OT: EBay Reps Meet With Dealers/Sellers At 2018 National

[thetruthisoutthere]

From Rich Mueller, the editor of Sports Collectors Daily:

https://www.sportscollectorsdaily.com/ebay-reps-meeting-collectors-dealers-at-nscc/


And my follow-up thread:

https://live.autographmagazine.com/profiles/blogs/ebay-representatives-meet-with-dealers-sellers-at-2018-national-c

[mr2686]

Great thread Chris. EBAY's concern for the customer and authenticity is a sham indeed.

[thetruthisoutthere]

Great thread Chris. EBAY's concern for the customer and authenticity is a sham indeed.

Thank you, Mike.

In my opinion, Ebay is the primary enabler of the "Florida" forgeries.

It's amazing that Ebay can lie with a straight face when they say "Authentication at eBay in general, and not just this category, is near and dear to our hearts,” she said. “It’s a huge priority for us.”

[btcarfagno]

That guy from eBay comes off as a clown in search of a circus.

[thetruthisoutthere]

That guy from eBay comes off as a clown in search of a circus.

That's funny, Tom!!!

[SetBuilder]

You guys are wasting your time. Trying to stop the forgers is a never ending game of whack-a-mole. They just pop up again with a different account and a different COA.

The real solution is for people to stop buying their goods. They're in business because there is demand for what they sell. Once people become aware that 90% of autographs are fake, demand will drop, and they'll be out of business.

The only real way to get the forgers to disappear is for buyers to become educated on the signatures they buy and to be more skeptical.

Let's face it, most experienced collectors on this forum will never buy one of those shady autographs. It's only novices that buy them.

I've never seen a marketing campaign aimed at increasing awareness of forgeries. Very few autograph buyers even know forums like this exist. Why is that?

It's like the war on drugs. Everyone knows it's pointless to try to stop the supply. Look how that's worked out in the real world. Stop one druglord, and the next one is waiting to take his place. The real way to stop the drug cartels is for people to stop doing drugs. You stop the problem by shutting off the demand, not trying to stop the supply. If someone is willing to die to sell a bag of drugs, there isn't much of a deterrent that can stop them.

[RichardSimon]

You guys are wasting your time. Trying to stop the forgers is a never ending game of whack-a-mole. They just pop up again with a different account and a different COA.

The real solution is for people to stop buying their goods. They're in business because there is demand for what they sell. Once people become aware that 90% of autographs are fake, demand will drop, and they'll be out of business.

The only real way to get the forgers to disappear is for buyers to become educated on the signatures they buy and to be more skeptical.

Let's face it, most experienced collectors on this forum will never buy one of those shady autographs. It's only novices that buy them.

I've never seen a marketing campaign aimed at increasing awareness of forgeries. Very few autograph buyers even know forums like this exist. Why is that?

It's like the war on drugs. Everyone knows it's pointless to try to stop the supply. Look how that's worked out in the real world. Stop one druglord, and the next one is waiting to take his place. The real way to stop the drug cartels is for people to stop doing drugs. You stop the problem by shutting off the demand, not trying to stop the supply. If someone is willing to die to sell a bag of drugs, there isn't much of a deterrent that can stop them.

Nancy Reagan said "Just say no." How's that working out?
Aside from forums like this what can be done to stop people from buying forgeries?

[steve B]

Nancy Reagan said "Just say no." How's that working out?
Aside from forums like this what can be done to stop people from buying forgeries?


Forums like this are probably the best chance. And being successful at squashing this stuff is probably not going to happen.


Education about what someone collects is the key, and places like this are probably the best place to get it for most of us. I'm sort of interested, and have a few autographs I feel confident in, but all fairly cheap stuff. I test myself against the questions here, and on some of the more popular ones I'm only at maybe 50% after a few years. Not good enough for me to spend real money on.


A serious reduction in demand overall wouldn't be good for anyone, (except may be me since everything would be cheap) That's why there's no marketing campaign.
Imagine a tv ad starting out showing a bunch of nice looking autographed items, while the voiceover says " Autographs, they can be really great, and display well. They're a nice personal connection to the player in some ways... but you know what? All the nice looking stuff we've just shown along with nearly every autograph you'll see is complete rubbish! Just look at them, they're awful. Displaying them is basically displaying you're stupidity and gullibility, why would you do that.... spend a few years learning stuff before you buy pretty junk, please?"

Yeah, that would go over well...…

[steve B]

Now a public service announcement like this one.... That might just work.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ksjdH3z_KU

[thetruthisoutthere]

You guys are wasting your time. Trying to stop the forgers is a never ending game of whack-a-mole. They just pop up again with a different account and a different COA.

The real solution is for people to stop buying their goods. They're in business because there is demand for what they sell. Once people become aware that 90% of autographs are fake, demand will drop, and they'll be out of business.

The only real way to get the forgers to disappear is for buyers to become educated on the signatures they buy and to be more skeptical.

Let's face it, most experienced collectors on this forum will never buy one of those shady autographs. It's only novices that buy them.

I've never seen a marketing campaign aimed at increasing awareness of forgeries. Very few autograph buyers even know forums like this exist. Why is that?

It's like the war on drugs. Everyone knows it's pointless to try to stop the supply. Look how that's worked out in the real world. Stop one druglord, and the next one is waiting to take his place. The real way to stop the drug cartels is for people to stop doing drugs. You stop the problem by shutting off the demand, not trying to stop the supply. If someone is willing to die to sell a bag of drugs, there isn't much of a deterrent that can stop them.

I've been exposing forgeries and sellers of forgeries for a long, long time and I would like to think that I've made a small impact on the forgery industry, and at times I have asked myself "Why do I continue to do this?"

And I always come up with the same reply which is "I simply cannot just sit on the sidelines and do nothing."

There are a few people in the hobby (Richard Simon, Shelly, Steve Z., Terrier, Steve Cyrkin and others) who have stuck their necks out exposing the bad guys.

And at considerable risk to us.

I have literally written over a thousand threads/blogs on the forgery industry.

The majority of them have been directed at Coach's Corner (Scott Malack and Lee Trythall), Chris "I Never Saw An Autograph I Didn't Like" Morales, Ted Taylor (who I have deep, deep disdain for), Drew Max, Stephen Rocchi (Guaranteed Forensic Authenticators), the old GAI and others.

It is "my time that I am wasting," not yours.

[earlywynnfan]

Chris, do you mean the new GAI? I thought Global was respectable at first, then sold their souls like Ted Taylor later on. Or is there some newer incarnation of GAI that I'm unaware of?

And shouldn't Justin Priddy/ACE be on your list, or is he small potatoes?

Ken

[drcy]

Chris, do you mean the new GAI? I thought Global was respectable at first, then sold their souls like Ted Taylor later on. Or is there some newer incarnation of GAI that I'm unaware of?

And shouldn't Justin Priddy/ACE be on your list, or is he small potatoes?

Ken

GAI originally was good, then went downhill. They even split into two different GAIs, but that may have just been for cards.

[thetruthisoutthere]

Chris, do you mean the new GAI? I thought Global was respectable at first, then sold their souls like Ted Taylor later on. Or is there some newer incarnation of GAI that I'm unaware of?

And shouldn't Justin Priddy/ACE be on your list, or is he small potatoes?

Ken

Ken, I was referring to the old GAI when they "authenticated" thousands of Mantle, Williams, DiMaggio, Koufax, Mays, etc. forgeries in an attempt to avoid bankruptcy.

Those forgeries were also the "Florida" forgeries.

I have also exposed the garbage that GA "authenticated."