Is Anyone Updating the SCD Card Catalog?

[Leon]

I politely disagree about needing pricing.

I agree with what Adam said (hey Adam). We have enough pricing tools already. Prices can change quickly so anything printed will be out of date when it leaves the printer.
How are you going to price a card like this one below, which needs to be added if this project ever gets started? What we need is to add things to the catalog, imo. Burdick did it with his Card Collectors Bulletins and always considered his ACC as a work in progress. Full speed ahead!! (who's driving?) And of course, Burdick never liked the value aspect of cards, which is why he listed them low. He didn't want to see the hobby become what it has .

That being said, who said this has to be a for-profit project?

Originally Posted by Rich Klein

I respectfully disagree with this. For the members of this board who are well attuned to card values and are active, yes you can probably do this without pricing. However, the majority of the people who would be interested in such a tome would want some pricing information. It would be understood that not all pricing would be the final word and we understand things do change. But the pricing is what would make you a profit

[G1911]

If one doesn't do pricing and doesn't do a physical book, then this work becomes pretty easy as a group. The infrastructure is already set up, the more modern side of the hobby has seen to that. There are online databases already, the coverage of the old stuff is just limited because from this side of the hobby don't really contribute to them and hasn't organized. TCDB, BaseballCardPedia, etc. are out there and set up with nothing stopping expansion into the older stuff to serve as a primary reference database like the old Standard Catalog.

I love physical books, but it just doesn't make a lot of sense at this scale. I doubt I will get to buy a new standard catalog to use anytime soon.

[butchie_t]

Originally Posted by G1911

I love physical books, but it just doesn't make a lot of sense at this scale. I doubt I will get to buy a new standard catalog to use anytime soon.

This is a fear of mine, if it gets built, who would come?

Butch T.

BTW: Excellent conversations gentleman. I truly like the idea sharing and collaboration with this conversation. Gives me a bit of hope.....

[G1911]

Originally Posted by butchie_t

This is a fear of mine, if it gets built, who would come?

Butch T.

It saddens me, personally. It's so convenient that I can have 50,000 books on my iPad that take 0 space when traveling, but nothing is better in life than a good old fashioned book in ones lap.

Card catalogs fall into the sweet spot where the money just doesn't make sense. There isn't enough demand for a vintage card book to get a real publisher to invest into it; but there's also too much demand for you or I or something to print up the copies and just eat a small loss to put out a passion project. At this point, I suspect card physical books are going to be restricted to very narrow niche passion projects that are self-published where the author can just eat a small loss or break even and is doing it anyways because they want too, and perhaps some coffee-table like books.

I'd much rather a 2 volume actual book than a BaseballCardPedia type, but the later seems the only way to do it .

[butchie_t]

Originally Posted by G1911

It saddens me, personally. It's so convenient that I can have 50,000 books on my iPad that take 0 space when traveling, but nothing is better in life than a good old fashioned book in ones lap.

Card catalogs fall into the sweet spot where the money just doesn't make sense. There isn't enough demand for a vintage card book to get a real publisher to invest into it; but there's also too much demand for you or I or something to print up the copies and just eat a small loss to put out a passion project. At this point, I suspect card physical books are going to be restricted to very narrow niche passion projects that are self-published where the author can just eat a small loss or break even and is doing it anyways because they want too, and perhaps some coffee-table like books.

I'd much rather a 2 volume actual book than a BaseballCardPedia type, but the later seems the only way to do it .

BOLLOCKS!!!!! BOOK GOOD, iPad... Backup.

JMHO.

This coming from a person that has well over 200 Civil War 1st and 2nd edition Hardback Books.

Give me a book any day of the year.

[G1911]

Originally Posted by butchie_t

BOLLOCKS!!!!! BOOK GOOD, iPad... Backup.

JMHO.

This coming from a person that has well over 200 Civil War 1st and 2nd edition Hardback Books.

Give me a book any day of the year.

I love how you think! My home is stuffed with floor to ceiling bookcases with the books packed 2 rows to a shelf and then there's a bunch more boxed up I just don't have space to shelve but can't bring myself to part with. I use the iPad now for travel so I always have a book with me, but every evening I take a good old physical book and spend a few hours in one of my reading nooks or on the porch. Life is made the better with a real book.

[brianp-beme]

I envision it as something like Lew Lipset's Encyclopedia of Baseball cards, which involved an extensive writeup of each set involving background information, date of release theories, relations to other sets, etc. It was a shame that only 3 volumes were created - 19th century (N), tobacco (T), and early gum and candy (E). There was a basic pricing section, but that was not a focus, and in my opinion definitely not something necessary.

Online the Old Cardboard site (which you can access with the tab on upper right of this page) and prewarcards.com site do a pretty good job with vintage card info, with Old Cardboard providing great images and checklists for many sets, and Anson with his prewarcards site approaching each set in a more thorough Lipset-ian fashion, with of course updated info and research since Lew's books were published around 40 years ago. Perhaps using Anson's output, combined with input from experts in particular sets, could create a great physical hobby resource....

Just a thought.

Brian

[rjackson44]

Would love to see a 2024 edition why not. My 2011 will never part with. Just too much info i enjoy reading . Just saying

[steve B]

Sort of had this debate in a different hobby over a decade ago.

Small branch of a bigger hobby, club put out a monthly newslatter/magazine.
One of the leaders was very into computerizing everything.

Not that that was bad, his electronic catalogs included album page software so you could arrange a catalog as you wanted it. And they do small catalogs for super specialized stuff.

But they wanted to make the newsletter electronic only. "Oh, it costs too much to print and mail" - Yeah, that's what I'm paying the yearly dues for.
"It will be better electronically." Ummmm..... how? More actual content? (The print one was sometimes not much more than recaps of meetings and a scoreboard of sorts as to who had how many of the primary finite "set"

I wrote a letter they published about how I learned most of what I know from buying a nearly complete run of newsletters. And that while most people think the internet is forever, it's more ephemeral than most things.
And the main point, that if it's worth knowing it's worth committing to print.

They went electronic, with even less content than before... and I sort of drifted away from that niche. Still get some, as they come my way and are usually super cheap (sub $1 )

[butchie_t]

I now own the 2011 edition of the Standard Catalog of Baseball Cards.

I will, strike that, must wear safety shoes whenever I bring this book out for referencing any card I wish to look for from here on out.

I will also need to ensure I use both hands and freaking lift with my back when I pull it off of my bookshelf to use. Due to weigh imbalance concerns, this tome will reside on the bottom shelf. Thus assuring an earthquake proof bookcase if nothing else.

I'm also considering a safety lift for this thing too.

Thank you gentleman for the advise.

Regards,

Butch T.

[Rich Klein]

Originally Posted by Leon

I politely disagree about needing pricing.

I agree with what Adam said (hey Adam). We have enough pricing tools already. Prices can change quickly so anything printed will be out of date when it leaves the printer.
How are you going to price a card like this one below, which needs to be added if this project ever gets started? What we need is to add things to the catalog, imo. Burdick did it with his Card Collectors Bulletins and always considered his ACC as a work in progress. Full speed ahead!! (who's driving?) And of course, Burdick never liked the value aspect of cards, which is why he listed them low. He didn't want to see the hobby become what it has .

That being said, who said this has to be a for-profit project?

Leon, if this is not done as a for profit project, eventually there will be less people involved. And yes I get this board is good for not needing prices but I'm thinking of, ahem, a wider audience.

If you want to do a project for people of this board it's fine to think of updating a catalog this way. If you want a greater reach, you got to have prices at least as a baseline. Having actually, you know, worked for such an outfit, trust me when I say, pricing is what makes things go better. And that's why it's called a catalog. I guarantee you the #1 question you will get from anyone not active on this board will be: "What is this worth" and to have a baseline is a great start.

[Shankweather]

Y'all need to crowdfund this thing. If Leon, Al, and Rich are on board it'll get support.