Why is overstreet unrealistic?

Silver · October 24, 2006

Overstreet is not really relevant to our hobby anymore. It is still the greatest reference guide you can get for comics each year, but it's value as a price guide is almost non-existant.

Everything about our hobby has benefited from the Internet except the price guide. The folks at Overstreet seem determined to never use technology to improve their product. Long ago the guide should have become a website that people would probably pay to subscribe to, but nope...nowhere in sight. It shoulda/coulda been the GPAnalysis site. It could be the place that collectors logged and tracked their comics and values. Nothing. They just keep plugging along like they never heard of computers.

That PDF version that ONLY Heritage can sell...it's a joke that we would have to pay $25 for that and that it's not free to purchasers of the harback/softback version. It's useful to keep on a computer, but I wonder how many copies of it really sell every year?

I really wanted OS (been buying them regulalry since issue #3) to be the ones that pushed organizing our collections, maintaining current values based on actual sales, keeping an online cover gallery, etc, etc. to the collecting masses. But nope, they just keep doing what they do, ignoring the opertunitites that a good software design and their name could provide us all.

dzminn · October 24, 2006

The ability for an annual guide to accurately reflect prices at any given moment in time is impossible.

But OS doesn't even try

Yes, absolutely…..

Somewhat OT,

Is there an opportunity for an individual or two to publish a guide/reference piece about the comic market concerning information like this?

Would a comprehensive book of all variants with pictures and supporting data be welcomed in the marketplace?

I realize that much information is available on the web right now – but if somebody were to pull it all together across publisher lines, eras etc., wouldn’t it be considered a valuable resource?

adams · October 24, 2006

OS got by on a shoestring for so many years...

doing it out of his basement with family members helping him out...

There is a huge resistence at GEMSTONE to actually spend

money on technology ....the Guide is still done in an Excel format

line by line by line by line by line

not even in a database...go figure ?

As long as there is no competition for the PG..why bother spending money

to upgrade ?

lizards2 · October 25, 2006

Overstreet is not really relevant to our hobby anymore. It is still the greatest reference guide you can get for comics each year, but it's value as a price guide is almost non-existant.

I think OS is very relevant as a reference tool - there are no price guides that are accurate anymore - the market is way too fractured. There is retail from little tiny shops, to great big shops. There is mailorder. There is regionalism to include multiple countries, let alone across the U.S.A. There is eBay, and every internet scheme inbetween. There are websites galore. There are comic conventions. There is this board. There are my shills, who deliver gifts to me cutrate..., or expensively, if that's what I want. There is CGC operating across multiple layers of all of the above. Anyone who thinks they can generate an accurate price guide for all of the above circumstances..., stand up!!!! ...., but prepare to be beaten down!

WOXL · October 25, 2006

Is there an opportunity for an individual or two to publish a guide/reference piece about the comic market concerning information like this?
Would a comprehensive book of all variants with pictures and supporting data be welcomed in the marketplace?

I realize that much information is available on the web right now – but if somebody were to pull it all together across publisher lines, eras etc., wouldn’t it be considered a valuable resource?

Comics Price Guide is a nice resource that shows almost all variant covers but gives wildly incorrect prices. The Grand Comic Database is another nice resource that shows covers and is updatable - it unfortunately doesn't have variant covers though. Many of the big comic sellers (i.e. Lone Star and Mile High) also have pretty good databases of comic covers and may give you a better idea of current prices (think low percentage of MH prices ).

I don't know... it seems to me like a big reference book will be outdated before it's ever published. Plus, that would be one huge MFing book to hold decent enough sized pictures of enough comics to be useful. I think the current approach of the database websites is the right way to go. I really like the idea of the collecting community actively contributing to keep a site updated and useful for other collecters.

-Bob

Dick Pontoon · October 25, 2006

Overstreet is not really relevant to our hobby anymore. It is still the greatest reference guide you can get for comics each year, but it's value as a price guide is almost non-existant.

You are so wrong my friend, so wrong. OS is immensely useful as a guide.

If I spend a lot on comics and the missus raises an eyebrow, I just pick up Bob’s handy dandy tome and point out “Look hunny, in this condition it books for $25 more than what I paid!”

the blob · October 25, 2006

OPG is useful for artists, appearances, etc. As for prices....it's mainly just nice to know what the price in OPG is to get some frame of reference, particularly for books you don't come across all the time. But how much you discount from OPG, or add to it, varies wildly between books.

ArnoldTBlumberg · October 25, 2006

the Guide is still done in an Excel format

This is not true.

Paratrooper · October 25, 2006

It's been upgraded and done in Access

mica · October 25, 2006

The OPG to me has always been more of a reference document. The 1st few I bought (about 20+ years ago) served as a wonderful resource to information involving publisher, time frames, artists etc.

That is why I buy it. I know it's Blasphemous to say this but for me the prices get in the way, and take up room that I would like to see used better.

I'd like to see a few detail oriented guys like Scrooge expand upon each listing with publishers ; better abbreviations (stuff the young novice picking it up for the first time could handle) more comprehensive Artist notations. etc...

But then of course it would cease to be a price guide. And that's what 99% of collectors want. And I understand why.

But it's all things to all people or at least it has tried to be.

Now it's all that plus Big Little Books. I personally like BLB's but I'd want it to be as detailed as possible and you can't really do that when you're occupying a section of a price guide devoted to an entirely different hobby.

I'd like to see it become a Price guide (one volume) and then have it's companion volume the Reference guide (which gets exhaustive in artist/publisher/news/history/Centerfold-inserts/ etc...

It won't happen, but I think it would be well received. It would satisfy the geek in me that wants expanded details, and yet the regular guy could opt to buy Just the priceguide softcover which would be 80% of their sales. The regular guy just wants to see the $numbers and couldn't care less to read about Obadiah Oldbuck.

infinite_comics-migration · October 25, 2006

The Grand Comic Database is another nice resource that shows covers and is updatable - it unfortunately doesn't have variant covers though.

Which is a good thing! Luckily, the GCD is a research site for true comic collectors. No prices, no variant covers (although I've seen a few slipped in) and no slabbed comics The GCD has made the Gerber Guides (and to some extent the OPG) obsolete, too (and the GCD's scans are so much bigger )