Jon Berk collection to be auctioned. 18 18

[Straw-Man]

the real reason i turn a blind eye is i don't care. really. 

[Gotham Kid]

what's " manupilated" ? is that a play or words (that I'm obviously not getting) or do you mean manipulated ?

Edited July 24, 2017 by Gotham Kid

[Robot Man]

1 minute ago, Gotham Kid said:

what's " manupilated" ? is that a play or words (that I'm obviously not getting) or do you mean manipulated ?

Yes, sorry I'm a dumb comic collector...

[Gotham Kid]

8 minutes ago, Robot Man said:

Yes, sorry I'm a dumb comic collector...

No issue. I figured it probably was a new word along the lines of "mannup" or something.

Edited July 24, 2017 by Gotham Kid

[Sqeggs]

13 hours ago, Straw-Man said:

the real reason i turn a blind eye is i don't care. really. 

I thought you were going to get those new glasses? 

[Zolnerowich]

On 7/21/2017 at 6:19 PM, buttock said:

CGC has a massive interest in undergrading books, particularly those with "improvable" defects.  If you owned a business, would you rather have 2800 transactions or 2800 transactions with another 4-500 repeat transactions that use your sister service for even more transactions?   The "point" of CGC varies depending on your perspective.  For a collector it's an objective assessment.  For an employee or owner/investor, the point is to make money.   

Interesting and insightful though disturbing perspective. Such is the way of the world I guess.

[podboy66]

just in from CC...........

Jon, thanks for assembling such an amazing collection, these will be kept safe for a long time!

 

[podboy66]

[podboy66]

[podboy66]

[Larryw7]

4 minutes ago, podboy66 said:

That is a gorgeous cover.

[lou_fine]

4 hours ago, Zolnerowich said:

On 7/21/2017 at 4:19 PM, buttock said:

CGC has a massive interest in undergrading books, particularly those with "improvable" defects.  If you owned a business, would you rather have 2800 transactions or 2800 transactions with another 4-500 repeat transactions that use your sister service for even more transactions?   The "point" of CGC varies depending on your perspective.  For a collector it's an objective assessment.  For an employee or owner/investor, the point is to make money.   

Interesting and insightful though disturbing perspective. Such is the way of the world I guess.

Well, since you only joined the boards in 2016, I guess you missed all the fun when the whole pressing fiasco first came to light back around 2004 to 2005.

Completely unlevel playing field at the time as it became apparent that only a few players such as Matt Nelson, Jason Ewert, and the likes were aware that CGC was allowing certain manipulation of the books to go through as unrestored.  It became very clear that with CGC's unpublished grading standards, they had been allowing "people in the know" or people with the smarts to maximize the potential of their books without bothering to let the general marketplace know about this rather significant change in the then "generally accepted" grading standards prior to CGC starting up in 2000.  Although it should be pointed out that Jason was a bad boy and took it a tad too far in the end and was caught micro-trimming some of his books which was considered to be a no-no.  

Needless to say, after the furor had died down, almost everybody decided to jump onto this pressing boat as it was quite obvious there was a ton of money to be made by juicing up your books and then not disclosing it to the marketplace when it came time to sell them.  Personally, I am quite sure this was part of CCG's game plan right from the get go because why would you as the parent company want to make money on a book only once, when you can make money on it multiple times.  Sad to say, but it's gotten to the point where many of the submittors will now refuse to even think about getting a book graded unless it's gone through the pressing machine first, along with other "fixes" now allowed by CGC as part of their universal unrestored label.  After all, as CGC has clearly demonstrated to us here, it's really all about the money. 

Not to worry though because we've now got the new CGC grading team in place since the middle part of 2016 and now helmed by none other than Mr. Nelson himself, the King of the Pressors and the former owner and operator of CCS.  And for the life of me, I can't figure out why so many board members have been commenting lately that some books are presenting much better than their assigned grades, which certainly was not that common of a comment prior to the new grading team starting up.  Maybe if I pulled a few of these books out of their slabs and hold them up at a certain angle to the light, I might get a clearer idea why.  Almost makes me think that certain near invisible additional revenue generating defects may have moved up a few notches on CGC's Grading Hit Parade with the new team in place? 

Ok, END OF RANT as I believe we are really not supposed to be talking about these unspoken things here.  It's just that there seems to be so many newbies here the past few years who somehow believes we are still living in the days of sweet innocence and wine and roses.  SADLY NOT. 

 

Edited July 25, 2017 by lou_fine

[Zolnerowich]

On 7/25/2017 at 0:28 AM, lou_fine said:

Well, since you only joined the boards in 2016, I guess you missed all the fun when the whole pressing fiasco first came to light back around 2004 to 2005.

Completely unlevel playing field at the time as it became apparent that only a few players such as Matt Nelson, Jason Ewert, and the likes were aware that CGC was allowing certain manipulation of the books to go through as unrestored.  It became very clear that with CGC's unpublished grading standards, they had been allowing "people in the know" or people with the smarts to maximize the potential of their books without bothering to let the general marketplace know about this rather significant change in the then "generally accepted" grading standards prior to CGC starting up in 2000.  Although it should be pointed out that Jason was a bad boy and took it a tad too far in the end and was caught micro-trimming some of his books which was considered to be a no-no.  

Needless to say, after the furor had died down, almost everybody decided to jump onto this pressing boat as it was quite obvious there was a ton of money to be made by juicing up your books and then not disclosing it to the marketplace when it came time to sell them.  Personally, I am quite sure this was part of CCG's game plan right from the get go because why would you as the parent company want to make money on a book only once, when you can make money on it multiple times.  Sad to say, but it's gotten to the point where many of the submittors will now refuse to even think about getting a book graded unless it's gone through the pressing machine first, along with other "fixes" now allowed by CGC as part of their universal unrestored label.  After all, as CGC has clearly demonstrated to us here, it's really all about the money. 

Not to worry though because we've now got the new CGC grading team in place since the middle part of 2016 and now helmed by none other than Mr. Nelson himself, the King of the Pressors and the former owner and operator of CCS.  And for the life of me, I can't figure out why so many board members have been commenting lately that some books are presenting much better than their assigned grades, which certainly was not that common of a comment prior to the new grading team starting up.  Maybe if I pulled a few of these books out of their slabs and hold them up at a certain angle to the light, I might get a clearer idea why.  Almost makes me think that certain near invisible additional revenue generating defects may have moved up a few notches on CGC's Grading Hit Parade with the new team in place? 

Ok, END OF RANT as I believe we are really not supposed to be talking about these unspoken things here.  It's just that there seems to be so many newbies here the past few years who somehow believes we are still living in the days of sweet innocence and wine and roses.  SADLY NOT. 

 

Hi Lou -- thanks for that unadulterated and candid history of comic book grading magicks over the last 10-12 years. Having been on a comics holiday for a couple of decades, up until about 2006, I'd been pretty ignorant about the recent evolution of this hobby. This post of yours is required reading for relative newbies like myself. I appreciate how so many of the boardies here have shared their stories and perspectives on the more sordid aspects (and commercialization) of the funny books. 

[Robot Man]

On July 24, 2017 at 10:28 PM, lou_fine said:

Well, since you only joined the boards in 2016, I guess you missed all the fun when the whole pressing fiasco first came to light back around 2004 to 2005.

Completely unlevel playing field at the time as it became apparent that only a few players such as Matt Nelson, Jason Ewert, and the likes were aware that CGC was allowing certain manipulation of the books to go through as unrestored.  It became very clear that with CGC's unpublished grading standards, they had been allowing "people in the know" or people with the smarts to maximize the potential of their books without bothering to let the general marketplace know about this rather significant change in the then "generally accepted" grading standards prior to CGC starting up in 2000.  Although it should be pointed out that Jason was a bad boy and took it a tad too far in the end and was caught micro-trimming some of his books which was considered to be a no-no.  

Needless to say, after the furor had died down, almost everybody decided to jump onto this pressing boat as it was quite obvious there was a ton of money to be made by juicing up your books and then not disclosing it to the marketplace when it came time to sell them.  Personally, I am quite sure this was part of CCG's game plan right from the get go because why would you as the parent company want to make money on a book only once, when you can make money on it multiple times.  Sad to say, but it's gotten to the point where many of the submittors will now refuse to even think about getting a book graded unless it's gone through the pressing machine first, along with other "fixes" now allowed by CGC as part of their universal unrestored label.  After all, as CGC has clearly demonstrated to us here, it's really all about the money. 

Not to worry though because we've now got the new CGC grading team in place since the middle part of 2016 and now helmed by none other than Mr. Nelson himself, the King of the Pressors and the former owner and operator of CCS.  And for the life of me, I can't figure out why so many board members have been commenting lately that some books are presenting much better than their assigned grades, which certainly was not that common of a comment prior to the new grading team starting up.  Maybe if I pulled a few of these books out of their slabs and hold them up at a certain angle to the light, I might get a clearer idea why.  Almost makes me think that certain near invisible additional revenue generating defects may have moved up a few notches on CGC's Grading Hit Parade with the new team in place? 

Ok, END OF RANT as I believe we are really not supposed to be talking about these unspoken things here.  It's just that there seems to be so many newbies here the past few years who somehow believes we are still living in the days of sweet innocence and wine and roses.  SADLY NOT. 

 

+1 This is what I said earlier. Altering books from their original state is not only acceptable but even encouraged and actually done by a professional grading company and we just go along with it. I guess if it lines our pockets it is just fine...?

[lou_fine]

Since this is the Jon Berk Auction thread, it is important to clarify and note that as far as I know, all of the books from the Jon Berk Collection were simply slabbed and auctioned off as is in their original "natural" state.   

Edited July 26, 2017 by lou_fine