Exposing FRAUD And DECEPTION - A Must Watch! 18 18

[kav]

 

[MAR1979]

On 9/13/2021 at 10:21 PM, vodou said:

Lotta words that distract and have little to do with the only thing that matters here: will Heritage take the return? The end.

They are in Texas, the buyer is is stuck with it. 

Between their policy's and shill bidding from the house is legal in Texas one has to be prepared to pay their max amount of their bid for every item and more importantly eat the loss if said item has some flaws never mentioned in the auctions description.

-----------------

 

 

Edited September 14, 2021 by MAR1979

[Sweet Lou 14]

On 9/13/2021 at 10:34 PM, Domo Arigato said:

I thought you wanted to have a conversation.  I guess not.

And I should have paid closer attention, because I just realized something.  I thought Seth Abramson was sent a scan of that game by one of his followers or something.

According to his post.......he.....himself.....just happened to receive that game from Heritage and then he posted it.

What a coe-ink-ee-dink. 

 

You're going way out of your way to keep bashing Abramson.

But with that said, I do want to give credit where it's due.  Your explanation that mold could have formed on the box after it was graded by WATA, and that Heritage might have missed it because humans make mistakes, is plausible and valid.

As vodou said, all that matters (in this specific scenario) is whether Heritage takes the return.  And though you may not have said it exactly this way, it's fair to criticize Abramson for not giving Heritage that opportunity before "reporting" his story.  His decision to do that undermines his credibility and is representative of his "breathless" style (that's not my word, it's a word I saw in a critique of his work that I think describes him well).

[comicwiz]

On 9/13/2021 at 10:41 PM, Sweet Lou 14 said:

And though you may not have said it exactly this way, it's fair to criticize Abramson for not giving Heritage that opportunity before "reporting" his story.  His decision to do that undermines his credibility and is representative of his "breathless" style (that's not my word, it's a word I saw in a critique of his work that I think describes him well).

I think your explanation is fair, but in a practical sense, it's not reality. Anyone that's spent even two months on these boards understands why taking a matter online helps the situation. And in social media platforms, it's the only seeming way to get someone off the pot and correct their missteps, even when it's simply a situation where they can't be bothered to respond to their attempts to communicate their concerns.

Frankly, the fact pattern of customer service issues needing to be escalated by taking the issue online has caused an entire methodology to be advanced by most major brands, who have installed a human touch point that can be tagged, contacted on Twitter, or Facebook. Why put in the extra effort to go out and look for it, when those complaints come to you? Sure it might cause an issue to be publicly amplified, but there's a redeeming aspect to rolling-up the sleeves and course correcting. And even when this happens, the brands typically reach out, to explain they want to communicate offline. That's always been the strategy, to take the issue into a private conversation, and there may be merit in such instances. So in other words, nothing really out of the norm in seeing this shared in the manner Seth did. In fact, I'd say it's the rule rather than the exception.

However, in this particular instance consider that Seth was berated non-stop, even by people named in his reporting, over WATA's recent grading policy to red mark games with mold. It didn't matter that he was making a case that the game shouldn't have been allowed to sell without disclosure, but instead it turned into a way to undermine his credibility, because he didn't know anything about how games get graded... at least according to his most vocal critics.

Given his influence, and reach on Twitter, and the awareness of actual people connected to WATA, you'd think that something would have been communicated, refined, or revised in the manner which games are being listed for sale. But nope. Nothing happened.

In fact, not only did nothing happen, but the very person who identified the issue with not disclosing ended-up with an issue on the very matter he attempted to bring attention to. And that warning, from my view, had merit - arguably, a solution ought to have been found where those games needed to be recalled or delisted - the moment the issue was first raised in online environments - until they could be properly reviewed, regraded, and disclosed for their issue (mold, stain, whatever had been missed, or grew from the 4 months that game had been graded). Not sold, or worse have the person who brought the issue to your awareness running into the problem himself..

So he ends up with one now, and its his fault for posting about the experience. Not WATA. Or Heritage. It's all on his reporting style.

Edited September 15, 2021 by comicwiz

[Sweet Lou 14]

On 9/15/2021 at 10:33 AM, comicwiz said:

I think your explanation is fair, but in a practical sense, it's not reality. Anyone that's spent even two months on these boards understands why taking a matter online helps the situation. And in social media platforms, it's the only seeming way to get someone off the pot and correct their missteps, even when it's simply a situation where they can't be bothered to respond to their attempts to communicate their concerns.

Frankly, the fact pattern of customer service issues needing to be escalated by taking the issue online has caused an entire methodology to be advanced by most major brands, who have installed a human touch point that can be tagged, contacted on Twitter, or Facebook. Why put in the extra effort to go out and look for it, when those complaints come to you? Sure it might cause an issue to be publicly amplified, but there's a redeeming aspect to rolling-up the sleeves and course correcting. And even when this happens, the brands typically reach out, to explain they want to communicate offline. That's always been the strategy, to take the issue into a private conversation, and there may be merit in such instances. So in other words, nothing really out of the norm in seeing this shared in the manner Seth did. In fact, I'd say it's the rule rather than the exception.

However, in this particular instance consider that Seth was berated non-stop, even by people named in his reporting, over WATA's recent grading policy to red mark games with mold. It didn't matter that he was making a case that the game shouldn't have been allowed to sell without disclosure, but instead it turned into a way to undermine his credibility, because he didn't know anything about how games get graded... at least according to his most vocal critics.

Given his influence, and reach on Twitter, and the awareness of actual people connected to WATA, you'd think that something would have been communicated, refined, or revised in the manner which games are being listed for sale. But nope. Nothing happened.

In fact, not only did nothing happen, but the very person who identified the issue with not disclosing ended-up with an issue on the very matter he attempted to bring attention to. And that warning, from my view, had merit - arguably, a solution ought to have been found where those games needed to be recalled or delisted - the moment the issue was first raised in online environments - until they could be properly reviewed, regraded, and disclosed for their issue (mold, stain, whatever had been missed, or grew from the 4 months that game had been graded). Not sold, or worse have the person who brought the issue to your awareness running into the problem himself..

So he ends up with one now, and its his fault for posting about the experience. Not WATA. Or Heritage. It's all on his reporting style.

All I'm saying is that Abramson could have (and should have) reached out to Heritage for a resolution on the moldy box, and either withheld his report until he heard back one way or another or made clear that the response was pending.  Especially as someone who wants to be thought of as a journalist, that's the minimum standard.

I am not trying to defend the guy or bash him.  I just think it's obvious that his credibility as a disinterested journalist is severely undermined when he crosses over into complaints about his personal experiences as a customer of Heritage.

[vodou]

On 9/15/2021 at 3:15 PM, Sweet Lou 14 said:

All I'm saying is that Abramson could have (and should have) reached out to Heritage for a resolution on the moldy box, and either withheld his report until he heard back one way or another or made clear that the response was pending. 

Do we know that he didn't? (Or did I miss that somewhere?)

[comicwiz]

On 9/15/2021 at 3:15 PM, Sweet Lou 14 said:

All I'm saying is that Abramson could have (and should have) reached out to Heritage for a resolution on the moldy box, and either withheld his report until he heard back one way or another or made clear that the response was pending.  Especially as someone who wants to be thought of as a journalist, that's the minimum standard.

I am not trying to defend the guy or bash him.  I just think it's obvious that his credibility as a disinterested journalist is severely undermined when he crosses over into complaints about his personal experiences as a customer of Heritage.

I don't think he did anything super-terrible by acting like any customer would. He's allowed that, especially since he tried using some minimum standard of communicating his discontent with the lack of disclosure last month, and Heritage still went ahead and sold that game without any mention of the issue. It's like all that back and forth on Twitter never happened, and business as usual.

How about guys like this (see video below)? Is it equally bad this person posted his experience online? For the kind of issue being presented here, there are many facets to this experience being shared online that I see as a positive. The first is to warn others. It's a great example of how to organize yourself when submitting things, especially by taking good "before" pictures, which this person has used in his video to show how the game looked prior to submitting to WATA.

But also, given the interaction and conversations happening in the comments, they may learn some things about the incident which can help the person make a stronger claim against the company. Or for any person encountering a similar experience for that matter.

My personal opinion, cleaning services of any kind are an accident waiting to happen, particularly sticker removal. I think both the submitter and grader need a head shake.

However, what is alluded to (not in this video, but through the comments) is that they not only botched the sticker removal, and wrote on the game, it appears they may have sent him a different game than one he submitted based on how the sticker residue lines up to the printed Nintendo logo on the back. Even though it's video games, this is familiar terrain for people with a long-standing history on these boards - the comparison between before and after have helped identify and solve some of the biggest hobby scandals. For someone not immersed in that sort of collecting community or culture, that bit of helpful information coming from the comment section may in fact reveal something the submitter may not have been aware of prior to posting the video.

Now imagine this person decides to keep it offline, and is dealing directly with the company, like I did, back in the day when Haspel told me I submitted my book with the damage already. I wasn't given any options for a remedy, I was told to take a hike. One could easily argue that by taking the matter online, particularly given the severity of what has taken place in this particular instance with this persons video game allegedly being damaged by the grader, he won't be limited in his options to seek redress. Not everyone can be a lawyer, or NYT reporter, but every person can be a consumer, and in egregious customer service incidents of wrongdoing, this sort of thing needs to be posted for all to see. No one should have their property damaged like this, with no regard or care to even warn the customer of what took place in advance of it arriving in the mail.

 

Edited September 15, 2021 by comicwiz

[Domo Arigato]

On 9/15/2021 at 2:15 PM, Sweet Lou 14 said:

All I'm saying is that Abramson could have (and should have) reached out to Heritage for a resolution on the moldy box, and either withheld his report until he heard back one way or another or made clear that the response was pending.  Especially as someone who wants to be thought of as a journalist, that's the minimum standard.

I am not trying to defend the guy or bash him.  I just think it's obvious that his credibility as a disinterested journalist is severely undermined when he crosses over into complaints about his personal experiences as a customer of Heritage.

It's why Seth Abramson can't be trusted, and what I've been saying all along.  He is not searching for the truth.  Abramson is doing this for himself.  Everyone who is actually interested in finding out this guys history, simply has to search the internet on him.

And he is obviously not just another customer of Heritage.  Which brings us to another question.  Why is he telling everyone else to stay away from WATA and Heritage.....while he continues to spend $800+ on WATA graded games sold by Heritage?  If he is continuing to purchase and collect games......I wonder what possible reason he could have for trying to get their prices to decrease? 

 

[Sweet Lou 14]

I'm not really interested in making the conversation about Abramson.  I think he exposed himself to criticism in this case (and has done so before in other contexts) because frankly his style of reporting is very much a distraction and he seems to always make the story about himself.  But I disagree with the premise of using that valid criticism to completely dismiss the points he's making.

[Domo Arigato]

On 9/15/2021 at 3:35 PM, Sweet Lou 14 said:

I'm not really interested in making the conversation about Abramson.  I think he exposed himself to criticism in this case (and has done so before in other contexts) because frankly his style of reporting is very much a distraction and he seems to always make the story about himself.  But I disagree with the premise of using that valid criticism to completely dismiss the points he's making.

It goes to the point of his credibility.  Can his claims be trusted?  Was that game actually molded when Heritage had it?  We don't know, because he claimed Heritage hid it by angling the game in the picture.  Even though that's the way Heritage takes all of their pictures for their game auctions (Abramson won't mention that part because it doesn't fit his agenda).  Perhaps it was there and Heritage missed it.  We don't know at this point.  As I said in a previous post, mold can form inside of a plastic case that is not air tight very quickly if the conditions are right.  And I'm having a hard time believing that he just happened to randomly purchase a game from Heritage with mold on it as he's trying to further his agenda.

He's trying to convince everyone to not buy games graded by WATA.....and to not buy them from Heritage......as he continues to buy games graded by WATA......and he continues to buy them from Heritage.  It's like someone trying to depress the stock price for a good company, by making every unsubstantiated accusation they can to show the company is shady and won't last.  Then that same person continues to dump hundreds or thousands of dollars in that very stock.  

If a persons credibility is shot, then what's to be believed?  I'll wait until someone actually interested in facts and accurate conclusions to come along that doesn't have such an obvious agenda buried in ulterior motives.

 

Edited September 15, 2021 by Domo Arigato

[comicwiz]

On 9/15/2021 at 5:01 PM, Domo Arigato said:

If a persons credibility is shot, then what's to be believed?

The irony. I almost spit my drink out when I saw the game thread you started. I half hoped you'd do an updated Ultimate WATA game with 9' pyramids of video games and 5 rounds in which you video punching yourself in the gonads, screaming out whatever obscenities over your accomplishment, preferably in 5 different states. Since you have a penchant to question Seth's credibility, already numerous times in this thread, and would rather circle around the issues being raised than address them head on, to the point where all you really want to do is disrupt or derail, why did you shed the old board alias? I seem to have a vague recollection, but would rather hear it coming from you. I don't recall you mentioning any of this in your linked comment about your history.

Edited September 16, 2021 by comicwiz

[jaybuck43]

On 9/15/2021 at 4:02 PM, comicwiz said:

I don't think he did anything super-terrible by acting like any customer would. He's allowed that, especially since he tried using some minimum standard of communicating his discontent with the lack of disclosure last month, and Heritage still went ahead and sold that game without any mention of the issue. It's like all that back and forth on Twitter never happened, and business as usual.

How about guys like this (see video below)? Is it equally bad this person posted his experience online? For the kind of issue being presented here, there are many facets to this experience being shared online that I see as a positive. The first is to warn others. It's a great example of how to organize yourself when submitting things, especially by taking good "before" pictures, which this person has used in his video to show how the game looked prior to submitting to WATA.

But also, given the interaction and conversations happening in the comments, they may learn some things about the incident which can help the person make a stronger claim against the company. Or for any person encountering a similar experience for that matter.

My personal opinion, cleaning services of any kind are an accident waiting to happen, particularly sticker removal. I think both the submitter and grader need a head shake.

However, what is alluded to (not in this video, but through the comments) is that they not only botched the sticker removal, and wrote on the game, it appears they may have sent him a different game than one he submitted based on how the sticker residue lines up to the printed Nintendo logo on the back. Even though it's video games, this is familiar terrain for people with a long-standing history on these boards - the comparison between before and after have helped identify and solve some of the biggest hobby scandals. For someone not immersed in that sort of collecting community or culture, that bit of helpful information coming from the comment section may in fact reveal something the submitter may not have been aware of prior to posting the video.

Now imagine this person decides to keep it offline, and is dealing directly with the company, like I did, back in the day when Haspel told me I submitted my book with the damage already. I wasn't given any options for a remedy, I was told to take a hike. One could easily argue that by taking the matter online, particularly given the severity of what has taken place in this particular instance with this persons video game allegedly being damaged by the grader, he won't be limited in his options to seek redress. Not everyone can be a lawyer, or NYT reporter, but every person can be a consumer, and in egregious customer service incidents of wrongdoing, this sort of thing needs to be posted for all to see. No one should have their property damaged like this, with no regard or care to even warn the customer of what took place in advance of it arriving in the mail.

 

This video greatly reminds me of the TMNT first print/third print saga.  I don't buy it for a second.  He just so happens to open the box off camera, he just so happens to not see it until he flips it over, he just so happens to not get a shot under the side to see the angles of if it was written on the game.  And the sticker clearly covers the area with the rip.  Is it possible they made a hole?  Sure.  Like I said, feels like a pile on to get attention for his YouTube channel.  

[WolverineX]

On 9/16/2021 at 2:05 PM, jaybuck43 said:

This video greatly reminds me of the TMNT first print/third print saga.  I don't buy it for a second.  He just so happens to open the box off camera, he just so happens to not see it until he flips it over, he just so happens to not get a shot under the side to see the angles of if it was written on the game.  And the sticker clearly covers the area with the rip.  Is it possible they made a hole?  Sure.  Like I said, feels like a pile on to get attention for his YouTube channel.  

Interesting video.  I wonder why he didn't just use a hair dryer and take off the sticker himself... also what was written on it?

[Domo Arigato]

On 9/16/2021 at 1:05 PM, jaybuck43 said:

This video greatly reminds me of the TMNT first print/third print saga.  I don't buy it for a second.  He just so happens to open the box off camera, he just so happens to not see it until he flips it over, he just so happens to not get a shot under the side to see the angles of if it was written on the game.  And the sticker clearly covers the area with the rip.  Is it possible they made a hole?  Sure.  Like I said, feels like a pile on to get attention for his YouTube channel.  

Which smells like what Seth Abramson is doing as well.  He just so happens to be raising a stink about Heritage and WATA that is getting him a lot of clicks, followers and attention.  He just so happens to be warning people away from Heritage and WATA......while he buys WATA games from Heritage.  He just so happens to buy and receive a WATA game from Heritage that has mold on it so he can post it and say "SEE".  

And his entire premise starts out with a lie.  He is familiar with Heritage video game auctions.  He's been railing on them for weeks now.....and he's buying games there.....so he's looking at their scans.  He knows that Heritage photographs all of their games in the exact same way.  Yet he accuses them of purposely displaying this particular game at this angle to hide something.  This is how Heritage photographs games for their auctions.  This is how Heritage photographs ALL of their games for their auctions.  Here is a link to the 754 games that Heritage currently has up for auction.  Now look at his "GOTCHA" comment in the tweet below.  I'm going to go out on a limb here and guess that Abramson's nickname in law school wasn't Sherlock or Einstein.

 

 

Edited September 16, 2021 by Domo Arigato

[Bronty]

On 9/16/2021 at 3:21 PM, Domo Arigato said:

Which smells like what Seth Abramson is doing as well.  He just so happens to be raising a stink about Heritage and WATA that is getting him a lot of clicks, followers and attention.  He just so happens to be warning people away from Heritage and WATA......while he buys WATA games from Heritage.  He just so happens to buy and receive a WATA game from Heritage that has mold on it so he can post it and say "SEE".  

And his entire premise starts out with a lie.  He is familiar with Heritage video game auctions.  He's been railing on them for weeks now.....and he's buying games there.....so he's looking at their scans.  He knows that Heritage photographs all of their games in the exact same way.  Yet he accuses them of purposely displaying this particular game at this angle to hide something.  This is how Heritage photographs games for their auctions.  This is how Heritage photographs ALL of their games for their auctions.  Here is a link to the 754 games that Heritage currently has up for auction.  Now look at his "GOTCHA" comment in the tweet below.  I'm going to go out on a limb here and guess that Abramson's nickname in law school wasn't Sherlock or Einstein.

 

 

exactly right.

Not only that, but can someone show me the mold?    Because the pics I recall seeing it was just red goop on the plastic.  I don't know one way or the other, but obviously mold isn't normally red, and goop can happen under poor storage conditions without it being mold.

To be clear, whether or not its mold isn't the point because whether or not there was a mistake on this game, mistakes happen, and as you say, heritage is consistent with their photography (no back cover scans on CLINK, anyone?).   But it would be very "gotcha" indeed if the big hubbub was over a properly graded game (goop wipes off of plastic...).

Edited September 16, 2021 by Bronty

[comicwiz]

On 9/16/2021 at 2:05 PM, jaybuck43 said:

This video greatly reminds me of the TMNT first print/third print saga.  I don't buy it for a second.  He just so happens to open the box off camera, he just so happens to not see it until he flips it over, he just so happens to not get a shot under the side to see the angles of if it was written on the game.  And the sticker clearly covers the area with the rip.  Is it possible they made a hole?  Sure.  Like I said, feels like a pile on to get attention for his YouTube channel.  

The location of the tear, and the Nintendo logo, along with the residue of the removed sticker clearly show this is not even the same game. I'm not sure if you saw it to the end, but there is also writing on the front, appears to be on the cellophane. My guess is this is not the game he submitted, but I guess he's trying to make sense of it all. I do legit think he got caught up in the box opening, which is a thing in online environments, and was genuinely surprised by seeing the writing on the front. I don't get anywhere near the same "staged" vibe as the TMNT video, not even in the same discussion tbh. That whole video screamed staged.

[comicwiz]

On 9/16/2021 at 2:30 PM, Wolverinex said:

Interesting video.  I wonder why he didn't just use a hair dryer and take off the sticker himself... also what was written on it?

Hair dryer on cello is unwise. Best thing is to leave the sticker alone. The one he got from WATA appears to be a store security sticker, which uses a "tattoo-like" transfer that bonds to the cello, and contains a metallic signature that would set off a detector if someone were to try to walk out with it. It's hard to know this exactly without looking at the item in hand, but the Target sticker he shows in the before does not appear to be the same type of sticker.

Edited September 16, 2021 by comicwiz

[Domo Arigato]

On 9/16/2021 at 3:40 PM, comicwiz said:

I'm not sure if you saw it to the end, but there is also writing on the front, appears to be on the cellophane. 

It's not on the cellophane....it's on the inner casing.  This guy, and anyone else wanting to look at this with a critical eye, should easily be able to tell this. 

All one has to do is take a look at the video.....starting at about the 7:20 mark.  Look at the writing as he angles the game.  If the writing was on the game, it would remain at the same places on the game as he angles it.  However, the inner case is slightly above the game, so if the writing was on the inner case, the ink would appear to "slide" a bit as he angles the game. 

Looking at the "VING" at the end of the word, you can easily see where the ink starts to slide.  That wouldn't happen if the ink was directly on the game.

The images on the left are the straight on shots.......the images on the right are from when he starts to angle the game.

I've highlighted the areas in the bottom images to show the ink movement.

 

On 9/16/2021 at 3:40 PM, comicwiz said:

I do legit think he got caught up in the box opening, which is a thing in online environments, and was genuinely surprised by seeing the writing on the front. I don't get anywhere near the same "staged" vibe as the TMNT video, not even in the same discussion tbh. That whole video screamed staged.

Most people do a box opening by setting the camera up so you can see the box.  Then they open the box on camera, show them removing the contents and then display it for the camera.

This guy sets the camera up so you can see the box and him grabbing his pocket knife......then yanks the box out of camera view to open it.  Then he conveniently says he won't show us the front of the game right away, so we can guess the grade ourselves......when the grade is printed right there on the back label as well.  And if that's his serious reaction, I would hate to see his acting.  I especially liked the Rocket Raccoon style fake laugh......followed by the last shot where he's sitting pensively at his table contemplating the meaning of life and game grading as he takes a stiff drink. 

 

Edited September 17, 2021 by Domo Arigato

[Domo Arigato]

On 9/16/2021 at 1:30 PM, Wolverinex said:

Interesting video.  I wonder why he didn't just use a hair dryer and take off the sticker himself... also what was written on it?

It appears to be written on the inner well of the case and says "Receiving". 

 

[comicwiz]

On 9/17/2021 at 12:56 AM, Domo Arigato said:

as he takes a stiff drink. 

when I saw that, I wondered if someone should warn Bubbles, before he starts getting into the swish hard