Amazing Spider-Man 361 Print Run

[RockMyAmadeus]

 

How is it not speculation if others are grabbing copies too?

 

I don't know how to answer your question, because I didn't say that it wasn't speculation. My comment refers to the degree of "speculativeness", not whether or not it was speculation at all. When everyone's grabbing a copy, in a mad rush, is it really all that speculative that the book is going to be in demand? It moves into "no-brainer" territory at some point.

 

Can a comic be speculated on the day of release? In other words, if ASM 361 wasn't ordered heavily because it wasn't promoted, but the initial customers who saw it on the stands knew it was something special and generated a buzz, thus causing other customers to buy multiples off the stand, can that be considered speculation?

 

Absolutely, as I said here, in the post you quoted:

 

Sure, there was certainly some degree of "on the shelf speculation" happening...

 

And when I said "there was certainly some degree of "on the shelf speculation", I'm referring to the fact that it was hard to speculate on something that was rapidly disappearing before your very eyes, or was "1 per customer", as the context makes clear, not that there was any hesitation involved because of speculative doubt.

 

In other words, speculators were only being held back by the limitations already placed by the print run, orders from their particular stores, limits placed by those stores themselves, and the amount of copies physically available at the time of purchase.

 

Otherwise, I have no doubt that people, if they could have, would have happily bought 1,000 copies at their local store when the book was released.

 

And how would that "buzz" be generated? This was pre-internet (mostly, without getting all technical about usenet and whatnot), and traditional media wouldn't have responded anywhere near fast enough. The book was selling out within days, if not hours, after being placed on sale. Did people call their friends and tell them about it? Ok, sure, but maybe not. This was the madness era, and everyone scooped up what they could, as fast as they could.

 

But, at some point, it's no longer "speculation" (which means you're hoping for future increases in value), when the book is selling out all over the country. Not really very "speculative" at that point...some (there are no guarantees there)...but not much.

 

I am wondering, because without this initial promotional push as you pointed out, how did I end up buying 5 copies for my collection? I did not collect ASM, yet there are 5 copies of this one book in my collection. I wasn't in the habit of picking up 1 copy of titles I didn't buy, let alone 5 copies.

 

I've already said that when the book appeared, it created a firestorm. People saw the book and went nutso.

 

I assume that was your reaction as well.

 

Is there a magic number on the number of copies one has to buy for it to be considered speculation?

 

Sure: more than one, unless you had no intention to buy the book as a consumer anyways, in which case: one.

[RockMyAmadeus]

There was speculation on the back end (i.e. after the point of sale).

 

After, or at?

 

And that's assuming it was even possible, considering the availability of the books at the time a person decided to speculate.

 

There were stores which sold out in hours on this book. I don't doubt that, by the weekend, everyone across the nation was.

 

If I can find some literature about this, I'll post it. Maybe it's mentioned in one of the OPG updates.

[Gatsby77]

How's that?

 

Multiple folks have already mentioned that, even if they did not know about it prior to release, let alone pre-order it, they were able to do "backend speculation," i.e. secure copies either from multiple stores off the shelf (as I did, 1 per x 4 store visits that week) or from the newsstands 1-3 weeks later.

 

I may have left some out, but folks who have said as much in this thread (either re. them or friends of theirs) include:

 

Me

BrianR

Broke As a Joke

Kimik

Peter G.

Petey's Wheatcakes

The Blog

Showcase 22

 

Many of them also noted that they did not sell their copies that year, but held on to them, which you apparently believe is contrary to human nature.

[RockMyAmadeus]

And "speculation" needn't be unnecessarily encumbered by competing definitions. It just means that someone thinks and hopes that an item will have future value above and beyond the acquisition cost. It doesn't matter if that future is 5 minutes, 5 days, or 5 decades...it's all speculation.

 

From the retailer's perspective, they might speculate by increasing orders...in which case, they aren't speculating on a single copy, or even multiple copies, but that the issue itself will generate higher than normal sales, creating more value above the acquisition cost by selling more copies than normal, resulting in a larger bottom line.

 

 

[RockMyAmadeus]

How's that?

 

What are you referring to?

 

Multiple folks have already mentioned that, even if they did not know about it prior to release, let alone pre-order it, they were able to do "backend speculation," i.e. secure copies either from multiple stores off the shelf (as I did, 1 per x 4 store visits that week) or from the newsstands 1-3 weeks later.

 

Again, what are you referring to? Trying to glean from context, it seems that you believe I said people didn't speculate on this issue after it came out. If that's your understanding, that is incorrect. That's not what I said.

 

This is what I said:

 

In other words, speculators were only being held back by the limitations already placed by the print run, orders from their particular stores, limits placed by those stores themselves, and the amount of copies physically available at the time of purchase.

 

Otherwise, I have no doubt that people, if they could have, would have happily bought 1,000 copies at their local store when the book was released.

 

(emphasis added.)

 

Did you read everything I wrote..?

 

I get the sense, especially from reading your "Nov 18/Nov 20 incontrovertible proof" example, that you don't really read everything, but rather skim, and that results in you coming to erroneous conclusions and misunderstandings of what other people say.

 

I'd be happy to be wrong, but that really seems to be the case.

 

Many of them also noted that they did not sell their copies that year, but held on to them, which you apparently believe is contrary to human nature.

 

One more time: the plural of anecdote is not evidence.

 

That means, many people relating the same experience doesn't make a conclusion drawn from that experience accurate (or not accurate.)

 

Here's an example:

 

"My local store only ordered 5 copies of Superman #75."

 

"Yeah, mine only ordered 10."

 

"Yeah, me too! They only ordered 7."

 

"Well, it must not have been very heavily ordered, then."

 

Based on the experience of those three people, one could come to the conclusion that Superman #75 wasn't heavily ordered. That is why we don't rely on anecdotes, no matter how many they may be, when drawing conclusions, especially if those anecdotes conflict with the data. We have to rely on the data we have.

 

And again: buying multiple copies to speculate, and then failing to do something to take advantage of that speculation is contrary to human nature.

 

How can you, or anyone, disagree with that?

 

You're essentially saying this:

 

"Here I am, on the day of release, and I'm buying 20 copies."

 

"Here it is, 2 months later, and the book is worth $25. I think I'll pass on trading/selling any of them."

 

"Here it is, 4 more months later, and the book is now worth $15, and on the downward trend. I think I'll still pass on trading/selling any of them."

 

That is acting contrary to one's own interests. I'm not saying it doesn't happen, or didn't happen, but it certainly wasn't the general experience. People don't generally buy multiple copies with the express intention of profiting off of them and then sit idly by while that opportunity comes and goes.

 

I don't understand why this is controversial at all, unless perhaps people are embarrassed that they watched that opportunity pass them by, and want to justify the situation, if only to themselves...? If that's the case, it's not necessary. Most of us have done just that. It happens.

 

[rjrjr]

The word "speculation" or "speculating" may be what's causing the confusion here, because I think we all agree that orders for Amazing Spider-Man #361 did not increase drastically.

 

A retailer is "speculating" when they (suddenly) order many extra copies of a book. They believe they will do better than they have in the past due to some factor specific to that book. Maybe one or more of their customers have requested extra copies, and it's actually those customers who are "speculating" on that book. When the whole print run significantly increases, then many people are "speculating" that they will do better on that book than the prior issue. ASM #361 is not one of those types of "speculating" books because the print run didn't increase drastically.

 

When a book becomes popular, even as early as the release day, it can certainly be hoarded, stockpiled, etc., and we can say that those buyers are "speculating" that they will do better than they have in the past due to some factor specific to that book. But those things that a buyer does, no matter how many copies he obtains, won't increase the print run like retailers who are "speculating". It's too late for that.

 

"Speculation" may be the correct word for both situations, but there's a very clear difference in the result.

 

"Speculation" that increases the print run drastically generally results in worthless books, because it is very hard to find examples of valuable books with print runs significantly higher than surrounding issues. The expectation of increased demand resulted in increased supply. Superman #75 might be the only example of a successful speculation that significantly increased supply.

 

"Speculation" that occurs after the print run is set generally results in valuable books, because that type of "speculation" resulted in an increased demand with no increase in supply.

 

If we're using the same "speculation" word for the "thing that significantly increases supply, even beyond what the market will ever need" and the "thing that significantly increases demand, far beyond what the supply can handle", then we need different words.

 

Would the second book be referred to as a sleeper hit? ASM 361 is interesting. Orders did increase significantly so some retailers were speculating it would sell more copies than earlier issues. But if it caught collectors off guard, that would make it a sleeper hit.

 

I think much of the discussion in this thread boils down to how you define speculation and hoarding. When it comes to hoarding, how many copies does one have to acquire? Does it depend on the income of the person doing the hoarding? (I can tell you, buying 5 copies of ASM 361 was a huge number of copies considering my [lack of] income at the time.

 

This has been an interesting discussion.

[rjrjr]

This also brings up an interesting point about the modern heating up thread. Many people have posted they are "speculating" on a particular comic by buying as many as they can. And they readily admit they have no plans to sell them. So, are the "speculating" or are they "hoarding"?

 

Seems to me, many of the posters in this thread were "hoarding" but not "speculating" on ASM361. Myself included. Which goes back to the original problem others had with RMA's statement that ASM361 wasn't hoarded.

 

"And no, this book wasn't hoarded from day one. Books that sell out quickly enough to have a second printing aren't hoarded....they are distributed far and wide."

 

Was Star Wars #1 (2015) hoarded? It went back to print 6 or more times. I believe it was hoarded. Again, I'm sitting on a small hoard myself and I know others are as well. And I'm not just talking about the different variants, I'm talking about the standard, non-variant copy.

[mysterio]

There was speculation on the back end (i.e. after the point of sale).

 

After, or at?

 

And that's assuming it was even possible, considering the availability of the books at the time a person decided to speculate.

 

There were stores which sold out in hours on this book. I don't doubt that, by the weekend, everyone across the nation was.

 

If I can find some literature about this, I'll post it. Maybe it's mentioned in one of the OPG updates.

 

I was a bit glib, so I wasn't as precise as I meant to be. At the point of sale, meaning seeing it on the shelf and buying more than you typically would, is closer to what I meant. I can see where "after" would easily be confused for post-LCS or newsstand cover price purchases.

[Gatsby77]

There was speculation on the back end (i.e. after the point of sale).

 

After, or at?

 

And that's assuming it was even possible, considering the availability of the books at the time a person decided to speculate.

 

I'm sorry -- I was referring to that quote. You know, where you infer that it may not have been possible, "considering the availability of the books at the time a person decided to speculate."

 

[Why use quotes when it's obvious I'm referring to the immediately prior post in the thread?]

 

It was possible to speculate/invest in/hoard/buy ASM 361 book from its release and up to several weeks afterwards (via the later newsstand distributions).

 

And multiple people here on these boards have stated they did so. Anecdotes? Yes.

 

But if your myriad assumptions in this thread are to be believed, we're all mis-remembering, or flat out lying. (And why would we? To look cool to strangers on a comic book message board?)

 

And (sigh) again, not everyone was a flipper. We believed in books like this as long-term investments. Scratch that. "I" believed. My friends did as well. Can't speak to anyone's feelings on these boards specifically.

 

When it went to $8, then $12, then $20, we thought "cool! Might be an Iron Fist 14 in 15 years."

 

Harbinger 1's another example of this.

 

Did people who bought it for $1.95 sell it when it went to $15 7-8 months' later? If not, were they stupid not to?

 

Did they sell it when it went to $35 two months after that? If not, were they stupid not to?

 

Did they sell it when it went to $100 a few months after that? If not were they stupid not to?

 

I (gasp! anecdote alert) remember at least two local dealers refusing to sell Harbinger 1 for $100 because they legitimately thought it would go to $250 in a year.

 

_That_ was the mentality.

 

The dealers may have only paid $40 for their copies but they didn't put them up for sale because they thought the pre-Unity books were here to stay -- the equivalent of the dawn of the Silver Age Marvel books.

 

And that's precisely why folks were paying $100 a copy -- they missed out when it was $35 and didn't want to have to pay more a year later.

 

That's how bubbles work.

 

But at the time, _many_ of us who hadn't lived through the B+W crash of the mid-80s didn't see that.

 

With ASM 361, we saw our chance to get on the ground floor with an ASM 300-type book.

[RockMyAmadeus]

This also brings up an interesting point about the modern heating up thread. Many people have posted they are "speculating" on a particular comic by buying as many as they can. And they readily admit they have no plans to sell them. So, are the "speculating" or are they "hoarding"?

 

If they have no plans to sell them, how can they possibly be "speculating"? They're just hoarding them, and using the word "speculation" incorrectly.

 

Seems to me, many of the posters in this thread were "hoarding" but not "speculating" on ASM361. Myself included. Which goes back to the original problem others had with RMA's statement that ASM361 wasn't hoarded.

 

That others had a problem is not surprising, because people tend to think their experiences are universal, but that doesn't alter the fact that the upward pressure for this book was too great for most people to hoard, rather than sell, ASM #361.

 

Again...that's why people have seen collection after collection with ASM #361 under-represented, in comparison to books like #362 and #363.

 

PS. "5 copies" doesn't seem like much of a "hoard", but others might disagree.

 

"And no, this book wasn't hoarded from day one. Books that sell out quickly enough to have a second printing aren't hoarded....they are distributed far and wide."

 

Again..."hoarding" means gathering them up and holding on to them. This can be in the hopes that they might one day go up in value, but not necessarily. It almost always implies that the hoarder is both holding the books for a period of time, and gathering, rather than selling, the item(s) in question.

 

After all...how can you be "hoarding" something that you are concurrently selling? At that point, it's just inventory, whether you're a retailer or not.

 

That didn't apply to ASM #361 "from day one." The pressure to sell/trade became too great, too quickly, and they were traded/sold off. Anecdotal stories aside, that's what happened with this particular book.

 

"Hoarding" doesn't mean "buying a whole bunch of copies brand new and then doling them out over the next few weeks/months."

 

Was Star Wars #1 (2015) hoarded? It went back to print 6 or more times. I believe it was hoarded. Again, I'm sitting on a small hoard myself and I know others are as well. And I'm not just talking about the different variants, I'm talking about the standard, non-variant copy.

 

This is a vastly different market, which operates under vastly different rules.

 

In the early 90's, later printings were relatively rare, because 1. publishers were still generally printing overages, and 2. with the standard print runs of the day, they were rarely necessary.

 

As noted in several places in this thread, the print runs for even low selling books were 200-300k copies, at a minimum.

 

Now, print runs struggle to reach 100k for even the best selling titles, and 20-30-40k copies aren't uncommon. Therefore, any sellout at that level is going to result in going back to the press for more copies, and achieving that isn't anywhere near as difficult as it was 20-25 years ago.

 

Publishers in days gone by did not necessarily WANT to go back to press; it was inconvenient and expensive. So, they printed enough that they (usually) didn't have to.

 

Now, that has completely turned around. Not only has technology advanced to the point that it is easier and cheaper to reprint, now publishers look at them as an opportunity to print variant covers, for which they can give more work to creators. Sometimes, they even plan to have later printings, regardless of the success of the first printings, because they believe the first printings will be a sellout.

 

So, my question to you is this: what is the value of Star Wars #1 (2015) first print?

 

If ASM went to $25, meaning it went up in value about 20 times cover price, did Star Wars #1 (2015) go to $100?

 

If not, it's not comparable.

 

[RockMyAmadeus]

There was speculation on the back end (i.e. after the point of sale).

 

After, or at?

 

And that's assuming it was even possible, considering the availability of the books at the time a person decided to speculate.

 

I'm sorry -- I was referring to that quote. You know, where you infer that it may not have been possible, "considering the availability of the books at the time a person decided to speculate."

 

[Why use quotes when it's obvious I'm referring to the immediately prior post in the thread?]

 

Because it wasn't obvious...obviously. There were several sentences in between that one and your reply, along with several other posts to which you could have been referring.

 

Why do I always include quotes when I reply? Why do I "dissect" (boy, do people get upset with that) each point as it comes?

 

So people know exactly what I'm referring to. It's just simple courtesy. What may be obvious to you, isn't necessarily obvious to others.

 

It was possible to speculate/invest in/hoard/buy ASM 361 book from its release

 

Not true. Did you forget your own "1 copy per customer" anecdote?

 

If the book was sold out....and it sold out in a couple of days, and in some instances, a couple of hours....how was someone supposed to speculate with no copies to buy?

 

and up to several weeks afterwards (via the later newsstand distributions).

 

ALSO not NECESSARILY true. It assumes that anyone had access to newsstand distribution, and that that access would have provided them with copies, and that they were able to get those copies before someone else. Sometimes, people made deals with local news vendors to have "access" to hot books before they were physically put on the stands. This was common, going back to the 70's.

 

I know for a fact that Superman #50 wasn't going to be available on the newsstands in Dublin, CA, because I went around the night they were being put on the stands, at 2 AM, and bought them all.

 

Which is why, of course, I said "assuming it was even possible, considering the availability of the books at the time a person decided to speculate."

 

Once the book was printed, the supply was finite, regardless of the channel through which it came.

 

This seems pretty common sense, here.

 

And multiple people here on these boards have stated they did so. Anecdotes? Yes.

 

But if your myriad assumptions in this thread are to be believed,

 

What myriad assumptions?

 

Can you name any? Will you?

 

I suspect the answer is "no" in both cases. As has been shown, you don't like to answer direct questions, much less provide documentary evidence of your claims.

 

So why resort to silly hyperbole out of annoyance?

 

we're all mis-remembering, or flat out lying. (And why would we? To look cool to strangers on a comic book message board?)

 

I already said this: when "memories" conflict with the DATA, the MEMORIES must be suspect, if not discarded altogether.

 

I didn't say anyone was lying. But why WOULD people lie? Many reasons...one of them is they're embarrassed that they sat on hot books until they weren't hot. Ego. Pride. Self-delusion. People "remember" things that never happened, demonstrably so. Are they lying? No, they believe it's true. That doesn't make it true, however.

 

And (sigh) again, not everyone was a flipper.

 

And (sigh) again, I didn't say everyone was.

 

Pay close attention, here...and I'm not saying that to be snarky, but to get your attention: if you were buying multiple copies for the purposes of speculation...that is, to sell/trade them when they became valuable...it made no sense to watch that opportunity come and then go.

 

Does that mean I said everyone was a flipper?

 

No.

 

Does that mean I said everyone who bought multiple copies was speculating?

 

No (clearly, there were people who were buying to "put away" for the long term, as well as people who liked to buy multiples just to have multiples. These latter are VERY rare. I do NOT refer to either of those types of people.)

 

We believed in books like this as long-term investments. Scratch that. "I" believed. My friends did as well. Can't speak to anyone's feelings on these boards specifically.

 

That is correct.

 

When it went to $8, then $12, then $20, we thought "cool! Might be an Iron Fist 14 in 15 years."

 

As I have said, over and over, and which I don't think you've bothered to read...you were the EXCEPTION, and you're still arguing as if you were the RULE.

 

Acknowledging the EXCEPTION doesn't mean I am dismissing the EXCEPTION, as if it didn't happen. It's simply acknowledging the EXCEPTION.

 

Harbinger 1's another example of this. p

 

Harbinger #1 is NOT "another example" of this.

 

Did people who bought it for $1.95 sell it when it went to $15 7-8 months' later? If not, were they stupid not to?

 

Sorry, but Harbinger #1 is not at all like ASM #361.

 

They aren't comparable, for all the reasons that I've already given, which I suspect you haven't red. Are you reading this?

 

Did they sell it when it went to $35 two months after that? If not, were they stupid not to?

 

Did they sell it when it went to $100 a few months after that? If not were they stupid not to?

 

I (gasp! anecdote alert) remember at least two local dealers refusing to sell Harbinger 1 for $100 because they legitimately thought it would go to $250 in a year.

 

_That_ was the mentality.

 

_That_ was because Harbinger #1 was a DIFFERENT TYPE OF BOOK than ASM #361.

 

The dealers may have only paid $40 for their copies but they didn't put them up for sale because they thought the pre-Unity books were here to stay -- the equivalent of the dawn of the Silver Age Marvel books.

 

And that's precisely why folks were paying $100 a copy -- they missed out when it was $35 and didn't want to have to pay more a year later.

 

That's how bubbles work.

 

But at the time, _many_ of us who hadn't lived through the B+W crash of the mid-80s didn't see that.

 

With ASM 361, we saw our chance to get on the ground floor with an ASM 300-type book.

 

No, you really didn't. You may believe you did, but you didn't, because you couldn't. Again...at the time, "ASM #300" was not "ASM #300!!!!", that is, it wasn't the monstrosity that it later became.

 

If YOU thought so, great. You were the only one. You won't find it in the literature of the day, because PRIOR TO ASM #361, Venom was NOT the "ultrapopular character" that he would become.

 

If you have actual evidence...and not anecdotes, remembrances, stories, or other non-confirmable information...please, by all means, share it.

[RockMyAmadeus]

There was speculation on the back end (i.e. after the point of sale).

 

After, or at?

 

And that's assuming it was even possible, considering the availability of the books at the time a person decided to speculate.

 

There were stores which sold out in hours on this book. I don't doubt that, by the weekend, everyone across the nation was.

 

If I can find some literature about this, I'll post it. Maybe it's mentioned in one of the OPG updates.

 

I was a bit glib, so I wasn't as precise as I meant to be. At the point of sale, meaning seeing it on the shelf and buying more than you typically would, is closer to what I meant. I can see where "after" would easily be confused for post-LCS or newsstand cover price purchases.

 

Thanks for the clarification.

[rjrjr]

This also brings up an interesting point about the modern heating up thread. Many people have posted they are "speculating" on a particular comic by buying as many as they can. And they readily admit they have no plans to sell them. So, are the "speculating" or are they "hoarding"?

 

If they have no plans to sell them, how can they possibly be "speculating"? They're just hoarding them, and using the word "speculation" incorrectly.

 

Seems to me, many of the posters in this thread were "hoarding" but not "speculating" on ASM361. Myself included. Which goes back to the original problem others had with RMA's statement that ASM361 wasn't hoarded.

 

That others had a problem is not surprising, because people tend to think their experiences are universal, but that doesn't alter the fact that the upward pressure for this book was too great for most people to hoard, rather than sell, ASM #361.

 

Again...that's why people have seen collection after collection with ASM #361 under-represented, in comparison to books like #362 and #363.

 

This sounds very anecdotal to me. Do you have proof of this? Or does anecdotal evidence only work when you use it but not for others? This is your experience and you are using it universally.

 

PS. "5 copies" doesn't seem like much of a "hoard", but others might disagree.

 

"And no, this book wasn't hoarded from day one. Books that sell out quickly enough to have a second printing aren't hoarded....they are distributed far and wide."

 

Again..."hoarding" means gathering them up and holding on to them. This can be in the hopes that they might one day go up in value, but not necessarily. It almost always implies that the hoarder is both holding the books for a period of time, and gathering, rather than selling, the item(s) in question.

 

After all...how can you be "hoarding" something that you are concurrently selling? At that point, it's just inventory, whether you're a retailer or not.

 

That didn't apply to ASM #361 "from day one." The pressure to sell/trade became too great, too quickly, and they were traded/sold off. Anecdotal stories aside, that's what happened with this particular book.

 

"Hoarding" doesn't mean "buying a whole bunch of copies brand new and then doling them out over the next few weeks/months."

 

You are correct. As myself and others pointed out, we didn't do that, we bought a bunch of copies and held onto them. Thus we hoarded them.

 

[RockMyAmadeus]

Again...that's why people have seen collection after collection with ASM #361 under-represented, in comparison to books like #362 and #363.

 

This sounds very anecdotal to me. Do you have proof of this? Or does anecdotal evidence only work when you use it but not for others? This is your experience and you are using it universally.

 

No need for snark.

 

The difference is, I don't pretend that anecdotes are evidence, and frame my comments to demonstrate that. Notice, I said "that's why people have seen", which was then corroborated by others in this thread. I didn't say "it's a proven fact", nor am I using it "universally." If I was, I would have said "that's why collection after collection has ASM #361 under-represented."

 

Note the difference.

 

I also don't get angry with others if they challenge my anecdotes, unlike several here, and my anecdotes don't contradict the evidence. If they do...out the anecdotes go.

 

Do you have proof that contradicts my statement? If so, by all means, please provide it. Proof works both ways, too.

 

But, in the interest of scholarship, I can certainly document the situation the next time I see it happen.

 

You are correct. As myself and others pointed out, we didn't do that, we bought a bunch of copies and held onto them. Thus we hoarded them.

 

I don't doubt it (although, again..."5 copies" doesn't seem very "hoardlike.")

 

And as I said, several times: you are the exception, not the rule.

[Gsims718]

ASM 361 is way over represented in my collection..

[Broke as a Joke]

RMA you keep saying this --

 

" And as I said, several times: you are the exception, not the rule."

 

This is such a blanket statement. What is the boundaries of this? Every man, woman and child in the world than, yes that would be right. But we are talking about comic book collectors. We all post on a comic book collecting website and more people than not have said in this thread that they had multiple copies that they held on to. A small sample size of the larger collective.

 

 

[Plantman]

I know for a fact that Superman #50 wasn't going to be available on the newsstands in Dublin, CA, because I went around the night they were being put on the stands, at 2 AM, and bought them all.

 

I missed out on ASM #361, for some odd reason. I don't know, maybe I had dropped the title by then, because the "Round Robin" story was terrible. I got maybe 2-3 copies from my usual sources the week it came out, but that was it.

 

Serious question: how did you go from clearing out Superman #50 on the Dublin, CA newsstands to getting shut out on ASM #361?

[RockMyAmadeus]

I know for a fact that Superman #50 wasn't going to be available on the newsstands in Dublin, CA, because I went around the night they were being put on the stands, at 2 AM, and bought them all.

 

I missed out on ASM #361, for some odd reason. I don't know, maybe I had dropped the title by then, because the "Round Robin" story was terrible. I got maybe 2-3 copies from my usual sources the week it came out, but that was it.

 

Serious question: how did you go from clearing out Superman #50 on the Dublin, CA newsstands to getting shut out on ASM #361?

 

Different priorities.

[RockMyAmadeus]

RMA you keep saying this --

 

" And as I said, several times: you are the exception, not the rule."

 

This is such a blanket statement. What is the boundaries of this? Every man, woman and child in the world than, yes that would be right. But we are talking about comic book collectors. We all post on a comic book collecting website and more people than not have said in this thread that they had multiple copies that they held on to. A small sample size of the larger collective.

 

 

That's not an example of a blanket statement. A blanket statement is "a vague and noncommittal statement asserting a premise without providing evidence "

 

What I've said is quite specific: the people who bought multiples of this book and held on to them through the initial market runup are the exception, not the rule. Nothing blanket about that.

 

Everyone arguing "well, *I* didn't sell them, so you're wrong" are arguing the exception, and not the rule.

 

That's nice that a handful of people say they hoarded the book from the outset, but one more time: the plural of anecdote IS NOT EVIDENCE. It doesn't matter if "more people than not" here have said they held them. We're talking, what, 6-8 people? That's not anywhere close to being a representative sample of anything, and that doesn't even consider selection bias. You cannot possibly draw such a conclusion from just the people posting in this thread.

 

As well, several of them are disqualified from the outset. Both Gatsby77 and rjrjr said that they didn't buy multiples to flip, which means they weren't part of that group in the first place, because they had no intention of selling them in the short term. They were offended that I called them "stupid" when I wasn't even referring to them.

 

Basic economics says that if you're buying multiple copies to make a profit, the faster and higher the value goes up, the more likely you're going to trade/sell them. This is not any revolutionary idea. It's basic economics at work.

[rjrjr]

RMA you keep saying this --

 

" And as I said, several times: you are the exception, not the rule."

 

This is such a blanket statement. What is the boundaries of this? Every man, woman and child in the world than, yes that would be right. But we are talking about comic book collectors. We all post on a comic book collecting website and more people than not have said in this thread that they had multiple copies that they held on to. A small sample size of the larger collective.

 

 

That's not an example of a blanket statement. A blanket statement is "a vague and noncommittal statement asserting a premise without providing evidence "

 

What I've said is quite specific: the people who bought multiples of this book and held on to them through the initial market runup are the exception, not the rule. Nothing blanket about that.

 

Everyone arguing "well, *I* didn't sell them, so you're wrong" are arguing the exception, and not the rule.

 

That's nice that a handful of people say they hoarded the book from the outset, but one more time: the plural of anecdote IS NOT EVIDENCE. It doesn't matter if "more people than not" here have said they held them. We're talking, what, 6-8 people? That's not anywhere close to being a representative sample of anything, and that doesn't even consider selection bias. You cannot possibly draw such a conclusion from just the people posting in this thread.

 

As well, several of them are disqualified from the outset. Both Gatsby77 and rjrjr said that they didn't buy multiples to flip, which means they weren't part of that group in the first place, because they had no intention of selling them in the short term. They were offended that I called them "stupid" when I wasn't even referring to them.

 

Basic economics says that if you're buying multiple copies to make a profit, the faster and higher the value goes up, the more likely you're going to trade/sell them. This is not any revolutionary idea. It's basic economics at work.

 

You said the book wasn't hoarded. Some of us said it was. Now you are saying those of us who held onto them were not part of "that group in the first place". Which group? Speculators or hoarders? I'm very confused because it sounds like you are talking about speculators. In fact, you keep flipping back and forth between the two concepts.

 

Those of us who bought many copies and had no intention of selling them would be considered hoarders.

 

And never once did I say I was offended. In fact, I corrected you and told you I was amused by your statements. You really should take my word at what my feelings are on the matter.

 

And I apologize if I came off as snarky above. It was not my intent.

 

Also, I feel my 5 copies was a hoard, again, considering my income level at the time I acquired those 5 copies. If I had the means at the time, I might have more in the collection.