Bronty

fair enough

Well, I don't look at it that way, I was very fortunate in a lot of ways and worked hard in some other ways and as a result I was able to collect some cool things. I don't feel any different though inside then when I was a kid buying $2 comics or when I was a 20something buying 50 dollar games.

I appreciate it and hope I don't come off too snarky. I'm just trying to provide my own perspective from someone that's been involved in some of this, and the truth is a lot less exciting and nefarious than sometimes gets asserted.

Okay, lets set up a system where no one gets any advantages. How do we do that. Communism? More to the point, instead of being envious of another person's advantages, be grateful for your own. I guarantee you that you and I are better off than a lot of people in this world.

So far, all you’ve really said is that your jealous he got help from his dad. Am I wrong? I mean... who are we to opine on how their family did things. He turned out okay. Dad seemed like a kind and wise person. I have trouble taking issue with any of it.

1. You implied that he did this as a means by which to boost the value of his collection when the stuff he collected isn’t even the stuff that’s going up 2. You seem to think wata was handed to him when in fact from what I’ve seen he’s worked absurdly hard at it. It is SO difficult to convert people from one hobby to another. Remember Brians Toys and how they thought selling VGA’d NES to action figure guys would be easy? They made zero strides. Deniz made it look easy.

I’m not sure, but from my short time with them it seemed clear that dad knew much more about comics than Deniz. He was about games.

I can’t speak to that; I didn’t necessarily get that sense (about Deniz’s attitudes being shaped). Maybe. More to the point though his dad had some connections in comics and Deniz took those and ran with them - he’s really very well spoken and a good marketer so that’s no surprise.

I've met his dad; he's a wonderful guy. But I think long-term, dedicated and knowledgeable comic collector is a better way to describe him. From what he told me he doesn't typically spend a fortune on any particular book, but enjoys the hobby and enjoys having a large and wonderful collection, but he's not flipping million dollar books which is what some might think when 'big-time' is the description. He's buying books for a few hundred or few thousand and keeping them for the most part. He did open a store to sell some overstock but I think that's more fun for him than any attempt at making money.

Because of your constant not so thinly veiled comments that this whole thing is an orchestrated pump and dump between various advisors and comments to that effect. Its laughable, its incorrect, and its you looking for a conspiracy instead of asking genuine questions, if we are putting hands to god.

What I am telling you, for the third time, is that the advisory board has been inactive since the doors opened. We gave initial feedback. That's it. Now if Deniz or Kenneth called me and asked me for advice? Of course I'd give it. But the fact is they don't ask because they are busy and have their own opinions on how to run things anyways. And that's fine.

What part of ‘no advice since doors opened’ and ‘cumulative total of zero compensation is confusing? Wata is Deniz and Kenneth and arguably the other owners. (And I don’t know who all of those people are. I am not an owner). Ha, clink, gocollect, myself, Dain, these are all separate entities. Yes some of us helped give them feedback before the doors opened? So what? I did the same for VGA before they opened. I’d probably give similar help for anyone starting up a new hobby venture that asked.

Moreover, unless trends in collecting markets change in general, wata will Really never affect that person because the 20 year trend has been that the truly special items explode in value and the typical stuff stagnates or declines.

That's true to a point, as it is unfortunate when people get priced out, but don't forget that some of those people with big money aren't any less fans than you, and having a smaller wallet doesn't make you a 'truer' or 'better' fan. What you're really saying is it got harder to compete, which sucks, I get it, but this idea that if you can't afford something you're better than the guy that can? Is just the mirror version of the guy that thinks his fat wallet makes him better than you. Its the same type of thinking. I have (fan love, money) so I am better than the guy with no (fan love, money). Either train of thought is unsupportable.

Jone, In truth though, weren't we largely already there? I don't know about you but even before all this, I really wasn't too interested in buying a ton of new material at the prices prevalent even then. Everything I might get halfway excited by seemed to cost 5k+ and I just wasn't feeling it considering I first started buying some of those items for 200 a pop. 5k or 50k I wasn't really going to buy new stuff. The fun was kinda gone already in terms of sealed games. It used be you'd have to outbid bucky and he'd put a monster snipe in to avoid losing anything good and keep a stranglehold. Now you have to outbid a comicbro. What's changed, really, besides the number you bid for the honor of being underbidder? I mean... its even more exaggerated, now, sure, and maybe its spread to material you were interested in that you could get before. But to at least some degree, this had already happened. Now part of the reason that it is/was less fun for me personally is because as you know, I very interested in and dedicated to collecting box art, and my energy and money gets spent there. Games themselves have been a secondary hobby for me to art since 2007 and it was getting harder to compete for games when they weren't even my primary interest anymore. If I had 10k to spend I was sure as heck going to spend it on art over a sealed kid Icarus or something. That said, I wonder how much sealed collecting I would have been doing anyways. Its tough to get excited about buying something for 15k that you used to buy for 200 bucks.

There's no question that when things start getting sold on auction sites that have deep collector pools, prices generally go up which makes it more difficult to acquire new material. On the other hand, the auction site constantly bringing things to market means that you don't have to search 4 years for a copy of some sealed title. Availability and liquidity go up, price goes up. The games you have are worth more, the games you want cost more. You take the good with the bad I guess.

I really don't think so. Resentment because Dain decided to leave, or resentment because we have to login to a new URL? come on. How petty can we get. Annoying yes, but not wata's fault. The whole gocollect transition was not well handled in my view but that's gocollect, that's not wata, and not HA and not clink. Gocollect. At the end of the day, I think Jeff had good intentions for the most part, but ultimately everyone is better off having transitioned to this site. 'Inviting the devil into our house?' Who is the devil in that analogy, exactly? 'Comicbros' ? And to Hamster's point, most of the people on the site really don't collect the material being bought and sold at these higher prices anyways. The truth of the matter is that it doesn't affect most people on this site, except for fear of change and or a tingling in their underwear that I'll describe as butthurt.

Great! Hope you are still enjoying the SK

No they don’t. The majority thinks ‘wata is not good for the hobby.’ That’s fine. But when they find that sealed killer tomatoes or sealed Mario bros in their closet they are mailing out a package right quick my friend. Those people you are telling me are so concerned with ethics were tripping all over themselves to sell their cib stickers! At prices they would have called unethical six months previous!

I liked Pro Set! Nice clean layout!

I mean, if that's what you want to tell yourself. Some guy with a sealed killer tomatoes or anything else that they can do much better than they expected with by getting it graded and sending it to HA is not going to give a flying fuck about 'questionable ethics/optics' as you see them. And the guy without the ability to take advantage of that is going to cry foul. This topic divides people, unfortunately, but its the money that is the divide, not the ethics.

Sir - great post. That's really all there is to say.

I honestly had no expectation of it becoming anything like that. I mean, it would have been nice but I didn't expect a cent back since the first returns went to the production staff. I actually felt bad for the director with all the work he put in that he didn't get more - I think he returned more than he should have. Do you mean to say that Dain (and/or you) had different expectations?

Hey we made money on that LOL. I never thought I'd get a cent of my money back but I got it all back and a little bit more too I think. Why do you say it was a tipping point with him?

a) they probably did at some point b) he sold his collection what at least a year ago? They may have already belonged to Jeff c) who cares. So he lost interest and decided to collecting something else. If he's not into anymore, he's not into it.