Posted By:
Marc S.<<If people are encouraged to alter cards, this will increase the amount of altered material that is out there, and some of this will end up being sold as un-altered.>>
Two points I think you are ignoring. First -- restoring a card to very nice shape is an expensive and time-consuming process.
Second -- there is a big difference between card restoration and trimming (IMHO). With trimming, there is much less of the card there, which presents a problem. In comic books -- I don't think anyone cuts off the borders of the pages because they show some wear. Re-coloring, adding fibers, erasure, crease removal are all forms of restoration that keep all of the original card there.
I think most advanced collectors avoid trimmed cards -- you can't turn a VG/EX card into a NM/MT one without trimming away most of the border -- and then what are you left with? Something ugly that doesn't represent anything close to what it was supposed to originally.