Quote:
Originally Posted by steve B
Unfortunately it also brings the bad guys.
Steve B
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When I first graduated from merely collecting cards each summer to pursuing vintage and beyond back in the late Sixties/early Seventies, my collecting universe consisted of one collector in my home town and a half dozen additional guys around my area. Where there more? Most certainly. Unfortunately, there was no network for communication. This weeded out the casual collector as the activity was sparse and intermittent. It also made collecting a lot tougher for those of us that hung in there.
As the Seventies rolled along, mail order catalogs became part of the landscape. This extended the collector's reach and connected the hobby community a bit more. However, it also attracted mail fraud "jackasses". They could reach enough like-minded people to make it worth their while trawling for innocents. Around the same time, Card Shows came to pass, further solidifying the hobby. 99.9% of the vendors were upstanding guys, most collectors themselves. Again, sadly, the "jackasses" saw this as an opportunity to fleece the innocent. Fakes, trimming, de-creasing and corner reconstruction all found their way into our world. This is when I personally stepped away from the hobby, frustrated.
I watched from the outside as the hobby "hit the big time" and eleventy-two card companies flooded the market place with cards that promised to be an investment opportunity. Citing the values of vintage cards, they postulated that, obviously, their cards would grow in value and the same pace. Gimmicky sparkly cards, intentional short prints, and endless variations led me to believe that the "jackasses" had gone corporate, fleecing the innocent again.
The internet came to be, teethed, learned to walk and grew to what we have today. I took the opportunity to re-enter the hobby. It is the best of times. It is the worst of times. Our collector universe is immense. We communicate and deal with guys all around the country (world). My last five eBay transactions were we fellas in NJ, WI, MI, VA and WA. This many like-minded hobbyists available and the touch of a keyboard is fantastic. Ah, but the "jackasses"....... I have no concept of the monies exchanged on a daily or weekly basis in this hobby but we have certainly have reached the magic number. The pool of collector's cash has attracted not only the low tech "jackasses" but "jackasses" with the finances and technology to screw with us non-stop. The same internet that brought us together as a group of collectors has served as a "barrel" for the "jackasses " to shoot fish in. Fishing must be good. They are here to stay.
Net 54 acts as a safe place for us to circle the wagons and "pick off" the occasional "jackass". For that, Leon, I will voice the group opinion and say "Thank You". Without a site like this, many more "jackasses" would thrive. OK, I am done..........
