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POLL - Should GEEzusWalks be removed from the Probation List over the objection of the nominator, Columbia Comics?
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Should GEEzusWalks be removed from the Probation List over the objection of the nominator, Columbia Comics?  

106 members have voted

  1. 1. Should GEEzusWalks be removed from the Probation List over the objection of the nominator, Columbia Comics?

    • Yes: I support removing GEEzusWalks from the Probation List.
      44
    • No: I oppose removing GEEzusWalks from the Probation List.
      62

This poll is closed to new votes

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  • Poll closed on 07/23/2019 at 03:00 AM

208 posts in this topic

2 minutes ago, F For Fake said:

I might be more inclined to agree with you if @GEEzusWalks was themselves raising this stink. As it stands, it's not like the seller is lobbying to be removed. There are people arguing on his behalf, but he is strangely quiet. Personally, that feels like "Ok, I'm caught, let's just make this go away." If they truly felt wronged, I'm sure they'd be in here lobbying along with you. I suppose it's true that a bad precedent could be set either way. As it stands, I'm inclined to side with the Probation Worthy side. If a seller wants to pull shenanigans, there are plenty of places to do so. But the boards have been heavy policed, and therefore honest, as long as I have been here. If we're on a slippery slope, I'd prefer it be on the side of being overly cautious.

That's a very good point. I am more inclined to give the benefit of the doubt if the history is clean, but I think there is merit to this as well. 

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1 minute ago, RockMyAmadeus said:
48 minutes ago, thunsicker said:

but I've alway thought that the Probation List should be used for monetary torts.  People not shipping books and not refunding.  People not paying for books.  Look, I like Brock and have no idea who GEEzusWalks is, but I don't think that's how the PL should be used

I tend to agree, and would go even a step further: even people not paying for books doesn't necessarily damage the seller. Obviously, there are exceptions. Yes, it's a pain...but the PL has become far too powerful a tool to be put on just because a transaction didn't happen.

Not being able to get something you agreed to buy sucks...granted. And such activity should be highly discouraged. 

But using the Probation List solely because you didn't get something you want, if you're not out any money,is just a bit over the line. 

the virtues of our members, we write upon the sand,

their faults upon the stones of eternal memory.

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55 minutes ago, F For Fake said:

I might be more inclined to agree with you if @GEEzusWalks was themselves raising this stink. As it stands, it's not like the seller is lobbying to be removed. There are people arguing on his behalf, but he is strangely quiet. Personally, that feels like "Ok, I'm caught, let's just make this go away." If they truly felt wronged, I'm sure they'd be in here lobbying along with you. I suppose it's true that a bad precedent could be set either way. As it stands, I'm inclined to side with the Probation Worthy side. If a seller wants to pull shenanigans, there are plenty of places to do so. But the boards have been heavy policed, and therefore honest, as long as I have been here. If we're on a slippery slope, I'd prefer it be on the side of being overly cautious.

Very good points made.  For the record (even though this is a private poll), I voted for him to stay on the list, even though I would have had reservations about placing him on to begin with, which I explained at length, somewhat long-windedly HERE, and which I won't necessarily go into detail again in this thread.  Also for the record, despite my ridicuously large number of transactions here over the years, I'm 99% sure I've never dealt with either party (which is astounding, given the number of deals I've done from both buyer and seller ends), so I have no agenda or skin in the game here,

In short, for anyone who hadn't read my thoughts posted at that link already (and who don't go and read what I wrote then), this is very much a circumstancial case.  If this were a criminal trial, would the burden of "reasonable doubt" have been reached as to whether the seller had pulled some shenanigans?  I think so, but I do see the viewpoint that, even if I might think it's a fishy story, the seller's claims as to the chain of events could be the truth.  Only he knows 100% for certain, and while his seemingly flippant attitude towards the situtation adds to the idea that he is guilty of what he's been accused of, it's not proof in itself of that.

The parts of FFF's comments I bolded were to emphasize that, as I believe I said in my linked commentary, this is so unusual from almost every case that has been brought up for the probation list in the time I've been here (and in ten years, there have been a lot of them), so there's legitimate reason to debate and discuss rationally whether bad precedent is being set by not putting him on/taking him off or by putting him on initially (as I stated there as an example, a very well-regarded dealer, with a ridiculously good reputation in the hobby, once couldn't find a book I bought from them, and promptly refunded me.  I completely understood and believed their explanation entirely, and I have done business with them since and would highly recommend them to anyone -- showing my faith in their account of what happened -- but by some of the logic that's been used here, I could have brought them up for a PL nomination, as they're a member of the boards.  If I had, the PL nomination would have been laughed off entirely, mainly due to their sterling rep, so it's not always solely the facts that are in play -- reputations, past behaviors, etc. can all be a factor as well.)  I worry that losing a book = a permanent spot on the PL is way too harsh, because it can obviously happen to the best of sellers (as in my example), but as FFF said, erring on the side of caution for the betterment of the community is not the worst thing to be doing here.  My own opinion is that every case is different, and any future case of a "lost" book would have to be looked at separately under its own merits, and whatever decision is made here should not be an all-encompassing guideline for potential future cases that would be similar in nature.

crassus made some outstanding points in the other thread over in the PL forum which I thought were worth quoting here for anyone voting.

21 minutes ago, crassus said:

I would like to add to this a few things about precedents.

First, while personally I am happy to hear CC is willing to be guided by the poll results, it needs to be remembered that the poll results, either way, would only be valid because he has agreed to accept them as a resolution. As the rules currently stand, CC is within his rights to keep the seller on the list.

It is an open question what precedent would be set either way by this resort to a poll, but imo it would not be setting any dangerous precedent against the existing rules. Assuming CC's assent to the poll, whatever the result of the vote, it would represent only another form of mediation, which the rules allow and encourage. 

Second, (and I mean this as an elaboration, not necessarily a criticism, of Newshane's point) the seller is not on the PL simply because he claimed to have lost a book. He is on the PL because of how he has followed up on that claim vis a vis the buyer. 

What also raises concern vis a vis precedent is the idea that a full and prompt refund does not necessarily end a transaction (or void obligations) with finality.

Does a full and prompt refund necessarily void all other circumstances?

The final point to make here is "What does remaining on the PL mean, if that's what ends up happening?"  As has been pointed out, the seller can continue to do transactions here, run sales threads, claim books, etc.  CGC and the moderators here do not enforce the PL, as it's a community-enforced endeavor to protect and educate buyers and sellers.  There have been instances in the past that I can remember people who were nominated to the PL (and even the HOS) publicly posted as an act of defiance of their inclusion that people were still buying/selling to them privately (I think it was either solarcadet1 or Symbiotic -- both HOS members -- who did so, though my memory is fuzzy on the offenders.  I know it's happened before, though.), so clearly the list is not always the final word.  For my own ends, I don't buy from people on the list, nor do I sell to them (per my sales thread rules), and I have a personal list of people that I have on ignore for specific bad behaviors I've witnessed who are on my "personal lists".  Continued inclusion on the list won't stop the seller from continuing to do business here (though it will curtail his potential base), and removal won't magically make suspicious people suddenly start doing business with him again, due to their own personal lists, so that's something to be kept in mind.

Whether you vote for keeping him on the list or not (or whether you believed he belonged in the first place), the discussion here has been healthy (and cordial), important since this was a far more unusual case than almost all of the PL cases that come up.  It would be better for the discussion if the seller chimed in more in their own defense -- the lack of doing so has been telling, IMO, and it certainly has damaged their cause.

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4 minutes ago, ChiSoxFan said:

as I stated there as an example, a very well-regarded dealer, with a ridiculously good reputation in the hobby, once couldn't find a book I bought from them, and promptly refunded me

Did they destroy all evidence of the book and pics though?  If I "lost" a book I would keep pics for sure in case it showed up somewhere hey thats my book.  No functioning person would lose a $1000 book-which could mean it was stolen-then destroy all pics of the book when that would be their only hope of one day getting it back.  Also, deleting the pic from this forum does not "save up space" on someone's computer.  If someone says and does completely the opposite of what someone would actually do if their story was true in a situation, you have to strongly suspect they are lying.

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30 minutes ago, ChiSoxFan said:

The final point to make here is "What does remaining on the PL mean, if that's what ends up happening?"  As has been pointed out, the seller can continue to do transactions here, run sales threads, claim books, etc.  CGC and the moderators here do not enforce the PL, as it's a community-enforced endeavor to protect and educate buyers and sellers.

It would exclude them from participation in the Gift Exchange and Holiday Raffle... at least as the rules for those two events state.

I know @GEEzusWalks has participated in both events in the past (without problems) and even though this should be another reason for them to communicate more on their own behalf when it comes to removal from the PL, it might also give members a reason to pause when considering whether a member should be placed on the probation list without any way for them to be removed other than the offended party to say, "You're Free".

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14 minutes ago, ChiSoxFan said:

[A]s I stated there as an example, a very well-regarded dealer, with a ridiculously good reputation in the hobby, once couldn't find a book I bought from them, and promptly refunded me.

 

5 minutes ago, kav said:

Did they destroy all evidence of the book and pics though?  If I "lost" a book I would keep pics for sure in case it showed up somewhere hey thats my book.  No functioning person would lose a $1000 book-which could mean it was stolen-then destroy all pics of the book when that would be their only hope of one day getting it back.  Also, deleting the pic from this forum does not "save up space" on someone's computer.  If someone says and does completely the opposite of what someone would actually do if their story was true in a situation, you have to strongly suspect they are lying.

It was an eBay listing.  There was a record of it for a while, but that record is gone.  I looked back through my purchase history on eBay when I typed up that post in the PL forum and couldn't find the transaction (possibly because it's been prior to 2017 -- that's as far back as I can see anything in my own purchase history).  It's a dealer who does regular shows, and who has a website.  If I wasn't 100% a believer in this dealer's repuatation, both from my dealings with them in the past (and after the fact), and from their reputation with others, I could have claimed they sold the book at a show for more money shortly after I bought the book off of eBay. no?  The book, while not a major key, wasn't a common nor cheap book (it was a graded book that, if memory serves correctly, only 16 copies grade higher than the one I wanted to buy, and it's a book that has a GPA of $400-$500, so it's not only an uncommon book to see for sale in grade -- a quick check now shows not a single "major" dealer has the book graded in stock in the grade I had tried to purchase this copy in -- but it's easliy one that could have had a buyer at a show jump at it at an escalated price from what I hit the BIN on eBay for -- I did buy the book, IIRC, on a weekend, so the dealer could certainly have been at a show,).

Since I'm guessing you didn't read my linked commentary from the PL forum, the dealer in question didn't know themselves what had happened to the book.  They reasoned they might have sold it at a show, or it could have sold off of their website, and their eBay store simply had erroneously not been updated -- but they 100% could not say for certain what had happened to the book, other than it wasn't it their possession (and therefore, was "lost", for lack of better wording). Using my non-hypothetical example, would you say they would have been worthy of a PL nomination here?  Genuinely curious. hm

And for the record, said dealer was extremely apologetic, offered a discount on a future purchase (which I never took them up on, because I completely believed their account of the events and I didn't want to punish them for an honest mistake).  But as I said above, I think not every case is black-and-white, but dependent on a lot of other circumstances -- in this case, this seller has a reputation that left me feeling that nothing nefarious was going on.  In this seller's instance, there's enough questions that have been raised that make me doubt the seller's account of the situation (he likely would have been on my "Won't buy from him" personal list, even if he weren't on the PL currently).  The point I believe I made above -- and I'll repeat -- is that inclusion on the PL for this particular seller should not mean that "I can't find the book" means a future seller should automatically be put on the PL, even if they issue a refund, nor should removal from the PL list (if Brock agreed to it and the poll called for it -- as Robert stated, the decision by way the PL list is run is solely Brock's call, no matter what any poll says) be a sign to sellers that they can back out of an agreed upon deal if they don't like the price simply by refunding the money and claiming to have lost the book.  Any future situation would have to be looked upon on its own merits. 

What happened in my own experience is apples and oranges to this one, but was brought up as an example to people who've claimed it's "impossible" to lose a book shortly after it sells to show that it can happen, even to the best of sellers (even if it's extremely rare).  

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2 minutes ago, ChiSoxFan said:

Using my non-hypothetical example, would you say they would have been worthy of a PL nomination here?  Genuinely curious. hm

No.  They did not "cover their tracks" like GeeWhiz

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30 minutes ago, ChiSoxFan said:

Using my non-hypothetical example, would you say they would have been worthy of a PL nomination here?  Genuinely curious. hm

 

28 minutes ago, kav said:

No.  They did not "cover their tracks" like GeeWhiz

Just to play Devil's Advocate, as the "buyer", my argument is my example when you say that is this: My contention is they didn't pull the book from their show stock when it sold on eBay, waiting to see if they could get more there for it.  When it did sell at [Insert show here] for more money than they had it listed on eBay, they contacted me to say they couldn't find it.  They didn't need to cover their tracks -- their buyer, I'm contending, is not another dealer, nor is it someone who participates in the registry, so the serial number won't ever show up again in the near future most likely.

Still no PL nomination then?  IMO, you'd certainly be getting into a "he said, he said" type of situation in that case, and it while it's clearly different than the current situation up for debate, there is a line between the two that would begin to get fuzzy -- going back to my original contention that every PL situation is going to be different, and while a lot of PL nominations are clear black-and-white affairs, some are greyer in tone.  This one falls in the latter -- and that's my belief even with my stated opinion that 1) the seller here on the boards has a story that raises all of my red flags for numerous reasons and 2) I voted to leave him on the PL. 

ETA:  In my own situation, if a similar one were to come up, I would say "no" to a PL nomination, so in that, I'm agreeing with kav.  One instance shows behavior far more suspicious, or "provable" than the other, and therefore, IMO, carries far more weight.  I'm just interested in where opinions are where those lines are drawn where one explanation goes from "reasonable" to "not believable".  In any case, discussion on it, as I stated before, is healthy.

Edited by ChiSoxFan
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I chose no. I understand the arguments being made in favor of removing him, but I hold the sales area on these boards in the highest regard. The sellers here are the best sellers. They list items accurately and honestly. They fix problems. They package well. This is my favorite place to shop and the first place I look. The VCC is what got me to join the boards in the first place. I suspect GEE regretted the sale and lied to get out of it. I think that should warrant a warning label of sorts

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24 minutes ago, ChiSoxFan said:

 

Just to play Devil's Advocate, as the "buyer", my argument is my example when you say that is this: My contention is they didn't pull the book from their show stock when it sold on eBay, waiting to see if they could get more there for it.  When it did sell at [Insert show here] for more money than they had it listed on eBay, they contacted me to say they couldn't find it.  They didn't need to cover their tracks -- their buyer, I'm contending, is not another dealer, nor is it someone who participates in the registry, so the serial number won't ever show up again in the near future most likely.

Still no PL nomination then?  IMO, you'd certainly be getting into a "he said, he said" type of situation in that case, and it while it's clearly different than the current situation up for debate, there is a line between the two that would begin to get fuzzy -- going back to my original contention that every PL situation is going to be different, and while a lot of PL nominations are clear black-and-white affairs, some are greyer in tone.  This one falls in the latter -- and that's my belief even with my stated opinion that 1) the seller here on the boards has a story that raises all of my red flags for numerous reasons and 2) I voted to leave him on the PL. 

ETA:  In my own situation, if a similar one were to come up, I would say "no" to a PL nomination, so in that, I'm agreeing with kav.  One instance shows behavior far more suspicious, or "provable" than the other, and therefore, IMO, carries far more weight.  I'm just interested in where opinions are where those lines are drawn where one explanation goes from "reasonable" to "not believable".  In any case, discussion on it, as I stated before, is healthy.

Book has disappeared, pics have all disappeared, seller has disappeared-everything has disappeared nothing to see here folks-this thing is like an onions, as george costanza would say.

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3 hours ago, ExNihilo said:

I can also understand removing pictures from the board because once you believe an item to be sold, you might as well remove the photos so anyone quickly scrolling through your sales thread will know the item is gone.

Absolutely valid. Except this was not the reason given.

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