GPAnalysis rant!

[Jaymole]

Although I agree that PQ info would be useful, GPA provides the service that I want now. The price for the service is reasonable and I don't want to get it hiked up to pay for a bunch of services that I'm not bothered about. There are loads of existing sites where I can match a cover image to an issue number in seconds, I don't need GPA to be bogged down with it.

 

Very important point. You want more from GPA, you will have to pay more.

 

Additionally, I think more relevant to explaining the price outliers is where it was sold, rather than PQ. We know that certain submitters skew/falsify submitted data (much to George's disgust and anger) and this can help validate...or not...certain sales.

 

Oh, and for all those who would like to see CLink data included...start shouting at Josh, would you, 'cause it ain't GPA that's the problem with this. (thumbs u

 

Do you know if there is a reason why CLink doesn't want to provide the data?

 

Thanks

[Flaming_Telepath]

Although I agree that PQ info would be useful, GPA provides the service that I want now. The price for the service is reasonable and I don't want to get it hiked up to pay for a bunch of services that I'm not bothered about. There are loads of existing sites where I can match a cover image to an issue number in seconds, I don't need GPA to be bogged down with it.

 

Very important point. You want more from GPA, you will have to pay more.

 

Additionally, I think more relevant to explaining the price outliers is where it was sold, rather than PQ. We know that certain submitters skew/falsify submitted data (much to George's disgust and anger) and this can help validate...or not...certain sales.

 

Oh, and for all those who would like to see CLink data included...start shouting at Josh, would you, 'cause it ain't GPA that's the problem with this. (thumbs u

 

Do you know if there is a reason why CLink doesn't want to provide the data?

 

Thanks

 

There are two stumbling blocks with the data, both of them resolveable if Josh were prepared to deal with GPA on the same terms as every other submitter.

[Silver Surfer]

I think they should make a notation for all books sold at auction on a Holiday.

 

I just set a bunch of GPA lows on books that ended on the 4th of July.

 

 

I learned the hard way a few years back. Great time to buy stuff though.

[TheWatcher]

Although I agree that PQ info would be useful, GPA provides the service that I want now. The price for the service is reasonable and I don't want to get it hiked up to pay for a bunch of services that I'm not bothered about. There are loads of existing sites where I can match a cover image to an issue number in seconds, I don't need GPA to be bogged down with it.

 

Very important point. You want more from GPA, you will have to pay more.

 

Additionally, I think more relevant to explaining the price outliers is where it was sold, rather than PQ. We know that certain submitters skew/falsify submitted data (much to George's disgust and anger) and this can help validate...or not...certain sales.

 

Oh, and for all those who would like to see CLink data included...start shouting at Josh, would you, 'cause it ain't GPA that's the problem with this. (thumbs u

 

 

As Nick said above, CLink wanted to submit some sales data of their choosing. George wanted all or nothing. They couldn't come to some resolve, so there's no data from CLink

 

[etanick]

I think the PQ question can be solve real easily going foward if CGC decides to add a letter to the serial number such as...

 

instead of 123456789, just do a123456789, b123456789, etc...

 

a= white, b= ow/w, c= ow, etc...

 

simple modification to the existing serial system and at least going forward all new slabs PQ can be identify by just looking at the serial number

 

maybe someone already suggested something similar?

[gaz973]

I think the PQ question can be solve real easily going foward if CGC decides to add a letter to the serial number such as...

 

instead of 123456789, just do a123456789, b123456789, etc...

 

a= white, b= ow/w, c= ow, etc...

 

simple modification to the existing serial system and at least going forward all new slabs PQ can be identify by just looking at the serial number

 

maybe someone already suggested something similar?

 

Not a bad suggestion but I don't think that CGC has a motivation to make the change.

[ComicsAndCode]

I think the PQ question can be solve real easily going foward if CGC decides to add a letter to the serial number such as...

 

instead of 123456789, just do a123456789, b123456789, etc...

 

a= white, b= ow/w, c= ow, etc...

 

simple modification to the existing serial system and at least going forward all new slabs PQ can be identify by just looking at the serial number

 

maybe someone already suggested something similar?

 

Not a bad suggestion but I don't think that CGC has a motivation to make the change.

 

I was thinking the same thing. I just don't see the incentive for them doing it either.

 

BUT...assuming they are willing to make that change, instead of pre-pending an alpha for PQ, just have the first (or last) digit denote PQ. For one thing, they don't have to change the way the serial # is stored...it's still a numerical value. And because it's seamless, GPA may or may not choose to use that digit.

 

[lizards2]

I could go with the presser's chant and say most of the hobby doesn't care.

[plasticide-migration]

First off, I'm a GPA subscriber and consider it a valuable resource. So thanks George, et al for the site. BUT isn't it about time the service started providing page quality data? I mean, I really think that in a lot of cases, the sales data would make more sense with PQ because it would likely answer for the disparate prices realized for a book at a specific grade (i.e. white pages statistically command more than cream, off-white, etc.).

 

Is this a valid request or am I being too picky?

 

Nope, not too picky and wouldn't be much more work for them either. It sure is easy to sit and do nothing to improve when you are the only game in town as GPA has. I toyed with the idea of competing with those guys years ago and I had PQ in my data as I always thought that was a glaring deficiency in GPA. It would also be great to see the median, mode and range values which are easily calculated. I do like the live auctions feature they added, but would prefer more statistical analysis and more ways to sort/group the data. Also, would it kill them to add cover images? Comics.org allows images to be borrowed as long as credit is given to them. What's the hold-up?

 

When you say "cover images", are you referring to a generic one or of the actual comic book sold? A generic one wouldn't add a whole lot of value. And providing the cover image for the actual sold comic is a technical and content-management nightmare. As I recall, GPA recently did a major site restructuring where part of it was to reduce response time on the searches. Adding cover images would impact the performance gained from that restructuring. Plus, consider how much work is involved in loading the images to the service, one at a time. I imagine that would hike up operation cost which no doubt would be passed on to the subscriber.

 

I'm talking about generic images and I absolutely see the value there. As I am browsing Batman (1940) and can't remember the issue number I'm interested in but can remember the cover image, seeing a little thumbnail as I open the tree-view next to a number would help me identify the correct issue.

 

Other ideas off the top of my head that would benefit all:

 

At least sort the "title" combo box by most popular descending or by start date of the series, not alpha-numeric or however they do it now. If I type in "Incredible Hulk", I need to hunt through tons of entries to find Hulk (1963). This should be the first entry in the list, not somewhere in the middle.

 

Why limit the search to comic title? The "title only" search system is terribly inadequate. Allow common searches that most all comic related sites allow:

Searchable by issue story synopsis

Searchable by character cross-reference

Searchable by creator (Writer, Artist). I know I want to find Neal Adams books and I want to browse them all in one search, rather than run hundreds of individual queries.

 

Show me Live Auctions that were listed for a particular date or date range, so I can browse the newest additions for Buy-It-Nows and check GPA data on those books at the same time.

 

Once implemented, these improvements don't cost GPA anything. Only the initial cost of doing the data entry and improving the code.

 

No charge for these suggestions GPA, get crackin please.

 

You gotta be kidding me Do you want GPA to flip the pages of your comic for you too?

[sterlingcomics]

I had a brainstorm about five years ago to use the CGC Registry database so that a service oriented architecture (SOA) application could make a web call to find out the title, issue, grade, PQ, etc simply by knowing the serial number. Armed ONLY with this information on ANY sale, the rest of what everyone asking is would be easy.

 

I was even willing to pay CGC a subscription fee for this service.

Then, something bad happened.

 

They locked down the registry. They were concerned about the traffic. It simply wasn't to be.

 

In theory, the request for PQ is nice and would explain the data gaps.

 

Unfortunately, it's not going to happen imo. Simply too intensive from an implementation standpoint since GPA would have to do the proper searching, scrubbing, validating etc. It would be a nightmare.

 

Maybe CGC should recognize legimiate business need for companies to query their registry database, and offer it as a fee. Unfortunately, it would uncover all of the nasty resub problem we already know.

[mrlatko]

First off, I'm a GPA subscriber and consider it a valuable resource. So thanks George, et al for the site. BUT isn't it about time the service started providing page quality data? I mean, I really think that in a lot of cases, the sales data would make more sense with PQ because it would likely answer for the disparate prices realized for a book at a specific grade (i.e. white pages statistically command more than cream, off-white, etc.).

 

Is this a valid request or am I being too picky?

 

Nope, not too picky and wouldn't be much more work for them either. It sure is easy to sit and do nothing to improve when you are the only game in town as GPA has. I toyed with the idea of competing with those guys years ago and I had PQ in my data as I always thought that was a glaring deficiency in GPA. It would also be great to see the median, mode and range values which are easily calculated. I do like the live auctions feature they added, but would prefer more statistical analysis and more ways to sort/group the data. Also, would it kill them to add cover images? Comics.org allows images to be borrowed as long as credit is given to them. What's the hold-up?

 

When you say "cover images", are you referring to a generic one or of the actual comic book sold? A generic one wouldn't add a whole lot of value. And providing the cover image for the actual sold comic is a technical and content-management nightmare. As I recall, GPA recently did a major site restructuring where part of it was to reduce response time on the searches. Adding cover images would impact the performance gained from that restructuring. Plus, consider how much work is involved in loading the images to the service, one at a time. I imagine that would hike up operation cost which no doubt would be passed on to the subscriber.

 

I'm talking about generic images and I absolutely see the value there. As I am browsing Batman (1940) and can't remember the issue number I'm interested in but can remember the cover image, seeing a little thumbnail as I open the tree-view next to a number would help me identify the correct issue.

 

Other ideas off the top of my head that would benefit all:

 

At least sort the "title" combo box by most popular descending or by start date of the series, not alpha-numeric or however they do it now. If I type in "Incredible Hulk", I need to hunt through tons of entries to find Hulk (1963). This should be the first entry in the list, not somewhere in the middle.

 

Why limit the search to comic title? The "title only" search system is terribly inadequate. Allow common searches that most all comic related sites allow:

Searchable by issue story synopsis

Searchable by character cross-reference

Searchable by creator (Writer, Artist). I know I want to find Neal Adams books and I want to browse them all in one search, rather than run hundreds of individual queries.

 

Show me Live Auctions that were listed for a particular date or date range, so I can browse the newest additions for Buy-It-Nows and check GPA data on those books at the same time.

 

Once implemented, these improvements don't cost GPA anything. Only the initial cost of doing the data entry and improving the code.

 

No charge for these suggestions GPA, get crackin please.

 

You gotta be kidding me Do you want GPA to flip the pages of your comic for you too?

 

No but I hate the fact that nothing changes simply because they own the monopoly. Step up and show your subscribers that you care about being the best you can possibly be. Don't stand pat because you can. If you aren't going to do it right, don't do it at all. Frankly I'm surprised that some of you are defending the way GPA works as status quo and that's the best we should expect. Don't understand that view point at all.

[mrlatko]

I had a brainstorm about five years ago to use the CGC Registry database so that a service oriented architecture (SOA) application could make a web call to find out the title, issue, grade, PQ, etc simply by knowing the serial number. Armed ONLY with this information on ANY sale, the rest of what everyone asking is would be easy.

 

I was even willing to pay CGC a subscription fee for this service.

Then, something bad happened.

 

They locked down the registry. They were concerned about the traffic. It simply wasn't to be.

 

In theory, the request for PQ is nice and would explain the data gaps.

 

Unfortunately, it's not going to happen imo. Simply too intensive from an implementation standpoint since GPA would have to do the proper searching, scrubbing, validating etc. It would be a nightmare.

 

Maybe CGC should recognize legimiate business need for companies to query their registry database, and offer it as a fee. Unfortunately, it would uncover all of the nasty resub problem we already know.

 

Why would gathering PQ info for GPA be any different than the other data about a sale that they must validate? Not seeing your point there.

[sterlingcomics]

So you know for certain that a human eyeball verifies every single transaction that goes into GPA ? If so, then I guess I make no point at all other than to rant about stuff no one cares about.

 

If you are NOT certain, then there's a quantifable additional cost to do this. I'm guessing it would be cost prohibitive relative to price point you are willing to pay. My guess...coming right out of my arse. Maybe George the man himself needs to talk.

[Comicdey]

I subscribe, and I'd love to have all our boardie to boardie sales of GA slabs included....I know we probably have more transactions than most sites.

[sterlingcomics]

You gotta be kidding me Do you want GPA to flip the pages of your comic for you too?

 

I'll pay GPA to read my comics to me bed-side....

[gpanalysis]

 

No but I hate the fact that nothing changes simply because they own the monopoly. Step up and show your subscribers that you care about being the best you can possibly be. Don't stand pat because you can. If you aren't going to do it right, don't do it at all. Frankly I'm surprised that some of you are defending the way GPA works as status quo and that's the best we should expect. Don't understand that view point at all.

 

I'm more than happy to discuss all aspects of GPA, how we work, relationships, technology, future plans, but when I read this kind of BS it just makes me really angry. So you have intimate knowledge of what we do day to day? How we validate feeds, work through 10 different technology systems to categorise and group sales, continuous code updates, database redesign, not to mention additional services we test in-house before we even contemplate publishing so we don't look like half- insufficiently_thoughtful_persons? You've certainly gone about the right way to engage me in a constructive debate (thumbs u

[sterlingcomics]

I think the PQ question can be solve real easily going foward if CGC decides to add a letter to the serial number such as...

 

instead of 123456789, just do a123456789, b123456789, etc...

 

a= white, b= ow/w, c= ow, etc...

 

simple modification to the existing serial system and at least going forward all new slabs PQ can be identify by just looking at the serial number

 

maybe someone already suggested something similar?

 

That would thwart the CGC Registry lockdown as per my earlier rant. It won't happen.

[sterlingcomics]

I'm more than happy to discuss all aspects of GPA, how we work, relationships, technology, future plans, but when I read this kind of BS it just makes me really angry. So you have intimate knowledge of what we do day to day? How we validate feeds, work through 10 different technology systems to categorise and group sales, continuous code updates, database redesign, not to mention additional services we test in-house before we even contemplate publishing so we don't look like half- insufficiently_thoughtful_persons? You've certainly gone about the right way to engage me in a constructive debate (thumbs u

 

Cmon George...it's all technology...all automated...you just have people locked in your basement looking over millions of eBay pages...

 

Seriously though just to have what we have now is a godsend. PQ would be great, but considering I work in IT I understand the challenges in doing so.

 

I know that you don't get the cert # on each transaction, so there's a lot of guess work "fuzzy math" involved. In an ideal world it would be great if you could get the cert# and then simply reference the registry (which you can't b/c CGC doesn't serve it) on pulling everything else. But alas, the world isn't so kind.

[gpanalysis]

I'm more than happy to discuss all aspects of GPA, how we work, relationships, technology, future plans, but when I read this kind of BS it just makes me really angry. So you have intimate knowledge of what we do day to day? How we validate feeds, work through 10 different technology systems to categorise and group sales, continuous code updates, database redesign, not to mention additional services we test in-house before we even contemplate publishing so we don't look like half- insufficiently_thoughtful_persons? You've certainly gone about the right way to engage me in a constructive debate (thumbs u

 

Cmon George...it's all technology...all automated...you just have people locked in your basement looking over millions of eBay pages...

 

Sorry, I'm being half- insufficiently_thoughtful_person again. If we still had a star system I'd give you five stars!

 

I don't need "people" any more. I have a "categorise comics" button on all my keyboards...

 

But to be serious for one moment, a product like GPA is not run by one person and by one method. It is built upon multiple relationships, technologies and requirements. Hence why to one collector what "should" be the case is not always possible. Not impossible, but not possible due to many factors, often outside of the control of the business in question.

 

As far as PQ, I have ALREADY agreed that we are working on getting this into GPA. Approx 70% of GPA entries have the CGC barcode, the other 30% (mainly eBay) do not. Until we have a system in place that is 99.99% accurate for those entries I'm not prepared to release it into our system. Period.

[sterlingcomics]

But to be serious for one moment, a product like GPA is not run by one person and by one method. It is built upon multiple relationships, technologies and requirements. Hence why to one collector what "should" be the case is not always possible. Not impossible, but not possible due to many factors, often outside of the control of the business in question.

 

As far as PQ, I have ALREADY agreed that we are working on getting this into GPA. Approx 70% of GPA entries have the CGC barcode, the other 30% (mainly eBay) do not. Until we have a system in place that is 99.99% accurate for those entries I'm not prepared to release it into our system. Period.

 

Understood. Each site has different metrics on what they use; your method of interacting with that site will vary. I was working on how to solve the problem of the "Global Wish List" and the problems it had to solve are almost identical to what you are doing...same patterns anyway.

 

I haven't talked to CGC lately; are they willing to serve up their registry to you? If so, maybe I can renew some talks for my project.

 

Personally, I think long term people who sell CGC books should always use cert numbers and reference the CGC registry for grabbing everything else...I would PUSH for that as much as possible.

 

I'm actually amazed that CGC hasn't realized that they have a B2B business web service they could sell right now. I talked to Harshen years ago and it fell on deaf ears...maybe now they see the value.