Another Albedo #2 on Ebay (CGC 9.6)

[Todd Shogun]

Somebody obviously screwed up there!

[shaxper]

CGC is a rapidly expanding company. As your business grows, you broaden your hiring policy to take on new graders to speed up turn-around time, and you start employing more middle management to oversee all of these employees, quality is going to be compromised. I don't know how CGC can pretend to offer consistant grading under such circumstances. How many of their employees can actually have been professional graders prior to their employment? The numbers just don't work out.

Most companies that get big are willing to accept that quality will be compromised and work to strengthen other areas. No one at McDonalds expects their employees to deliver a burger that tasted like the ones that came out of their first California store in the 1950s, yet CGC somehow thinks they can maintain their quality grading standards. Go figure.

[Todd Shogun]

Excellent observation, shaxper. It may just end up being a fad. They should have limited their efforts to Golden Age / Silver Age comics only and rejected any modern comics. In fact I think they separated the "modern" comics out at one time (red label), but realized the mistake that at some point in the future those "modern" comics will no longer be modern...

What I can see happening is them slowly losing their client base of Golden/Silver Age customers by taking on all the Modern Age comic speculators. People slabbing hot-off-the-press popular comics in hoping to artificially increase their price over standard NM bagged-and-boarded copies.

For Golden/Silver Age comics this concept would have worked out great. Comics that are so scarce, so old, and worth so much that a standardized grading system for them would have ensured consistency and kept values in check. In fact, they shouldn't even have the same grading system apply to Golden/Silver Age as to Modern. Maybe slowly over time they add susequent publishing years to addressing aging comics. Throw in modern comics and you open yourself up to an avalanche of problems as you've pointed out.

They only thing they can do is expand, which I agree would cause grading quality to suffer. Maybe you could separate out their graders so that the professionals do Golden/Silver Age books only, and stick the Joe-Shmoe fanboy graders with the Ultimate X-Mens. I mean how much would it take to grade a copy that was printed a couple months or even years ago? It take a lot more knowledge and expertice to grade a copy of Batman #1 by Bob Kane than it would to grade a copy of Batman and the Monster Men #1. Thet's hope for their sake as they expand they factor this in...

Another thing they could do is raise the price to grade newer comics to deter this type of activity, or force longer turnaround times for non-Golden/Silver Age books. Thing is, they're in the business to make money. If they really cared about comics grading, they would have limited their efforts to the Golden/Silver Age market in the first place. My 2 cents!

[shaxper]

I mostly agree. Unfortunately, they've done the complete opposite by imposing their ten point grading system. The level of fussiness actually creates more difficulty in grading an apparently NM new comic than an apparently VG Golden Age comic. Joe Schmoe would have more luck with Batman #1 by Bob Kane.

[Gaffey]

(while we're on the topic of CGC)

You'd think they would at least slab Noriko's first appearance.

eBay auction

[go]

Dear Readers,
Is it time to reprint Albedo #2?
Best wishes to all!
go

[shaxper]

The original negatives no longer exist, so the issue can never be reprinted in its entirety without suffering severe quality loss. The Usagi Yojimbo story is available in vol. 1 (Ronin), as well as in the Usagi Yojimbo Summer Special by Fantagraph. The Erma Felina story is available in Command Review 1.

More info available at: http://www.usagiyojimbo.com/casl/comics ... bedo2.html

[Todd Shogun]

I reprinted it on my own to have a reading copy. As I only own 1 that is in way too good condition to pull out and read whenever, a reading copy does nicely.

As far as reprinting it for those who do not have a copy, I am sure today's technology will allow for limited loss of quality reprinting without the original negs. With the material inside available elsewhere however, reprinting the issue itself wouldn't make a whole lotta sense.

Wow...US $2,275.00 final bid!!! This totally destroys the previous record. Incredible. Guess CGC is working for those who use it...

[shaxper]

Todd, what process did you use to reprint your issue? Wasn't there a risk of damaging the original?

If you're able to make more copies, I'd love to purchase one from you. I would solomnly swear not to try to pass it off as an original and resell it.

[Todd Shogun]

I just *carefully* xeroxed each page years ago when doing the Albedo NR 2 Webpage. I won't make any more copies simply because it's too much of a risk to the book itself..plus I can't violate Steve G's copyright by selling copies of his book!

[shaxper]

I certainly respect your obligations to Steve. I assume, then, that photocopying the photocopy (which was what I'd meant to suggest) is out of the question too.

[Todd Shogun]

And then distributing it, yes. I just don't want to go there. I get the feeling that Steve is pretty serious when it comes to reprinting his work. He's mentioned it before in passing. I only made the reading copy for my own personal use. Do you have a copy of the book?

[shaxper]

Yes, I own a copy of the original, but I'd be terrified to attempt to make my own copy. Unfortunately, I'm far too much of a butterfingers to be in possession of such a valuable comic.