[thecatspajamas]

I think Heritage's biggest mistake in all this is not in writing the copy for the auction catalog ahead of time, but rather in letting people view the "work in progress" with the expectation that they would understand that it was not finalized. There seems to be a pretty broad misunderstanding that every word in the preview is to be taken the same as the finalized catalog.

I have no doubt that writing up the descriptions ahead of time for hundreds of items as having full LOAs from autenticators, with the anticipation of that being the case, is a common practice with auction houses. After all, who wants to go back and re-work the description of EVERY autographed item sold in an auction? By "pulling back the curtain" to let bidders see the catalog as it is being formed though, they are inviting headaches of this sort. If they feel the headaches are worth it for the additional exposure for their consignors' items, that's their decision, but they should either take the additional measures that have been discussed here as well as add big glaring notices that this is only a preview (subject to change) and not the finalized catalog. That way, if/when someone does a screen capture of the preview, the notice would appear big and bold to put the write-up in its proper context.

Incidentally, this is why I actually avoid looking at auction "previews." Too often I am either disappointed when something I was watching gets pulled from the "live" auction, or else I don't notice when a description has been tweaked between the preview and the live version. I prefer looking at items I can actually bid on then and there.

Lance F!ttr0