Very scarce book? 0

[Tri-Color Brian]

Can a book be considered "very scarce" if there are 29 copies available on ebay?    Does the overuse of the word "scarce" make a dealer look like a shill?  does it affect your opinion of the dealer in a negative way?

Edited September 8, 2017 by tricolorbrian

[1950's war comics]

Naw..... i think we all know that the superlatives that sellers use to pump up their books are for the most part just hype..............

[Tri-Color Brian]

Yeah, well...I take hype to heart and associate it with dishonest sellers.  I avoid dishonest sellers, so if a seller still wants my business they should be honest in their representations of what they sell...just my 2cents...

This goes for the blatant over graders too.  If they can't grade accurately within .5 of a grade, I ignore them...

Edited September 8, 2017 by tricolorbrian

[Ricksneatstuff]

What!!????

You mean this wasn't "scarce"?

 

[Tri-Color Brian]

1 minute ago, Ricksneatstuff said:

What!!????

You mean this wasn't "scarce"?

 

[Bomber-Bob]

1 minute ago, tricolorbrian said:

Yeah, well...I take hype to heart and associate it with dishonest sellers.  I avoid dishonest sellers, so if a seller still wants my business they should be honest in their representations of what the sell...just my 2cents...

I kind of agree with you. You can hype a book with superlatives about it's appearance, maybe upgradable, etc. That's okay since it's just an opinion. But using the term 'rare' can be challenged with quantifiable research like you have done here. IT probably should be regarded as a 'lie'.

[Tri-Color Brian]

1 minute ago, Bomber-Bob said:

I kind of agree with you. You can hype a book with superlatives about it's appearance, maybe upgradable, etc. That's okay since it's just an opinion. But using the term 'rare' can be challenged with quantifiable research like you have done here. IT probably should be regarded as a 'lie'.

I sent the seller a message telling him he sounded like a shill.  I've bought from him before, and he is a decent seller, but he just gets carried away with the word "scarce"...

[DanCooper]

The Overstreet Guide, in it's Glossary of terms in the back of the guide, defines "Scarce" as "20 - 100 copies estimated to exist"

There are examples, in the guide, where this is applied inaccurately.

For example, Flash 106 has a designation as "scarce". There are 251 CGC copies alone overall in the census for this book.

In terms of books in all conditions, it is hard to think of any key books from the Silver Age forward as scarce (non-superhero stuff like Romance, War, Funny Animal, etc can test the 100 copies overall on certain issues though)

In terms of KEY books, in grade, from the Silver Age in at least 9.0 for DCs and 9.4 for Marvels, I guess the term "scarce" is more in line (for The Flash 106 example, census shows 6 copies in 9.0 and above)

 

Edited September 8, 2017 by DanCooper

[fett]

I don't collect much DC so don't really know if Flash 106 comes up for sale much. But if I were looking for a copy and no one was selling over a long period I would probably consider the book to be scarce. 

[Martin Sinescu]

Back in the early days of eBay, when I would get bored I'd have a contest between the search terms "rare" and "mint" to see which one came up with more results. They always came back with 100,000+ each. At some point, eBay started rejecting my search because it was too broad. To the actual point of the post, it does seem a little hucksterish, but I look at it as just a cheap throw-away term to fill out the rest of the space and maximize the amount of letters you're allowed in the listing (I prefer the far more adorable "L@@K"). It's a little worse when they spend the body of their listing desperately telling you how there are only a handful out there and the supply is rapidly drying up or something. 

[1950's war comics]

4 hours ago, DanCooper said:

The Overstreet Guide, in it's Glossary of terms in the back of the guide, defines "Scarce" as "20 - 100 copies estimated to exist"

There are examples, in the guide, where this is applied inaccurately.

For example, Flash 106 has a designation as "scarce". There are 251 CGC copies alone overall in the census for this book.

In terms of books in all conditions, it is hard to think of any key books from the Silver Age forward as scarce (non-superhero stuff like Romance, War, Funny Animal, etc can test the 100 copies overall on certain issues though)

In terms of KEY books, in grade, from the Silver Age in at least 9.0 for DCs and 9.4 for Marvels, I guess the term "scarce" is more in line (for The Flash 106 example, census shows 6 copies in 9.0 and above)

 

Excellent, insightful post !! you should post more often............

[01TheDude]

On 9/7/2017 at 5:10 PM, tricolorbrian said:

Yeah, well...I take hype to heart and associate it with dishonest sellers.  I avoid dishonest sellers, so if a seller still wants my business they should be honest in their representations of what they sell...just my 2cents...

This goes for the blatant over graders too.  If they can't grade accurately within .5 of a grade, I ignore them...

that seems a little extreme to me. More important is that they describe defects, provide many pictures and scans of the book, and point out things that pictures can't reveal-- such as brittle or supple pages.

If you have ever watched or participated in any of the grading contests on this forum you would see that even the best graders can be off in their assessment. So I appreciate someone giving a decent effort as to their opinion of a book. I don't hold them to some intense scrutiny because I evaluate the pictures and base any bidding on my guess of the grade.

As for the scarce comments-- that might turn me off to dealing with someone who either lies or has bad information. It sort of strikes at their knowledge of the hobby itself and helps you spot lazy or incompetent sellers. But if it is a book I really want, the pictures look good and the price is right-- I might look past it and take a chance.

Anyway-- the main point is that opinions on grade are not precise typically-- even if the person under grades on purpose. Buy the book-- not the hype.

[Tri-Color Brian]

I like undergraders, but I'm tired of over-graders who overprice...it's just my opinion.  Maybe .5 was too harsh...maybe a full grade over is better...I don't know.  I just see consistent overgrading with certain sellers, so I avoid them...unless...unless...I can talk them down on the price to reality or below...then all is good.    But some choose to wait for suckers and will not negotiate or change the grades... those I really avoid, and i share my opinion of them with my friends.  Someone has to do it.  We have too many con-artists in this hobby.

BTW, I talked to the dealer i first mentioned in this thread, and he said he meant that the book was very scarce for the "grade", but that's not what the ad said...

Edited September 9, 2017 by tricolorbrian

[Readcomix]

It certainly seems that scarce and rare get overused to the point of us wanting to gloss over them, and often rightfully so. I do think there's also the occasional exception of false commonality created by eBay listings on occasion, though. I'm thinking of Jughead's Folly, a 1957 one-shot, for example. Seems like no one wants it anymore, and there's maybe eight on eBay the last time I looked. But that might be about half of all of them. Of course, this is the exception rather than the rule, but I think some less popular older books may be truly scarce yet available in small handfuls at one time.