Books you just cant find in the Wild 22 22

[RockMyAmadeus]

2 hours ago, paqart said:

Hmm...regardless, what matters to collectors is the supply available to them, not the hypothetical number of copies that exist. If they aren’t in the collector’s market, they may as well not be there at all. For example, there are Disney’s and superhero comics from the 1950’s that sold in the 5-10 million copies a month range, yet the comics are hard to find now.

the industry insider is not Chuck Rozakis btw. I wouldn’t even describe Rosakis that way because he is a dealer not someone who ever worked for a publisher. The guy I’m thinking of worked for Marvel. I’d have to look up his name to remember it but he would have had knowledge of print runs as part of his job. One thing about logical arguments that I don’t like is that they are often wrong. Sometimes things don’t make sense but they happen anyway. If a Marvel VP of marketing says it was 1%, and Jim Shooter says it was 2%, I’ll believe the number is closer to either of those two numbers than the larger numbers you mention, which, by the way, appear to be based on logical assumptions, not any kind of estimate from someone with knowledge of actual print runs.

again, the number printed is less meaningful than the number available for purchase, but the number printed does give an idea of the maximum that could be available. I agree that 40 copies a state seems ridiculous, but it may be that by the time Marvel was at the lowest numbers for newsstand distribution they were only selling to a few stores around the Country — exactly as they say they were doing. Maybe those stores were in only ten or twenty states. Also keep in mind that although their total order may have been a few hundred comics per month, they would be divided by a number of titles. When I worked at a comic book store in the seventies, there were some titles we didn’t order at all, and others that we ordered only a few copies of. Given the number of titles Marvel was pumping out around 2013, it wouldn’t surprise me if Barnes and Noble and Waldenbooks ordered only a few copies of each title, resulting in a total order of maybe one or two boxes of comics.

I...and everyone else who is concerned with getting to the truth, rather than capitalizing on misinformation for personal gain....am very interested in getting to the bottom of the matter, but an anonymous "Marvel VP of marketing" and "Jim Shooter" aren't going to come anywhere close to cutting it. Jim Shooter hasn't been involved with Marvel since he was ousted in 1987, and hasn't dealt with the newsstand since 1992. I'm not sure how he'd be in a position to know what newsstand print runs would be in the 00s, nor would he care.

And what do those "1%" and "2%" figures represent? "Print runs"? Sales? Lots of people...lots of them...have violently and angrily denounced anyone who says that we don't have the information necessary to make even cursory guesses as to what was made, even to the point of vicious personal attacks. But the fact remains: publishers, especially Marvel and DC, do not reveal print run information, and almost never have. Aside from the information in the Statements of Ownership...which even then only contained precise information for one issue a year, and still made no distinction between Direct and newsstand copies...we simply don't know the extent of print runs for anything.

I've used this figure before. In 2011, Barnes & Noble had 705 stores in the United States alone, the year Marvel began winding down its newsstand distribution program (Waldenbooks went of business in mid-2011, and had been scaling down for a couple of years before that.) If Marvel & DC were only printing 2,000 copies (or less) of each issue, and all of those copies went only to B&N (they did not), that means each store got about 3 copies of each book. Since the standard sell-through was 30%, that means each store sold a single copy, on average...and the books would have been distributed solely at B&N, which wasn't the case.

https://www.statista.com/statistics/199012/number-of-barnes-noble-stores-by-type-and-year-since-2005/

Marvel has had a 3,000 copy minimum...and Image has had 1,000...in place for many years for retailer variants....and all of THOSE books go to a single source. The cost to administer a continent-wide program to only print 2,000 copies...or less!...and have a sell-through of 20-40%...would quickly overwhelm any profitability in such a system. It wouldn't justify the salary of even one person, much less an entire circulation department.

The issue has nothing to do with being "right" or "wrong"; as I have said countless times before, I'm not suggesting you or anyone else making your claims is wrong...I'm saying we don't have enough information to draw those conclusions, and what we DO know doesn't support those conclusions. Speculation in the face of so little hard evidence is pretty useless. There are a lot of people who would be interested in hard evidence, from people who are named, and willing to go on the record.

By the way...Disney's were, according to the OPG, the best selling books of the early 50s, selling 3-4 million copies...not 5-10 million. And they are, fortunately for those who want them, still quite common, and relatively cheap. There were no superhero comics selling millions of copies in the 50s. 

Edited October 9, 2019 by RockMyAmadeus

[paqart]

34 minutes ago, RockMyAmadeus said:

There were no superhero comics selling millions of copies in the 50s

First off, just so you know, I don't have a horse in this race and don't care who is right or wrong about any given detail, including myself. I did not intend to write something that was so exciting and alarming, so please keep that in mind if you choose to respond to this. I am just as interested in discovering the correct information as you seem to be. At the moment, I am working with the information I have, and that is all. If it is flawed, I hope that comes out. If not, it would be great if there were alternate sources to support it.

That said, you are still making logical arguments. They make sense to me but they disagree with what others have said actually happened. Doesn't mean you are wrong but there is a discrepancy to be accounted for. I've seen more than one company take a loss for no good reason, so I am disinclined to assume competence as the basis for arguing that Marvel and DC couldn't have had extremely low newsstand print runs. I've seen it argued, for instance, that the publishers continued newsstand distribution in some cases just to time out existing contracts. If that is what they were doing, they would have no incentive to try and sell more product to those customers. I have also read that some newsstand dealers were deliberately shorted some months to drive customers to comic shops instead.

When talking about best selling superhero comics in the fifties, I lumped in superheroes from the forties. I was thinking of Captain Marvel Adventures, which did sell in the multiple millions per month. I have heard of some single issue Disneys that sold over ten million units btw, so not unheard of but not a regular occurrence either, a bit like the aberrant sales of the early nineties, late eighties, around the time Image was founded. Those multi-million unit sales disappeared pretty fast and came out of nowhere but they did happen.

Speaking of costs and salaries, here is a logical argument for you: A typical comic book will cost a publisher a minimum of $10,000 in creative fees. That is for an under-performing artist, writer, letterer, and colorist. Add in administration on the issue, and you could be looking at $12.5k/issue. For top creative teams, you might be looking at closer to $30k/issue just to get it made. On the low end, that means a comic has to make about $27k in sales to break even. On the high end, more like $75k.  For the time period we're talking about (2000-2013), that translates to sales of between 10,000-25,000 units. Despite this, there are dozens of comics that fall below the low number in this range every month. And yet, the titles continued to be made. Clearly, profitability isn't the only concern. 

An example is my own comic, Harsh Realm, published by Harris Comics. I have no idea what the sales were but I never received a royalty, so they were below the threshold where royalties would be paid. After the mini-series concluded in 1994, it pretty much disappeared until 1999, when Fox television decided to make a TV show based on it with uber-producer Chris Carter (X-Files). Then, when writer James Hudnall and I filed a lawsuit against Harris, Fox, and Carter for violating our contract to make the deal for the TV series, Harris noticed that, although they never had the rights to the series, if they didn't quickly publish a graphic novel compilation within a few months, they would lose the right to represent James and I in any negotiations. To prevent that, they published a graphic novel but with the minimum print run necessary to fulfill the contractual obligation needed to prevent full reversion of rights. They did not publish the graphic novel to make money but but to retain rights.
 

Edited October 9, 2019 by paqart

[RockMyAmadeus]

2 minutes ago, paqart said:

First off, just so you know, I don't have a horse in this race and don't care who is right or wrong about any given detail, including myself. I did not intend to write something that was so exciting and alarming, so please keep that in mind if you choose to respond to this. I am just as interested in discovering the correct information as you seem to be. At the moment, I am working with the information I have, and that is all. If it is flawed, I hope that comes out. If not, it would be great if there were alternate sources to support it.

No one is excited nor alarmed. If you have or obtain hard data, by all means, feel free to share it. As of yet, and with all due respect, you have yet to provide any documentation for the claims you've already made.

This message board is filled with speculation, most of it bad. I think everyone can agree that we don't need more of it. We need documentation and proof, not supposition.

5 minutes ago, paqart said:

Speaking of costs and salaries, here is a logical argument for you: A typical comic book will cost a publisher a minimum of $10,000 in creative fees. That is for an under-performing artist, writer, letterer, and colorist. And in administration on the issue, and you could be looking at $12.5k/issue. For top creative teams, you might be looking at closer to $30k/issue just to get it made. On the low end, that means a comic has to make about $27k in sales to break even. On the high end, more like $75k.  For the time period we're talking about (2000-2013), that translates to sales of between 10,000-25,000 units. Despite this, there are dozens of comics that fall below the low number in this range every month. And yet, the titles continued to be made. Clearly, profitability isn't the only concern. 

I don't suppose you'd be willing to support these numbers with documentation, would you...?

For example...when you say a comic has to "make about $27k in sales to break even", what are you referring to? $27,000 in cover price? Or $27,000 in the roughly 40% that publishers make of cover price? For most of the 2000s, the average cover price of a standard Marvel/DC was $2.50. That means for every copy sold to Diamond, Marvel/DC made $1.00. So...assuming your $27,000 figure to "break even" is correct, and based on publisher revenue...they'd have to sell about 27,000 copies. 

And that confuses the issue of profitability: if Marvel/DC published SOME books that fell below the "profitability" threshold, they still published plenty of books OVER that threshold...assuming that threshold is accurate in the first place. But according to the "1%" or "2%" speculation, the entire newsstand distribution program stopped being profitable but Marvel/DC continued this publication model for years anyways.

13 minutes ago, paqart said:

An example is my own comic, Harsh Realm, published by Harris Comics. I have no idea what the sales were but I never received a royalty, so they were below the threshold were royalties would be paid. After the mini-series concluded in 1994, it pretty much disappeared until 1999, when Fox television decided to make a TV show based on it with uber-producer Chris Carter (X-Files). Then, when writer James Hudnall and I filed a lawsuit against Harris, Fox, and Carter for violating our contract to make the deal for the TV series, Harris noticed that, although they never had the rights to the series, if they didn't quickly publish a graphic novel compilation within a few months, they would lose the right to represent James and I in any negotiations. To prevent that, they published a graphic novel but with the minimum print run necessary to fulfill the contractual obligation needed to prevent full reversion of rights. They did not publish the graphic novel to make money but but to retain rights.

This is quite obviously an exception to the normal, day-to-day publication concerns of Marvel/DC, and not typical by any means, with which I'm sure you would agree. It's not comparable to the newsstand distribution program of Marvel/DC.

[paqart]

5 minutes ago, RockMyAmadeus said:

This is quite obviously an exception to the normal, day-to-day publication concerns of Marvel/DC

According to industry veteran Mark Evanier, who said this to me on multiple occasions in private conversations, many Marvel and DC titles were unprofitable but they kept them running because they were hoping for a movie or TV deal. The way he told it, apart from movies and TV, the primary profit center was royalties on toys and other merchandise, not the comics themselves. According to him, the comics were essentially functioning as advertisements for other products.

The few data points I have on newsstand rarity come from a combination of Comichron sales estimates and a number of articles I've read on https://rarecomics.wordpress.com/, most of which are written by Benjamin Nobel, but some aren't. Again, the bottom line is that the newsstand issues are definitely hard to find for collectors. That is more important than any of the other things described as potential reasons why they are hard to find. As a collector, if I want a high grade copy os ASM 694, it will be hard to find one for sale, let alone at a price that I am comfortable with. That is the bottom line, and that is well-known to any collector who has tried to fill newsstand runs of many modern titles. When every comic book store and online auction fails to produce even a single low-grade example of the comic you are looking for, it is "rare" in the only sense that matters to you, the comic simply cannot be had, regardless of price.

[ygogolak]

8 minutes ago, paqart said:

According to industry veteran Mark Evanier, who said this to me on multiple occasions in private conversations, many Marvel and DC titles were unprofitable but they kept them running because they were hoping for a movie or TV deal. The way he told it, apart from movies and TV, the primary profit center was royalties on toys and other merchandise, not the comics themselves. According to him, the comics were essentially functioning as advertisements for other products.

The few data points I have on newsstand rarity come from a combination of Comichron sales estimates and a number of articles I've read on https://rarecomics.wordpress.com/, most of which are written by Benjamin Nobel, but some aren't. Again, the bottom line is that the newsstand issues are definitely hard to find for collectors. That is more important than any of the other things described as potential reasons why they are hard to find. As a collector, if I want a high grade copy os ASM 694, it will be hard to find one for sale, let alone at a price that I am comfortable with. That is the bottom line, and that is well-known to any collector who has tried to fill newsstand runs of many modern titles. When every comic book store and online auction fails to produce even a single low-grade example of the comic you are looking for, it is "rare" in the only sense that matters to you, the comic simply cannot be had, regardless of price.

Are we sure this isn't a shill account to get some comments going and threads locked?

[paqart]

14 minutes ago, RockMyAmadeus said:

I don't suppose you'd be willing to support these numbers with documentation, would you...?

For example...when you say a comic has to "make about $27k in sales to break even", what are you referring to? $27,000 in cover price? Or $27,000 in the roughly 40% that publishers make of cover price?

I mean the $27,000 cover price at the retailer. I wasn't sure what the discount was or I might have used a different number but thought I remembered the direct discount as 60% and newsstand at 40% from when I worked at a comic shop in the 70's. Wasn't sure if those discounts stayed the same over the years or if they were adjusted later. As for costs, I know what the page rates were because I know what I was paid and what many of my friends in industry were paid. I also know what I paid comic book artists when I became an art director (though not in the comic book industry) and what friends in the industry with more experience than me told me about rates. 

A typical low end comic costs about $500/page though it can be as low as $300/pg for absolute beginners. Three hundred a page breaks down as approximately $100/pg for pencils, $75/pg inks, $50/pg for the -script, and $75/pg for letters and coloring. Five hundred a page is around $175/pg for pencils, $125/inks, $100/pg for the -script, and then the same breakdown for color and lettering. The rates vary considerably based on who you are talking about, their negotiating skills, and which title they are on. The $500/pg creators are names you would be familiar with, the $300/pg guys are either people who never made it in the industry and switched to something else, or those who went on to do very well later in their careers, like Romita jr and McFarlane. High end page rates vary too much to estimate, but I recall reading somewhere that Byrne was at one time paid $450/pg, then $750/pg plus royalties. At Mad, page rates are ridiculously high, or were. At Mad, some artists got as much as $5k/ pg (Mort Drucker, Jack Davis) and others as low as $3k/page (this confirmed by one such artist just last week.)

[paqart]

4 minutes ago, ygogolak said:

Are we sure this isn't a shill account to get some comments going and threads locked?

Not sure what you mean by that or what would make you say it in the first place. A shill for what? Rarity of newsstand comics? I happen to think they are interesting, searched the term, found an interesting discussion on the topic here, and have contributed. How is that any different from what others have written in the newsstand threads?

[revat]

3 minutes ago, paqart said:

Not sure what you mean by that or what would make you say it in the first place. A shill for what? Rarity of newsstand comics? I happen to think they are interesting, searched the term, found an interesting discussion on the topic here, and have contributed. How is that any different from what others have written in the newsstand threads?

I think in the past on the boards there have been hundreds if not thousands of heated debates about the print run/rarity of certain comics, both in terms of variants and newsstands.  They mostly stem from the lack of available ACTUAL factual evidence and other theories and seemingly strong theories that are made from seemingly logical (but non-evidence based) assumptions that are presented as something pretty close to factual.  But as you've stated, traditional or seeming obvious logic doesn't always seem to apply, and you are more interested in MARKET AVAILABILITY than the actual print run.  Which I think is an important distinction.

[RockMyAmadeus]

1 hour ago, paqart said:

According to industry veteran Mark Evanier, who said this to me on multiple occasions in private conversations, many Marvel and DC titles were unprofitable but they kept them running because they were hoping for a movie or TV deal. The way he told it, apart from movies and TV, the primary profit center was royalties on toys and other merchandise, not the comics themselves. According to him, the comics were essentially functioning as advertisements for other products.

No doubt. But his comments are about titles in general, not specifically newsstand distribution, so that doesn't apply here.

1 hour ago, paqart said:

The few data points I have on newsstand rarity come from a combination of Comichron sales estimates and a number of articles I've read on https://rarecomics.wordpress.com/, most of which are written by Benjamin Nobel, but some aren't.

Comichron (John Jackson Miller) deals with the Direct market, not the newsstand, and any mention of newsstand distribution is both cursory and estimated, as JJM explains.

"rarecomics" publishes erroneous information and does not maintain a rigorous policy for fact-checking and correction. As a result, whoever has been exposed to that website has gotten inaccurate and misleading information that leads them to conclusions that aren't supported by the information available.

 

 

[RockMyAmadeus]

1 hour ago, revat said:

I think in the past on the boards there have been hundreds if not thousands of heated debates about the print run/rarity of certain comics,

I'm pretty sure that's significant hyperbole.

1 hour ago, revat said:

you are more interested in MARKET AVAILABILITY than the actual print run.  Which I think is an important distinction.

I agree. However, getting TO that distinction ought not involve the repetition of information we know is erroneous, that then gets repeated throughout the hobby, becoming "fact" because it's never challenged. If an erroneous detail is repeated at 3, 4, 10, 20 different locations, it gives the appearance of validation, especially when that erroneous information actually comes from one source, that is then uncritically accepted as fact, and repeated.

We can use inductive reasoning to arrive at probabilities, and avoid arguments (point of clarification, since there's been some misunderstanding: an "argument" is a series of statements typically used to persuade someone of something or to present reasons for accepting a conclusion...it does not mean the same thing as "arguing") that are obviously not rational, like "in 1979, the Direct market only accounted for 6% of sales." Even though we don't have any direct evidence that that's not the case, we know it is through the indirect evidence we have: Marvel's company-wide adoption of Direct market cover dress in February of 1979, the availability of Direct market copies on the aftermarket, etc.

Just bringing up the example of "rarecomics", look at how many people...assuming honest intent...have come here repeating the same erroneous information found there, and when some investigation is done, it's discovered that, time and again, they got that information there.

How many others have been exposed to this inaccurate information, with no opportunity to hear otherwise? We'll never know.

[RockMyAmadeus]

2 hours ago, ygogolak said:

Are we sure this isn't a shill account to get some comments going and threads locked?

You don't need me to tell you this, because you're very aware of it already, but there's never been any need for any of these threads to get locked. Ever. It's entirely possible for adults to have discussions...even "contentious" (quotes on purpose) ones, where people entirely disagree, without resorting to activities which lead to locked threads.

And I'll take this opportunity to do a little politicking: I don't always agree with you, but as I have said before, I VERY much appreciate the fact that you're willing to challenge what people claim.

[RockMyAmadeus]

2 hours ago, paqart said:

I mean the $27,000 cover price at the retailer. I wasn't sure what the discount was or I might have used a different number but thought I remembered the direct discount as 60% and newsstand at 40% from when I worked at a comic shop in the 70's. Wasn't sure if those discounts stayed the same over the years or if they were adjusted later. As for costs, I know what the page rates were because I know what I was paid and what many of my friends in industry were paid. I also know what I paid comic book artists when I became an art director (though not in the comic book industry) and what friends in the industry with more experience than me told me about rates. 

A typical low end comic costs about $500/page though it can be as low as $300/pg for absolute beginners. Three hundred a page breaks down as approximately $100/pg for pencils, $75/pg inks, $50/pg for the --script, and $75/pg for letters and coloring. Five hundred a page is around $175/pg for pencils, $125/inks, $100/pg for the --script, and then the same breakdown for color and lettering. The rates vary considerably based on who you are talking about, their negotiating skills, and which title they are on. The $500/pg creators are names you would be familiar with, the $300/pg guys are either people who never made it in the industry and switched to something else, or those who went on to do very well later in their careers, like Romita jr and McFarlane. High end page rates vary too much to estimate, but I recall reading somewhere that Byrne was at one time paid $450/pg, then $750/pg plus royalties. At Mad, page rates are ridiculously high, or were. At Mad, some artists got as much as $5k/ pg (Mort Drucker, Jack Davis) and others as low as $3k/page (this confirmed by one such artist just last week.)

If you have any direct documentation to support all of this, it would be much appreciated. Thank you in advance.

[paqart]

3 minutes ago, RockMyAmadeus said:

As a result, whoever has been exposed to that website has gotten inaccurate and misleading information that leads them to conclusions that aren't supported by the information available.

The conclusion I've drawn from what I've read there and what I've seen "in the wild" is that newsstand editions, particularly those printed after about 2005, are hard to find. I define "hard to find" as: I haven't found any copies at all that are for sale for some of these comics, many of them actually. I don't see that as an erroneous conclusion after I have gone through literally every long and short box at NYCC, every box at every LCS I know of, garage sales, flea markets, and checking auctions every day. This isn't a fake phenomenon. Nobel may be wrong about some of the details but the thrust of his argument is correct: newsstand comics are hard to find, even rare in the context of the number of collectors there are for high profile titles. My biggest quibble with his data is that I have found newsstand editions from the eighties that are outnumbered by a factor anywhere from 4x to 80x by direct titles, despite supposedly having higher or near equal print runs. As a collector, that matters to me because it means it is more difficult to find those issues. Nobel's estimates, which appear to be good faith praiseworthy efforts btw, are based more on print run estimates than survivability, though he is aware of that factor. He, like you, me, and everyone else, is working with partial data. It is all there is, so if any decisions are made, that is what they have to be based on even if the data is imperfect. Sometimes, when the bomb is about to explode, you run, without worrying first if the light is green.

From what I have seen, in combination with what training I've had in statistics, there is plenty of information available to establish that newsstand editions can be much rarer than direct counterparts, and to estimate what that rarity is. When you have 115 copies of a comic auctioned and none are newsstand comics, you cannot extrapolate that none of the comics in the print run are newsstand comics. However, if you have industry estimates of 2%-1% newsstand comics for any given print run for the period, one can say that 115 auctioned direct and zero auctioned newsstand supports both of those numbers. When you have dozens of examples like that, the sample size is large enough to describe the population of comics in question. For instance, if you look up ten ASM issues in the 600-700 issue range, there are more than ten that will return results that support a 1-2% newsstand figure that have sold more than 100 times. That gives you a sample size of 1000+ to cover 2,000,000 comics, if you assume each of those copies of ASM had 200,000 copies printed. To determine whether those 1000 samples accurately represent the target population of 2m comics at a 99% confidence level with a confidence interval of 4 (meaning the true number will lie between 95%-100%), you would need 1040 samples, which is about what can be found by spending a few hours looking up auctions for those comics. These aren't seat of the pants estimates. They are statistically valid at levels higher than what is needed for pharmaceutical companies to release potentially dangerous drugs on the market.

[paqart]

3 minutes ago, RockMyAmadeus said:

If you have any direct documentation to support all of this, it would be much appreciated. Thank you in advance.

What, you want me to pull out my pay stubs from 1994? Don't be ridiculous. Also, it isn't as if I tape record my conversations with friends. That would be as silly as this request of yours. Besides, why do you want the information? What good would it do you? You can take my word for it or not. If not, it's no skin off my nose but if the information is valuable to you, it might be some skin off yours.

[RockMyAmadeus]

I'm pretty sure I've never seen anyone here say anything other than that newsstand comics from about the mid-90s to the end of newsstand distribution (2013 for Marvel and 2017 for DC) are harder to find/rarer/scarcer/(insert whatever adjective works for someone here) than their Direct market counterparts.

And while availability on the market is useful, it is not conclusive...and that's a very, very important distinction to make. There are factors involved in availability that are frequently not included, or not even known, by people making that argument.

That said, those who publish inaccurate and misleading information and rebuff correction are not operating in "good faith", by definition, regardless of the correctness of their "thrust." I have no right to repeat inaccurate information, regardless of my motives, because inaccurate information can lead people to make decisions that hurt them financially...for which I will be responsible, even if I'm not held to it.

Edited October 9, 2019 by RockMyAmadeus

[RockMyAmadeus]

5 minutes ago, paqart said:

What, you want me to pull out my pay stubs from 1994?

If you have your pay stubs from 1994, that would be wonderful. That's precisely the kind of documentation that is necessary to sort fact from fictitious supposition that has plagued this hobby for many decades. Chuck Rozanski, for all his flaws, has done a relatively good job of keeping documentation going back to the 70s. It's been invaluable.

[RockMyAmadeus]

15 minutes ago, paqart said:

When you have 115 copies of a comic auctioned and none are newsstand comics, you cannot extrapolate that none of the comics in the print run are newsstand comics. However, if you have industry estimates of 2%-1% newsstand comics for any given print run for the period, one can say that 115 auctioned direct and zero auctioned newsstand supports both of those numbers. When you have dozens of examples like that, the sample size is large enough to describe the population of comics in question. For instance, if you look up ten ASM issues in the 600-700 issue range, there are more than ten that will return results that support a 1-2% newsstand figure that have sold more than 100 times. That gives you a sample size of 1000+ to cover 2,000,000 comics, if you assume each of those copies of ASM had 200,000 copies printed. To determine whether those 1000 samples accurately represent the target population of 2m comics at a 99% confidence level with a confidence interval of 4 (meaning the true number will lie between 95%-100%), you would need 1040 samples, which is about what can be found by spending a few hours looking up auctions for those comics. These aren't seat of the pants estimates. They are statistically valid at levels higher than what is needed for pharmaceutical companies to release potentially dangerous drugs on the market.

Our resident statistician, @valiantman can do a far better job at addressing this than I. 

[paqart]

9 minutes ago, RockMyAmadeus said:

If you have your pay stubs from 1994, that would be wonderful

I do, but that isn't the kind of thing I'm willing to post. I also think it is an audacious request on your part. At a certain point your distrust makes no sense and harms your own knowledge. For instance, I know the numbers are accurate because I have direct access. I also know that you don't trust them. That means I have more information than you and I know it for a fact. This makes me suspicious of your claims about Nobel publishing inaccurate information. Speaking of which, what information exactly is inaccurate? From what I saw, he references ComiChron for sales figures and describes how he uses those numbers. Unless he has falsified the ComiChron numbers or used some other method to arrive at his estimates, then he hasn't misrepresented anything. I certainly haven't seen any reason to doubt that he is borrowing ComiChron numbers accurately because what he has written falls within the range of what I've seen on ComiChron. The same is true of his estimates, which he describes as estimates, and which he provides a basis. If the estimate is wrong, that isn't due to any dishonesty in the way the numbers are presented but because either ComiChron's data is faulty or missing data would fill in the picture in such a way that Nobel's numbers could be shown to be wrong. On that subject, I assume they are all wrong because they are estimates. However, they are a lot closer than not having an estimate at all, or an estimate that isn't based on anything. Where are the more accurate numbers you are comparing his numbers to? I would be curious to see them.

[RockMyAmadeus]

53 minutes ago, paqart said:

I do, but that isn't the kind of thing I'm willing to post. I also think it is an audacious request on your part. At a certain point your distrust makes no sense and harms your own knowledge.

"Trust, but verify" is a valuable concept, especially when you're dealing with information that can easily be misused (and has been misused) for personal gain. My request has nothing to do with "distrust" of you; I don't know you, and as you are a person who has made a mere 27 posts in 5 years (half of them in this discussion alone), there's no reason why anyone should take what you say without requesting documentation.

And that's not a slight or an insult: *I'm* a well-known entity on these boards, and I would neither expect, nor be allowed, to make claims for which I was unwilling to provide documentation...rightfully so. And I appreciate that.

53 minutes ago, paqart said:

I also know that you don't trust them.

That's an assumption on your part that isn't justified by the conversation thus far. I am merely asking for proof. 

53 minutes ago, paqart said:

This makes me suspicious of your claims about Nobel publishing inaccurate information. Speaking of which, what information exactly is inaccurate?

Here's an example:

"Although these are estimates (also see: Newsstand Rarity Discussion & Estimates), what this chart above clearly shows, is that what began as a good idea — to start making non-returnable direct edition sales to comic shops in 1979 — absolutely exploded into Marvel’s primary distribution method.  That first year, just ~6% of their total distribution was direct sales to comic shops (and said to be over 10% for more popular titles like X-Men), but by the 1985/1986 time-frame it was an even 50/50 split.  Talk about a successful idea!"

https://rarecomics.wordpress.com/2015/11/08/comic-book-newsstand-editions-understanding-the-difference/

This is inaccurate. The Direct market started in 1973/1974, by Phil Sueling. Why does it matter? Because it doesn't account for the early Direct market experiments that Marvel did, starting in late 1976. If someone reads that and doesn't know the real history of the Direct market, they're going to be confused as to what those books are, and why they exist. And that's not the only concern.

And that may seem to be a minor, insignificant error, but here's why being 100% factually correct is always the goal: if you get something that is obviously incorrect wrong...what have you also gotten wrong that's not as obvious...? If you can't get the little stuff right...why should you be trusted with the big stuff?

Mr. Nobel was made aware of this error over two years ago (see comments at bottom of that article), but he has thus far refused to correct it. 

And that's just one of many. This thread is about "books you just can't find in the wild", so we ought to focus on that, but you asked for proof, so I've provided it.

Edited October 9, 2019 by RockMyAmadeus

[Lazyboy]

3 hours ago, paqart said:

The few data points I have on newsstand rarity come from a combination of Comichron sales estimates and a number of articles I've read on https://rarecomics.wordpress.com/,

Yup. There's the confirmation of what was very obvious.

That site is garbage. The small amount of good information is drowned out by the ocean of misinformation, erroneous assumptions, unbelievably faulty logic, etc.