[jchcollins]

I read most posts, skimmed some, and boy howdy was this was an exhausting thread. Following the OP, we went sarcastic-pissed, then off on extreme legal tangents, and then (I think) actually got back around to talking about grading and alterations.

For what it's worth I will attempt to give my thoughts sans sarcasm, since I don't really have any personal experiences which sting. I've bought from PWCC before, but don't have any particular grudge against them for selling altered cards or dealing with shady consignors or anything like that.

For what it's worth I do think the "Conservation" (tongue-in-cheek) argument is interesting, but as many others have already pointed out - the hobby at large more or less set the bar there years ago, regardless of what PWCC does or does not decide to do for their limited marketplace.

Me personally, I've always been intrigued by the prejudice which seems to be accorded to cards assumed to be altered (trimming, obvious recoloration, etc.) vs. "honest wear" because - yes for some, at least a good deal of the time you can kind of tell - but if you weren't there to personally see how each card got it's wear, how do you really know definitively? You don't. That being said, cards upon which no dishonest work can be physically detected don't bother me. I think it should be left to TPG's and who you personally do or do not trust as to whether or not you believe their opinion on the state of alteration on the card or lack thereof is valid. All of the big TPG's make mistakes. Some think that at least one company among them is knowingly dishonest. All of it comes back around to are YOU happy with the particular example of the particular card, or does it mean more to you what PSA, SGC, BVG, (and then perhaps further qualifed by PWCC) have said or insinuated about the card or not? Because as we all know, what they grade or say is apt to be wildly different even if you submit the same card to each of them.

I've always maintained that it's absurd to think that some "professional" graders can have a valid opinion over and above some veteran hobbyists who have 30-50 or more years in looking at and evaluating vintage cards. At the end of the day what you can get comfortable with is all that matters. I don't particularly care one way or the other about graded cards - I think on the whole it is helpful to buy them that way online so as not to risk getting a creased card that is described as "Excellent" and things like that, but at the end of the day - ALL of this, even down to what PWCC wants to further cloud judgment with, purple stickers and altered vs. conserved, etc. etc. is really just opinion. There never will be a silver bullet for it, unless someone invents a time machine and we can go back and observe the whole, complete and unedited timeline provenance for every single existing baseball card in every collection today. Which of course ain't happening. I think what PWCC is propsing is pretty useless based on the fact that when it comes down to it - there is no way to be 100% certain about anything. Will it soothe collectors / investors already basically willing to look the other way into an easier false sense of security? Sure, and that's unfortunate for those of us who do care. But all of us here today reading this like / enjoy collecting vintage cards at least enough to be ~5% or more unsure about their true state of preservation. If we are being honest, how much leeway is really there - is it that - or more? Because as with just about everything, you can never really know 100% for sure. Taking the technical approach, as someone pointed out earlier - at some point gets so detailed as to be absurd and not consistent with the reasons people collect in the first place. I will be interested to see how much traction tactics like that can get...