WATA Finally Getting Sued?

[GPX | 1,373]

2 hours ago, TDIRunner said:

Agreed.  I remember when WATA was first announced, it was almost universally agreed upon in the gaming forums that, ON PAPER, they appeared to be a huge improvement over the practices at VGA.  Even if you weren't a fan of grading, it appeared that they were going to fix most of the things that made people upset.  

Things sure turned out different.  

Yeah, ON PAPER. They were piggy backing their reputation from the NA forum and its members. Once they got a sniff of the momentum, it became an amazing disappearing magic trick. 
 

[Gulag Joe | 584]

mArKeT MaNiPuLaTiOn!

LaWsUiT

fRaUd

The real fraud is the video game collecting content creators defrauding many of the people on this board that seem to worship them rather than understanding everyone had limitless government forgivable PPP loans and the influx of new free money was on a scale the world has never seen before. That money hit every single collectibles market and some of us have been trying to tell all of you that. I’m glad this message board is preserved in the video game collecting canon because it makes for an amazing read. You should be suing the content creators for fraud and manipulating your feelings because that’s the real crime that happened here.

 

[OptOut | 8,892]

Lol, did it really take you two weeks to clap back with that?

You are correct that the WATA fraudsters got incredibly lucky in the timing of their little scam here, as it did coincide with a remarkable and anomalous boom in collectable markets.

But, that doesn't change their ill-intent and their deceptive actions, which are all now a matter of public record. They were gunning for that boom before the pandemic was so much as a twinkle in a Chinese bat's eye.

If there was no WATA, that covid boom money wouldn't have gone into graded games, it would have just gone into regular game collecting (which it did AS WELL) or other collectable categories (which again, it did as well).

The pandemic boom in collectables is not a part of the accusations against WATA, and to conflate them is a product of either ignorance, willful ignorance, or an intention to distract or mislead.

[RH | 4,966]

19 minutes ago, Gulag Joe said:

mArKeT MaNiPuLaTiOn!

LaWsUiT

fRaUd

The real fraud is the video game collecting content creators defrauding many of the people on this board that seem to worship them rather than understanding everyone had limitless government forgivable PPP loans and the influx of new free money was on a scale the world has never seen before. That money hit every single collectibles market and some of us have been trying to tell all of you that. I’m glad this message board is preserved in the video game collecting canon because it makes for an amazing read. You should be suing the content creators for fraud and manipulating your feelings because that’s the real crime that happened here.

 

And yet you completely ignore that the eye-popping, media attention grabbing $100k SMB “sale” happened an entire year BEFORE the pandemic and 7 months before anyone would even hear the words “SARS COVID-19”.

After that sale event, the hypetrain had been started.  Did COVID-bucks push up those numbers? Certainly some, but Deniz and Jim Halperin lucked out in catching the attention of people that look for get-rich-quick schemes right before the pandemic even hit. This phenomenon would not have been nearly as pronounced as it was, especially for the sealed, graded market had that crowd not pushed with all their might the idea that video game collecting was an investment market about to explode.

If you want to present your point of view, you need to be sure you get your facts straight. You can’t ignore the significant hype and steam speculator investing that was going on during that time.  When COVID hit, people didn’t have extra tens of thousands of dollars to spend on games but some had thousands.  Your theory does not hold water against the several games that went for over $25,000. These were speculative purchases and people were doing that with money they probably already had banked and this get-rich-quick scheme caught there eye because they were bored, wealthy early aged Gen-Xers/older Millenials.

General source for the start of this nonsense: https://www.gamesradar.com/a-sealed-nes-copy-of-super-mario-bros-just-sold-for-over-dollar100000/)

[Gulag Joe | 584]

27 minutes ago, OptOut said:

Lol, did it really take you two weeks to clap back with that?

You are correct that the WATA fraudsters got incredibly lucky in the timing of their little scam here, as it did coincide with a remarkable and anomalous boom in collectable markets.

But, that doesn't change their ill-intent and their deceptive actions, which are all now a matter of public record. They were gunning for that boom before the pandemic was so much as a twinkle in a Chinese bat's eye.

If there was no WATA, that covid boom money wouldn't have gone into graded games, it would have just gone into regular game collecting (which it did AS WELL) or other collectable categories (which again, it did as well).

The pandemic boom in collectables is not a part of the accusations against WATA, and to conflate them is a product of either ignorance, willful ignorance, or an intention to distract or mislead.

How’s your lawsuit going Opty? Can you give me the name of your big shot lawyer so I can sue PSA because nobody wants to pay $1,000 for my Kenny Powers rookie card anymore? Thanks bro!

[Gulag Joe | 584]

46 minutes ago, RH said:

And yet you completely ignore that the eye-popping, media attention grabbing $100k SMB “sale” happened an entire year BEFORE the pandemic and 7 months before anyone would even hear the words “SARS COVID-19”.

After that sale event, the hypetrain had been started.  Did COVID-bucks push up those numbers? Certainly some, but Deniz and Jim Halperin lucked out in catching the attention of people that look for get-rich-quick schemes right before the pandemic even hit. This phenomenon would not have been nearly as pronounced as it was, especially for the sealed, graded market had that crowd not pushed with all their might the idea that video game collecting was an investment market about to explode.

If you want to present your point of view, you need to be sure you get your facts straight. You can’t ignore the significant hype and steam speculator investing that was going on during that time.  When COVID hit, people didn’t have extra tens of thousands of dollars to spend on games but some had thousands.  Your theory does not hold water against the several games that went for over $25,000. These were speculative purchases and people were doing that with money they probably already had banked and this get-rich-quick scheme caught there eye because they were bored, wealthy early aged Gen-Xers/older Millenials.

General source for the start of this nonsense: https://www.gamesradar.com/a-sealed-nes-copy-of-super-mario-bros-just-sold-for-over-dollar100000/

Do you have a source link that shows a gloss sticker sealed 9.4 A++ super mario for nes selling for less than $100k since then?

[OptOut | 8,892]

24 minutes ago, Gulag Joe said:

How’s your lawsuit going Opty? Can you give me the name of your big shot lawyer so I can sue PSA because nobody wants to pay $1,000 for my Kenny Powers rookie card anymore? Thanks bro!

I don't need to sue anybody, because I didn't burn all my money in a giant hype pit like a ton of other people did.

The only rookies I know of are all the comic book and baseball card collectors who stumbled blindly into graded game collecting as though it was a thing. 

[Gulag Joe | 584]

Point is, the prices went up across all collectibles (not just video games) when everyone got free money. And a lot of people who suddenly have lots of money tend to not know how to use it wisely. Once the free money dried up, the steady but steep drop in price is no surprise. There’s definitely a sting bugging some people who had some of these titles selling for tens of thousands and now they’re angry because they held on to theirs for too long and missed the opportunity to sell. I guess if that were me I would want to sue somebody too, but ultimately it would be my own fault. As for the speculators who bought these games at the inflated prices, as Ray once famously said on trailer park boys “it’s the way she goes”.

[GPX | 1,373]

1 hour ago, OptOut said:

I don't need to sue anybody, because I didn't burn all my money in a giant hype pit like a ton of other people did.

The only rookies I know of are all the comic book and baseball card collectors who stumbled blindly into graded game collecting as though it was a thing. 

I think there are 2 separate issues here. Graded collecting was definitely a thing, even prior to the pandemic. It was never really a thing of 6 to 7 figure proportions.

I would argue though that in time, natural organic growth of the market may well lead to those sorts of values. However, the inorganic manner such was the hype train from WATA and HA, promoted scam artists into participation rather than encouraging prior genuine graded collectors to collect. 

[GPX | 1,373]

1 hour ago, Gulag Joe said:

Point is, the prices went up across all collectibles (not just video games) when everyone got free money. And a lot of people who suddenly have lots of money tend to not know how to use it wisely. Once the free money dried up, the steady but steep drop in price is no surprise. There’s definitely a sting bugging some people who had some of these titles selling for tens of thousands and now they’re angry because they held on to theirs for too long and missed the opportunity to sell. I guess if that were me I would want to sue somebody too, but ultimately it would be my own fault. As for the speculators who bought these games at the inflated prices, as Ray once famously said on trailer park boys “it’s the way she goes”.

There is a serious false logical fallacy going on over the years, which is..

- people had received extra government financial assistance (true)

- the people above are contributing to the bidding of 6 to 7 figures on HA (false)

What some members on VGS were banging on previously weren’t the rise in market values, but more so the rapid trajectory, that it became obvious something was dubious. We just never really could tell the extent of this dubiousness. That is up until recent times, when actual lawyers and peed off clients are digging their teeth into the fine prints of the “what really went on”.

[Gulag Joe | 584]

1 hour ago, GPX said:

- the people above are contributing to the bidding of 6 to 7 figures on HA (false)

This didn’t happen with only video games. People were spending 6-7 figures on modern sports cards, comic books, vhs tapes, sealed G1 iPhones FFS. This is where the whole “wata and ha” completely falls apart in the bigger picture. It was ALL collectible markets. Video games are not special! Wata and HA didn’t make Timmy poindexter drop $60,000 on a Trevor Lawrence rookie card.

[GPX | 1,373]

On 3/11/2024 at 3:40 AM, Gulag Joe said:

This didn’t happen with only video games. People were spending 6-7 figures on modern sports cards, comic books, vhs tapes, sealed G1 iPhones FFS. This is where the whole “wata and ha” completely falls apart in the bigger picture. It was ALL collectible markets. Video games are not special! Wata and HA didn’t make Timmy poindexter drop $60,000 on a Trevor Lawrence rookie card.

I seriously doubt VHS tapes and iPhones were going at 7 figures. While sports cards and comic books had many decades of establishing their top-end markets.

Then you have HA/WATA teaming up, and then an item magically transforms 100 times more than it’s going rate within the space of 1 year. 

Now we also have a lot of evidence that there is a lot of hanky panky going on, which you seem to have conveniently ignored and rather, to focus on “most other collectibles were going up too!” 
I’m sure there is market manipulation in all forms of market, but most of us here are likely to focus on the games market because…it’s a games forum! 

 

[Code Monkey | 2,013]

I don't get it, pretending something is worth more than it is isn't a crime. It's also not a crime for me to lie to you about its value.

I could literally draw up some charts in Microsoft Paint, fabricate some numbers, have my friends corroborate the values and do media interviews about the sky high prices. If you give me or anyone else money based on your zero research, the fault is yours, not mine. It is fully your responsibility for any investment you make based on any information you accept.

I could tell you Dogecoin is going to be the next official currency of the moon peoples and you better buy it all up. If you actually do that, that's on you. People are acting like it's somehow Deniz's fault that he convinced people to buy things.

Disclaimer: I have no interest in Wata and do not even collect sealed games. I just can't sit here and read about people saying it's anyone else's fault but their own for a bad investment.

Side note: I don't see anyone here discussing how the $100,100 Super Mario Bros. sale wasn't even actually a sale. Deniz mentioned in his deposition weeks ago that the game was never sold, the original owner (Bronty) still retains interest in the game and they made up the sale price for hype. I thought that would have more people upset, that was a pretty shit thing to do.

[MrWunderful | 2,927]

1 hour ago, Code Monkey said:

I don't get it, pretending something is worth more than it is isn't a crime. It's also not a crime for me to lie to you about its value.

I could literally draw up some charts in Microsoft Paint, fabricate some numbers, have my friends corroborate the values and do media interviews about the sky high prices. If you give me or anyone else money based on your zero research, the fault is yours, not mine. It is fully your responsibility for any investment you make based on any information you accept.

I could tell you Dogecoin is going to be the next official currency of the moon peoples and you better buy it all up. If you actually do that, that's on you. People are acting like it's somehow Deniz's fault that he convinced people to buy things.

Disclaimer: I have no interest in Wata and do not even collect sealed games. I just can't sit here and read about people saying it's anyone else's fault but their own for a bad investment.

Side note: I don't see anyone here discussing how the $100,100 Super Mario Bros. sale wasn't even actually a sale. Deniz mentioned in his deposition weeks ago that the game was never sold, the original owner (Bronty) still retains interest in the game and they made up the sale price for hype. I thought that would have more people upset, that was a pretty shit thing to do.

Fraud isnt a crime in Canada? Thats wild lol

[MrWunderful | 2,927]

On 2/28/2024 at 6:20 AM, Scrobins said:

He’s not even moderating, just acting as a voice of reason and respect. You’d think a former mod would know the difference, but then again you just like Monday morning quarterbacking us.

Sorry, my bad. 

Edited March 16 by MrWunderful

[Tulpa | 3,534]

22 minutes ago, MrWunderful said:

Fraud isnt a crime in Canada? Thats wild lol

Seriously. A former president got slammed for $355 million dollars for basically what Code Monkey just described.

[Brickman | 4,013]

1 hour ago, Code Monkey said:

I don't get it, pretending something is worth more than it is isn't a crime. It's also not a crime for me to lie to you about its value.

I could literally draw up some charts in Microsoft Paint, fabricate some numbers, have my friends corroborate the values and do media interviews about the sky high prices. If you give me or anyone else money based on your zero research, the fault is yours, not mine. It is fully your responsibility for any investment you make based on any information you accept.

I could tell you Dogecoin is going to be the next official currency of the moon peoples and you better buy it all up. If you actually do that, that's on you. People are acting like it's somehow Deniz's fault that he convinced people to buy things.

Disclaimer: I have no interest in Wata and do not even collect sealed games. I just can't sit here and read about people saying it's anyone else's fault but their own for a bad investment.

Side note: I don't see anyone here discussing how the $100,100 Super Mario Bros. sale wasn't even actually a sale. Deniz mentioned in his deposition weeks ago that the game was never sold, the original owner (Bronty) still retains interest in the game and they made up the sale price for hype. I thought that would have more people upset, that was a pretty shit thing to do.

Wildest take I’ve read in a while. Fraud is illegal. Also giving legitimate financial advice without a finance degree or license is illegal in most countries.

[MrWunderful | 2,927]

7 minutes ago, Tulpa said:

Seriously. A former president got slammed for $355 million dollars for basically what Code Monkey just described.

Like you can lie in writing and its okay? Ill say “if you give me 100$ mil ill pay you back in 30 secs” and sign a contract, then i just dont and say “well it was on you to verify I could pay this back” boom just made 100 million? 

[Scrobins | 1,727]

1 hour ago, Code Monkey said:

I don't get it, pretending something is worth more than it is isn't a crime. It's also not a crime for me to lie to you about its value.

I could literally draw up some charts in Microsoft Paint, fabricate some numbers, have my friends corroborate the values and do media interviews about the sky high prices. If you give me or anyone else money based on your zero research, the fault is yours, not mine. It is fully your responsibility for any investment you make based on any information you accept.

I could tell you Dogecoin is going to be the next official currency of the moon peoples and you better buy it all up. If you actually do that, that's on you. People are acting like it's somehow Deniz's fault that he convinced people to buy things.

Disclaimer: I have no interest in Wata and do not even collect sealed games. I just can't sit here and read about people saying it's anyone else's fault but their own for a bad investment.

Side note: I don't see anyone here discussing how the $100,100 Super Mario Bros. sale wasn't even actually a sale. Deniz mentioned in his deposition weeks ago that the game was never sold, the original owner (Bronty) still retains interest in the game and they made up the sale price for hype. I thought that would have more people upset, that was a pretty shit thing to do.

You’re defending fraud, but weren’t you whining how you couldn’t buy one of KHAN’s games because he wasn’t “following Kickstarter’s rules”. You need to stop speaking like you understand the plain reading of basic rules of conduct.

[Link | 2,727]

2 hours ago, Code Monkey said:

note: I don't see anyone here discussing how the $100,100 Super Mario Bros. sale wasn't even actually a sale. 

no I'm pretty sure that has been mentioned a few times ITT. Or are you "just being funny" again?

[Gulag Joe | 584]

Did you all put Wata in jail yet or are they still out there on the streets grading video games and ruining lives?

[Tyree_Cooper | 771]

so this argument is that if the lawsuit fails and/or nobody ends up in alcatraz, it means they didn't do anything wrong. okay.

it was sort of obvious that all of this was shady. now it's been confirmed and it's even worse that what most thought. whether or not a lawsuit is successful, and whether or not anybody pays a fine or goes to jail is not going to cleanse them of anything.

[a3quit4s | 4,124]

29 minutes ago, Tyree_Cooper said:

so this argument is that if the lawsuit fails and/or nobody ends up in alcatraz, it means they didn't do anything wrong. okay.

it was sort of obvious that all of this was shady. now it's been confirmed and it's even worse that what most thought. whether or not a lawsuit is successful, and whether or not anybody pays a fine or goes to jail is not going to cleanse them of anything.

I think the agreement is that there will likely be no criminal charges but I can see the civil suits being ruled in favor of the plaintiffs. The fact of the matter is WATA offered grading services that had documented SLAs and failed on a majority of them to meet their own deadlines. That coupled with a financial reason to grade games higher to charge more on insurance without giving the customer a chance to refuse seems like a win. Now depending on the judgement levied it may bankrupt the company or at least put them in an operating hole. 

[GPX | 1,373]

23 minutes ago, a3quit4s said:

I think the agreement is that there will likely be no criminal charges but I can see the civil suits being ruled in favor of the plaintiffs. The fact of the matter is WATA offered grading services that had documented SLAs and failed on a majority of them to meet their own deadlines. That coupled with a financial reason to grade games higher to charge more on insurance without giving the customer a chance to refuse seems like a win. Now depending on the judgement levied it may bankrupt the company or at least put them in an operating hole. 

Also the big thing for me from the recent news, is that they were grading games from their own staff or board members, while making the claim they were too busy to keep up with the customer’s demands and hence the long waiting times. 

Well gee, how about grading the customer’s items first before grading the staffs’ inventory? That would probably help to reduce the waiting time.

[a3quit4s | 4,124]

6 hours ago, GPX said:

Also the big thing for me from the recent news, is that they were grading games from their own staff or board members, while making the claim they were too busy to keep up with the customer’s demands and hence the long waiting times. 

Well gee, how about grading the customer’s items first before grading the staffs’ inventory? That would probably help to reduce the waiting time.

You could really use their own scam against as they themselves propped themselves up to be the most trusted video game grading company and used that to hype up prices and put grading the games they owned and selling them before customers. Seems highly unethical. But if you charge all companies who act unethically with crimes there would be no companies left lol

Edited March 16 by a3quit4s