It is THIS simple. Why is it made so complex and even silly?

[bluechip]

This from a thread started in the GA forum. Posting here because this has been gone over so many times, I thought it was worth spelling out here as well and isolating as a separate thread.

 

 

This quotes the original post:

 

Hello All,

There have been a great many threads devoted to pointing out the crack/press/resub game that's going on. I have been reading them & frankly I am more than a little concerned...Big kudos to Master Chief for his Manufactured Gold thread. As a collector from old just coming back into collecting late this past year, I have had a lot of catching up to do, to include gaining knowledge about CGC, how the hobby has escalated, advances in collecting supplies and of course book trimming & other forms of restoration to include pressing.

 

While many conclude (including CGC) that pressing is not considered restoration, this point gives me pause: Books are being pressed and resubmitted for higher grades. In effect, they are altering the books' original condition and modifying it into a higher(?) grade. In addition, THIS IS NOT BEING DISCLOSED. If there is nothing wrong with pressing, why not simply disclose it? If they are trying to get a higher grade for a higher overhead, why not "man up" & admit it? There are a lot of people who feel pressing is not a big issue, period. There are those out there who don't care if the book has been pressed AS LONG AS IT'S DISCLOSED. These people will still buy the book. And, finally there are people who are against pressing altogether. Is it because of the latter that disclosure is not an option for these people?

 

CL, Heritage, Pedigree, and others who suspect books are pressed or actually have it done themselves are doing a disservice to people by failing to disclose what has been done or even SUSPECTED of being done. This subversion & deceit further adds to the negative stigma (and rightly so) that pressing brings to the table.

 

My main concern is for us collectors who indulge in the occasional HG book. Some of us don't have the knowledge and/or resources to be able to spot that resubbed book and know that 4 months ago this 9.6 was a 9.2 or 9.4. What about us? How can we protect ourselves from being cheated, because in essence not telling is the same as lying. If a book is altered & there's nothing wrong about doing it, then why not disclose it? How can we "normal collectors" not get taken for a ride?

 

I for one, don't want a book that's been physically altered unless I am going into the transaction knowing full well what has taken place. I'm almost scared now to buy a slabbed HG SA, because I don't know if last week it was two grades lower. What if CGC FINDS A WAY TO DETECT PRESSING? And make no mistake, someday a way to detect it WILL be found...Will it then be considered restoration? If that's the case, there are going to be a LOT of books that will become PLODDED in the future...This hobby is entering dangerous times now, and if we are not careful a LOT of negativity will be associated with it.

 

 

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

 

 

 

 

The single best first step to having all work disclosed, pressing included, is to work toward destigmatizing the work in the first place.

 

If you take away the stigmatized labels and describe all work on the same labels, then people who obsesse about avoiding particulat types of work including pressing, will still be able to avoid it.

 

And if you take away the stigma then people who don't mind purchasing books will be less worried their purchase will be stigmatized.

 

People who have books with a little bit of work done to them will feel less like they might just as well go ahead and do a whole lot of work because all restored books are lumped into one stigmatized barrel. That will lead to more people doing as little work as possible to books that don't need much work to look presentable.

 

If you label every alteration to the book simply as a defect, instead of trying to stigmatize (and multiply the effect of) defects caused by "intent," then people can judge the grade of a book without having to argue over who can read the mind of the former owner or aruge about whether we should multiply the effect of the damge as a means of punishing the thought behind it..

 

In short -- every defects and alternation (even pressing) can be noted wfor what it is without guessing as to how it happened.

 

Any of the above -- or all of the above -- will lead to less sellers feeling they have to hide what they've done.