Still no underground comix in Overstreet... 0

[oldmilwaukee6er]

14 hours ago, Lazyboy said:

Why would you even care what the outdated, irrelevant OPG does? Seriously.

The answer is actually pretty simple. A regular reference guide is one indicator of a healthy collectible field.

Check out Harry Rinker's writing on the topic- https://www.harryrinker.com/col-1206.html 

Fogel's guide, while pretty comprehensive, is published too sporadically (e.g. 2006, softcover supplement 2010, and 2016). 

A small section in Overstreet would be beneficial to the genre. 

[oldmilwaukee6er]

13 hours ago, Tony S said:

Overstreet doesn't list undergrounds for the same reasons Voldy doesn't grade them....

But I think the direction needed headed is to see Fogel's price guide come out more often. 

Quick question... Voldy as pee gee exx? or other Voldy? The first one has graded UGs (I tried them in 2004). 

And also, yes, Fogel's guide needs a regular publishing schedule. 

[Gambold Vintage]

>A regular reference guide is one indicator of a healthy collectible field.< 

Of course it is, and anyone who proclaims "I've never read an Overstreet Comics guide in my life" or some such nonsense is either just posturing or not a serious collector/dealer.

You don't have to love the OPG, use it much, or even believe in any of its pricing - but to deny that it is a foundational and ongoing part of the comics collecting hobby is just being specious.  And yeah, if you fancy yourself a collector or dealer of comics, you should acquaint yourself with it, because all your competition is. 

Now, what does anyone think of Zap-Kapow? *They* list undergrounds

Edited July 29, 2019 by Gambold

[Lazyboy]

3 hours ago, oldmilwaukee6er said:

The answer is actually pretty simple. A regular reference guide is one indicator of a healthy collectible field.

Check out Harry Rinker's writing on the topic- https://www.harryrinker.com/col-1206.html 

I'll bet those other collecting categories don't/didn't have multiple reference and/or price guide websites that equal or exceed the OPG. I don't see the necessity of a printed book, especially when it sucks at its stated purpose.

3 hours ago, oldmilwaukee6er said:

Fogel's guide, while pretty comprehensive, is published too sporadically (e.g. 2006, softcover supplement 2010, and 2016). 

A small section in Overstreet would be beneficial to the genre. 

There are lots of niches in comics that the OPG does a poor job (at best) of covering, but they still exist.

[Gambold Vintage]

>I'll bet those other collecting categories don't/didn't have multiple reference and/or price guide websites <

You'll need to list the one(s) you think are better, to support your contention that OPG is "outdated and irrelevant"  and "sucks at its stated purpose."

Granted, OPG is not an immediate, what-happened-yesterday price guide. But then how many of these online sites are either, for the vast majority of vintage (pre-modern) books?  

Auction results are useful generally if you are buying slabbed keys - and the OPG is not a reference guide for slabbed prices, I think we all know that.  Slabs are a WHOLE OTHER discussion. 

OPG provides a good overall look at the hobby - what's available, what is worth buying, and what it went for in the past year. For 95% of the books out there, the pricing is going to be pretty accurate. It certainly will be the source your friendly neighborhood con dealer is going to use, when you start haggling with him over a reader's copy of Sensation Comics 109. 

Edited July 29, 2019 by Gambold

[dupont2005]

10 hours ago, Gambold said:

>A regular reference guide is one indicator of a healthy collectible field.< 

Of course it is, and anyone who proclaims "I've never read an Overstreet Comics guide in my life" or some such nonsense is either just posturing or not a serious collector/dealer.

You don't have to love the OPG, use it much, or even believe in any of its pricing - but to deny that it is a foundational and ongoing part of the comics collecting hobby is just being specious.  And yeah, if you fancy yourself a collector or dealer of comics, you should acquaint yourself with it, because all your competition is. 

Now, what does anyone think of Zap-Kapow? *They* list undergrounds

What does Overstreet provide that the internet doesn’t provide more accurately and free?

I think anyone who collects comics is a collector. I won’t bother telling you how “serious” I am at it, because I do it for fun. Saying someone who doesn’t buy Overstreet isn’t as good a collector as someone who does is like saying someone who doesn’t buy Auto Trader can’t possibly be as into cars as someone who does.

[Gambold Vintage]

Well I didn't say BUY it, I said "acquaint yourself with it."  

>What does Overstreet provide that the internet doesn’t provide more accurately and free?<

I'm still waiting for someone, anyone, to actually list a website that they feel does a better job at reporting current market prices on collector comics than Overstreet.

 Let's have a link, please!

 

[comicwiz]

20 hours ago, oldmilwaukee6er said:

Quick question... Voldy as pee gee exx? or other Voldy?

CBCS doesn't grade UG's. It's a very unusual stance which has been questioned from the time the company came into existence. Very recently (like less than two weeks ago) they announced you can get signatures verified without grading, and someone asked if this could be done with undergrounds that were signed even before CGC existed, and they never replied. It is what it is.

Edited July 30, 2019 by comicwiz

[comicwiz]

 

On 7/29/2019 at 10:01 AM, oldmilwaukee6er said:

The answer is actually pretty simple. A regular reference guide is one indicator of a healthy collectible field.

 

11 hours ago, Gambold said:

I'm still waiting for someone, anyone, to actually list a website that they feel does a better job at reporting current market prices on collector comics than Overstreet. 

One of my hobbies is collecting Star Wars toys. Up until last year, there hadn't really been a printed price guide put out in forEVAR. And while the Overstreet Guide for Star Wars was well done, it isn't an annual publication to my knowledge. Even with this, collectors had the same pov on it's merit, because they've all become accustomed to using a dartboard method, with all the numbers on the dartboard being inflated. Even with sales happening on Facebook, every outlier sale becomes the new normal, and rarer stuff sells at a premium. A prototype rocket Fett recently sold at Hakes for $112K.

To me, feeBay needs to be used with extreme caution. There are numerous instances where it reports an item to have sold at the BIN price, without needing to peel back layers to find the actual accepted offer price. And with the majority of sales happening on feeBay's P2P "trading community" being BIN's, the trend seems to be one where they want to make it next to impossible for people to mine accepted offers, because frankly it makes their selling platform show weaker results. For slabs, GPA is simply not very useful when I have to refer to past sales from over 1 year, and with big money UG's that don't change hands as frequently, I'd much rather have a value from an annual printed guide.

Now back to the topic at hand, one of the things that is important to understand is that CGC did decide to grade UG's early on (I was one of the first submitters) because Mark Haspel persuaded Steve to do it. They handled nearly all submissions using Jay's guide, except for the undocumentated books with characteristics which hadn't been included in Jay's guide. Then there was material that Jay did not have a comfort level in sharing openly - one such example was the very low print run Adventures of Jesus by Frank Stack which was printed by Gilbert Shelton (copied at the U of Texas law library). Even though CGC wouldn't grade such a book because they claim not to know the difference between a copy or mimeographed publication, Jay was the only person believed to be able to distinguish between one of the 50 copies Shelton made, and later printed copies.

Those who continue to talk about Overstreet's relevance in the age of the internet don't realize that the notations CGC uses are taken from the OSPG. These days when a new movie is announced and/or new characters films are reveaed through -------------script announcements, people use Google images or feeBay to determine that characters first appearance, and the way they do it is to verify using a CGC graded comic which mentions that information on the label. I always felt that this "comfort level" with relying on the OSPG as CGC has done, served to the detriment of the publication over the long-term, especially when people get amnesia over how well it's served as a foundational resource for our hobby for nearly 50 years. I mention all this because in some ways the knowledge I've attained in determining prints (including those not documented in Jay's guide) is a specialized knowledge and I do feel indebted to Jay for the work he did, particularly when it was done, and would hate to see a grader monetize it without his estate/heirs making a cent from it. I may be in the minority with this opinion, but this is something that any publisher would have to get right in order for it to be done annually and get my support.

I'd even be happy with something that lists the top 100 underground comix based on year after year performance, with a grade breakdown that mimics the OSPG's current layout, and maybe one additional column for highest price attained that year (with listed grade). It could be a start to work towards something more comprehensive, but if it doesn't happen, I'm not one to put too much thought into the lack of a guide signifyiing the overall health of a collectible field, as the hobbies I'm in that have been without one for over 40 years are doing better than ever.

Edited July 30, 2019 by comicwiz

[Gambold Vintage]

Great post, thanks!

Still waiting for the detractors to post a link with an onsite resource they feel does a better job that OPG on reporting values. 

It's easier to knock something than to promote something, isn't it?

 

 

[comicwiz]

Timing couldn't be better - exhibit A of why eBay is more than ever heading toward very shaky ground as far as an online pricing tool!

 

[dupont2005]

On 7/29/2019 at 8:07 PM, Gambold said:

Well I didn't say BUY it, I said "acquaint yourself with it."  

>What does Overstreet provide that the internet doesn’t provide more accurately and free?<

I'm still waiting for someone, anyone, to actually list a website that they feel does a better job at reporting current market prices on collector comics than Overstreet.

 Let's have a link, please!

 

eBay completed listings for raw, census for slabbed

[dupont2005]

On 7/30/2019 at 6:59 AM, comicwiz said:

Timing couldn't be better - exhibit A of why eBay is more than ever heading toward very shaky ground as far as an online pricing tool!

 

eBay sales can be manufactured, eBay may not be perfect for researching sold BIN’s with offers, but Overstreet has never printed a realistic value on anything I’ve ever collected. I’d still say odds are in favor of eBay completed listings. 

 

How many known fraudsters have been Overstreet contributors throughout the years?

[comicwiz]

12 minutes ago, dupont2005 said:

How many known fraudsters have been Overstreet contributors throughout the years?

I'm sure I'm not alone in the view that this is something that's in need of addressing. I don't have a solution on how to do it though, unless it's something approached in a collective manner by more than a few people that want to get the riff raff out.

That said, the number of people you refer to is dwarfed by the amount of unscrupulous, shady, and downright illegal activity that is allowed to happen on feeBay. If we were to compare one with the other (which would be crude at best), I doubt their input, if any, has any influence or effect on the way values are reported. Comparatively, the amount of shill bidding, price fxing (both by sellers, and most recently, seemingly with feeBay's penchant for hiding accepted offers) and other forms of manipulative activity have, and continue to skew, reporting and final sales data on feeBay, with a negative trickling effect on third-party sites that use this data. 

I can't overlook the very shaky ground feeBay is on right now with them falsely reporting values on listings where a best offer has been enabled, and choosing to show the item sold for full BIN price, rather than the accepted offer. Christie's and Sotheby's were heavily fined in 2002 for essentially the same thing.

Edited July 31, 2019 by comicwiz

[Gambold Vintage]

>eBay completed listings for raw, census for slabbed<

The CGC census lists values?  That's news to me. Here's the census for Action Comics 2, with its great cover. I'm not seeing any pricing in the Census.

https://www.cgccomics.com/census/grades_standard.asp?title=Action+Comics&issue=2&publisher=D.C.+Comics&year=1938&issuedate=7/38

As for E-Bay, I'm not sure I would trust E-Bay to wash my car, much less give me an accurate report on the comics market. In any event, good luck trying to find specific titles and grades, especially of less-sold issues. 

[PopKulture]

I bought a small stack of undergrounds years ago at a postcard and paper show of all places. My experience with undergrounds back in the day was pretty much limited to the Freak Brothers, which I adored, from that counter-culture vibe to the intricate Shelton linework. Having dug these up recently,  I was wondering which ones those of you with more knowledge think worthy of keeping front and center (the rest will probably go back into a big box in storage). 

Are any of these historically significant or noteworthy in your collective opinion?

Just for reference, these were the ones I was more immediately drawn to (I know because I had separated them) when I first purchased them many years ago, either for the Crumb angle, the absurd cover, the seemingly earlier edition, etc.:

Thanks!!!  

[comicwiz]

Here's an anecdotal example to illustrate the manner UG's are overlooked, take from it what you will. Yesterday I watched a Netflix produced television series on a subject that interests me - it mainly covers toys made for the North American consumer market. The series is called The Toys that Made Us. Episode one for season 3 covers Laird and Eastman's Ninja Turtles. I've never really had more than a tepid interest for this toy line, however in one of the early photos of Kevin Eastman, he is seen surrounded by UG comix and mags. I found that part of the segment a bit puzzling since they show this photo and then he talks about the influence comics had on him. I always welcome anyone mentioning Kirby as an influence, but to show that image and not even mention the apparent influence Corben, and even more so, the underground comix movement had on the alternative and independent publishing scene and the eventual formation of Mirage Studios was disappointing. I'm sure the folks who produced this will chalk it up to an editing decision that was absent of historical context, or that it was a choice to cater to a PG 13 audience - it is what it is, but just one of the modern day examples of how missed opportunities, giving the artists and scene the respect it deserves, still occur to this day.  Figured I'd show some love anyway, and one of the comics on the back wall I outlined/highlighted is one of my favourite Corben covers - Up From The Deep #1

 

Edited December 8, 2019 by comicwiz