPA's methodology.

 

So. I know it because I've checked with GPA, and double checked their specs against ebay listings. The reason why GPA captures 99.9% of CGC books sold on Ebay is because the listings almost all have CGC in the title. If they don't, they (a) will not show up on the Live Auctions Links and (b) most probably won't have the sales data captured if they sell. I say most probably because you are correct, GPA has various capture methods.

 

You can check (a) for example by looking up Item # 181112268621, #181112266053, # 111044531382. You can check (b) by looking up globallifeafair's sold Spidey's from 3/16-3/25. Four slabs, none of which made it into sales data. Or dave_48030's XMen #2 which sold on 3/25 but didn't make it into the recordbook. Does it matter? Not so much really - unless you're claiming the irrefutable smoking gun in a particular board matter is no gpa record of a sale. Then it might make a difference.

 

Now this next part is important, because if you're a GPA subscriber, you probably care as much or more about the marketing aspects of having your listings show up in the Live Auctions Links as you do about having your sales data captured.

 

If you have an auction listing that runs greater than a 10 day duration, and many of us are going for the cost effective 30 Day or Good Till Cancelled BIN approach, then even if you have "CGC" in the title it will not show up in the Live Auctions Links unless you have the 10 digit cert # in the title as well. MyComicShop understands this concept well and presents their data accordingly - others not so much. Until recently I did not understand why my long term listings weren't showing up on GPA's site. Now I know.

 

Clarity in this area is beneficial to us all.

 

Reread my prior post. I stated that it wasn't impossible for eBay sales data to slip through the crack, just improbable. If one can believe GPA's claim of 99.9%, then it's to the tune of one book out of a thousand.

 

You stated:

If the string (or text as most would say) "CGC" is not included in the listing title, the sale data will not be captured.

 

And this is not true.

[Dr. Love]

Sigh. Yes, it is not true as a definitive across the board 100% no exceptions statement. But it is more true than not.

 

I pulled out 5 examples where no cgc in title = no sales data. I had to go through let's say 800 entries to find those. So much for one out of a thousand. But a high enough rate to justify a GPA subscription - especially when you see that it is generally Ebay newbies with little feedback and relatively low value books that have inadequate titles, ie do not have CGC in the title.

 

But the more salient question is: out of the sold listings of cgc books that had no "cgc" in the title field, how many made it into sales data and how many did not? In other words, how comprehensive are GPA's other methods of capturing that data? I found 1 that got in, 5 that did not (of the 800). A small sample set to be sure, but indicative that about 3 out of 4 listings that do not have "cgc" in the title field will not make it into sales data.

 

However, the value of my comments lies more in promoting an understanding of what it takes to appear in GPA's Live Auction Listings, especially for the long term listings.

 

 

 

[Ditch Fahrenheit]

3 out of 4 listings that do not have "cgc" in the title field will not make it into sales data.

 

I think your error analysis is way off. It certainly isn't 75%.

 

There are hundreds of active listings on eBay right now for CGC books that do not have CGC in the title. GPA isn't missing 75% of them, and a human screener could easily capture them.

 

I'd be interested in knowing the actual error rate. But from what I've seen, one book in a thousand doesn't seem too far off.

 

 

[Jeffro.]

We need a much larger sample size before we can conclude that what Dr Love is saying is true.

[Sqeggs]

OK I want to make sure this conversation doesn't get away from me. Meaning I first want to commend you Shellhead - your post gave the "case" a push in the accountability direction on top of the determination of one or two others, Soup got caught dodging again, and then rolled over. So good work! I just knew that your premise was based on somewhat faulty logic and didn't want to see anybody rush to judgement or get embarrassed in the future by not more fully understanding GPA's methodology.

 

So. I know it because I've checked with GPA, and double checked their specs against ebay listings. The reason why GPA captures 99.9% of CGC books sold on Ebay is because the listings almost all have CGC in the title. If they don't, they (a) will not show up on the Live Auctions Links and (b) most probably won't have the sales data captured if they sell. I say most probably because you are correct, GPA has various capture methods.

 

You can check (a) for example by looking up Item # 181112268621, #181112266053, # 111044531382. You can check (b) by looking up globallifeafair's sold Spidey's from 3/16-3/25. Four slabs, none of which made it into sales data. Or dave_48030's XMen #2 which sold on 3/25 but didn't make it into the recordbook. Does it matter? Not so much really - unless you're claiming the irrefutable smoking gun in a particular board matter is no gpa record of a sale. Then it might make a difference.

 

Now this next part is important, because if you're a GPA subscriber, you probably care as much or more about the marketing aspects of having your listings show up in the Live Auctions Links as you do about having your sales data captured.

 

If you have an auction listing that runs greater than a 10 day duration, and many of us are going for the cost effective 30 Day or Good Till Cancelled BIN approach, then even if you have "CGC" in the title it will not show up in the Live Auctions Links unless you have the 10 digit cert # in the title as well. MyComicShop understands this concept well and presents their data accordingly - others not so much. Until recently I did not understand why my long term listings weren't showing up on GPA's site. Now I know.

 

Clarity in this area is beneficial to us all.

 

 

Interesting and useful info. (thumbs u