Steve,
You are right on all points. In the past, after the outrage subsided,
things went on just as before. This time may be different for a couple
of reasons:
1) A *lot* more money was lost on these high-end fakes. Millions of
dollars by some accounts.
2) The reports coming out clearly show that the restoration and backing
industry needs to formalize practices and standards and unique
identifying serial numbers on backed items -- and to have some kind of
"Underwriter's Seal of Approval" that operations who observe those
practices and standards can display to show they are supporting industry
reform. If they don't join together and do this they *will* lose money
going forward (not to mention possibly ending up with some liability in
lawsuits). So it has now become in their best interests to spend the
relatively small amount of money necessary to form an industry guild and
police themselves. The cost would not be that large when it was spread
among the 20 or so operations and it would be well spent.
3) Some of the Really Big Players got hurt this time. Heritage and other
auction houses/retailers had to refund a lot of money to customers who
bought fakes from them. Maybe they had insurance to help with the
refunds, maybe they didn't, but it still hurt them financially and also
hurt their reputations and customer confidence. They should now be
willing to back the formation of a guild to define restoration standards
and practices and *identification marks* of who did the work so it could
be quickly checked on.
They should also be willing to encourage genuine experts to examine
their very expensive items and provide "Opinions of Authenticity" to
help restore buyer confidence. Note that I call them "Opinions" of
Authenticity because it is getting harder for even long-time
participants in this field to identify the best of the fakes. After the
John Davis fiasco, I doubt anyone would be willing to sign their name on
100% Guarantee anymore, but a solid opinion with specifics delineated
would still be better than nothing, which is what we have on most very
expensive items right now.
Grey is entitled to his opinion that there is no real problem in
catching fakes, but history has not borne that out in recent years and
besides, the public perception being what it is now, if Heritage expects
to keep setting those record prices they are simply going to have to
offer the buyers something more substantial in the way of authentication
on high-end items than they have in the past.
Or maybe not. Maybe it will all go back to business-as-usual once again.
In which case we can all look forward to even bigger scandals in the
future -- and declining realized prices for genuine high-end and
middle-tier authentic movie posters.
It is now in *everyone's* best interest to DO SOMETHING real and
practical to help insure nothing of this magnitude happens again. Just
making reassuring statements that the "sky is not falling" won't cut it.
A 19% buyers premium on a $30,000 poster sale is $5,700 bucks -- they
should be willing to spend a few hundred to properly authenticate it
before offering it to the customers they are asking to trust them.
A money-back guarantee is a great thing. But what good does it do you if
you end up buying a fake and never find out about it? Or don't find out
about it for 10 or 20 years... or until your children go to sell it
after you've passed it on to them in your estate?
-- JR
dsonesheets wrote:
Just a humble Japanese collector/dealer here, but that sounds like
quite a lot of money you're expecting "someone" to fork over, let
alone a publicity campaign for a standards group. Sounds like a
shitload of money.
I have let my voice be known for my absolute revulsion for the guys
like Thomas Loce, who to this day CONTINUE to have their wares up on
eBay, only to cry wolf when they get caught trying to pawn those Pulp
Fiction Lucky Strikes posters with the official "stamp" on the back.
And I only use that example because it's one most people know of.
They then start agreeing with the crowd that the stamp is fake, after
trying soooo hard to disprove actions like Dan Rickard.
Let's take a step back...
Seems like old times, when just three years ago that I suggested the
same thing to the poster community, albeit from the other side of the
restoration business. The email below was sent out to all the MOPO
crowd, and I received _*ONE*_ letter of encouragement, a single
letter, from the person who wrote the letter I am responding to, JR.
BTW I have bolded #2 in my list, as it bears relevant interest here.
The bottom line, going forward, is that talk is cheap and actually
devoting time and money to a "campaign" is something that no one wants
to do. PEOPLE ONLY CARE WHEN IT AFFECTS THEIR INCOME. Let me say
that again. People only care when it affects their income.
I expect a lot more fluff over the Dracula issue, and people like Loce
and his accomplices will keep doing what they've been doing and making
tons of money, being the King of Posters he is. What a joke. I don't
expect anyone even stepping up to shout their opinions of the Drac
incident from their soapboxes to really do anything. When it comes to
shelling out for *WHAT IS RIGHT*, I don't expect anyone to do
anything. Maybe I'll be proven wrong, but that is something I would
love to see.
I expect to see a few emails about this, maybe just one or two. I am
honestly sickened that this community, for all the good they try to
do, has no real love for the ENTIRE poster collecting/selling
community, apart from their own interests (like Universal horror
films, let's say). There are a few, like Ed and Sue, that really step
forward and do something. I tried *THREE YEARS AGO* to start something
that possibly could have prevented something like the Dracula incident
from ever happening, and no one wanted to help, apart from JR. I
didn't have the time, money or resources it would have taken for ONE
person to do this, so it stopped there.
If there are people who are genuinely interested in devoting even time
to this, I would be happy to assist where I can and even take lead on
as many issues as I can. But I don't expect anything to really come
out of this; maybe JR and I will start our own business. :)
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