"As
to how this has unfolded at MoPo - it is my personal view that
Geraldine should just post and people who are truly Heritage's friends
should shut up."
ABOVE is my quote from Tuesday, which was "cherry-picked" by Rich in his most
recent rambling post. BELOW is my quote in its full context:
"As
to how this has unfolded at MoPo - it is my personal view that
Geraldine should just post and people who are truly Heritage's friends
should shut up. If you're not Heritage's friend - or if you don't know
its people in person - post away. There are tactical reasons why
Heritage hasn't posted much about this at MoPo. I've personally talked
to Heritage about this. Quite candidly, public
rebuttals from third parties to Geraldine's posts aren't doing the
people in Dallas (Heritage) any favors."
* With the above, I'm NOT saying people should stop commenting "in toto." I'm
saying that if you're pals with Grey or Rudy - you're not helping them by
continuing to respond to Geraldine's posts - which have the effect of keeping
this topic alive ad nauseam. Geraldine's posts may continue, but you can't
have an argument when just one person is talking. You can plead with her to
stop posting her grievances, but that just invites her to do the opposite.
That's my take. Meanwhile, I have to say that Rich's post has a mildly
disingenuous feeling woven into it, e.g., sort of like debating with good
manners, dishing out phrases steeped in blood, slicing and dicing along the
way, while reassuring readers with a semi-Shakespearean flavor that his
intentions are good and respectful, e.g., like when Brutus says before the
final act, "But Caesar is a good friend of mine." He begins with a headline
that declares he's "neither for Heritage nor for Geraldine," but then the rest
of his note undermines his declaration and his true leanings are revealed. He
infers that if it was him, facing Geraldine's circumstances - he would
graciously accept Heritage's settlement offer to donate the proceeds of HIS
missing posters - to charity.
* Look, everyone has an opinion and we're free to voice it - or not. I repeat,
I've discussed this issue with Heritage and with Geraldine. And in my view,
there's no value in dissecting Geraldine's posts like others have - with
point-by-point rebuttals. But you guys can go right ahead, even though I bet
Grey and his pals would prefer you resist. As I wrote previously, the public
posts on MoPo about Geraldine's troubles feel like they're running 10-1 against
her anyway. But I don't believe they're making a bit of difference in her
determination to keep posting. I also believe - that she believes - that she's
truly writing for the 350 of the 376 members of MoPo - who are lurkers and
mostly silent collectors - who are getting some value watching this train wreck
- while simultaneously taking notes about which dealers they think are more
"customer friendly," who in turn they'll buy or consign posters with in the
future. One of the things I DO like about Rich is he doesn't give a damn what
people think in relation to its impact on his business; the guy has been a
success at everything he's done and it explains why "attitudinally," he tends
to go his own way, e.g., he's no one's "puppet."
* Finally, people who've seen my writings at MCW and/or on MoPo during the past
15 years know the manner and style of my arguments. The "truth" as I see it
isn't always "truth" to you - nor "ethically correct" to you. Everyone has
their own "truth," even when laced with "facts." Public debaters like myself
know - that it's how "facts" are presented - which can shape an audience's
perception of neutrality or bias. We tend to like people whose views already
match our own. Politicians, celebrities and other public figures complain
about being "impugned" all the time - constantly threatening detractors with
libel or slander lawsuits. It's the American way to parody public figures and
even insult them. But you only hear about the lawsuits which succeed. Most of
them fail. In sum, again, you guys can do whatever you want. I just get the
impression that Geraldine is emboldened - and not discouraged at all - by the
resistance she feels here. -d.
Date: Fri, 8 Jun 2012 21:09:43 -0700
From: [email protected]
Subject: Re: Bruce vs Heritage inventory & auciton services
To: [email protected]
Bruce
you mischaracterize some of our positions (those of us who have made
comments).
I am neither for Heritage nor for Geraldine
I am for seeing things in a realistic and fair way and honestly,
Geraldine is piling on.
and piling on
and piling on
If you look at my initial posts in this thread, I am clearly neutral, and
I only finally created this thread after weeks of not commenting on
Geraldine's claims at all. I am not a "Heritage supporter" as
you characterize. I am all for right and wrong.
It's easy to understand that she is pissed off and she feels she's been
ripped off.
Whatever the reality - if she did or did not send these posters - the
problem I see is that she has no inventory of what she sent, there is a
dispute of an inventory Heritage provided, and she disagrees with that
inventory
Grey Smith as agent of Heritage has offered to donate a negotiated amount
to the charity of Geraldine's choice, even though he does not believe he
received the posters that Geraldine claims. I'm not sure what else you
would expect someone to do, although it's obvious that Geraldine feels
Heritage should pay her directly, even though she has no inventory to
back up her claim.
If I was in Grey's position, I wouldn't do anything different. If I was
in her position, as the realist that you know I am, I would accept the
charitable offer, choose a charity, and move on.
However, Geraldine has repeatedly impugned Heritage, even though she has
no absolute inventory of what she sent Heritage.
Don't you see a problem here??
Geraldine wants to say, in different words of course, that she isn't
trying to disparage Heritage. I dispute her characterization in that
regard completely and as concerns my good friend David, for whom I have
lots of respect, when he says no one should be commenting other than
Geraldine or Heritage, I think he is completely wrong.
Geraldine, by virtue of posting her claims into a public forum engenders
commentary by all of those who are members of this forum, otherwise she
should be speaking either directly to Heritage via whatever other form of
communication she choose, or seeing as she has an attorney apparently
working on this situation and Heritage equally no doubt has an opposing
attorney, then she probably should have discontinued posting to any forum
as long as the legal eagles are dealing with the issue, she shouldn't
probably be saying anything to anyone so as not to present herself in a
position where Heritage could counter-sue her on grounds of disparagement
and interference as well as whatever other civil tenets she might be
offending.
That does not mean I am saying Geraldine should not post to the group if
she so chooses. Similarly, she should not be insulted by anyone else who
chooses to respond.
To further delve into what David said:
"As to how this has
unfolded at MoPo - it is my personal view that Geraldine should just post
and people who are truly Heritage's friends should shut up."
by that measure, David must equally feel then that Bruce
should not comment on any issue that involves, Heritage, Movie Poster
Exchange, MoviePosterBid, eBay, Sotheby's, Christie's or any similar
entity because, well golly, we're all competitors. But before you ask do
I really think that should be the case? Absolutely not. There is no
reason why anyone here, yourself and myself included, should not be able
post our feelings or to comment on anything posted to MoPo - a p
u b l i c f o r u m - by other members. Anything else would not
only be against the rules of the forum, it would be against the first
amendment rights we are all supposed to share. If Geraldine wishes to
continuously post her whine, she shouldn't be offended when people
respond to it, no matter what position pro or con that anyone takes. The
same goes for you, or myself. You continually attack Heritage in your
posts and in your marketing approach. I've told you personally my opinion
on this and it isn't something we have to agree on. I find no purpose in
attacking my business rivals personally. But again, this is not something
you need to agree with me and that doesn't mean I do not respect you
regardless. I do indeed respect you for the things you do, what have done
in the past and also based on our 44 years of knowing each other. I just
means I disagree with you, which last I looked is not a serious personal
divide. If it was, you probably wouldn't be talking to your own children
over some issues as I am positive that few children agree with their
parents on a whole lot after they reach the teenage years, and that goes
for wives, parents, girlfriends, best friends and employees.
I don't know anyone who I agree with 100% of the time - not even my best
bud Sean or my best buds John Knight, Redbeard or even my pal Dan here in
Vegas. So I don't think I have to agree with Geraldine either, who isn't
even on my best buds list, whether I were to support Heritage or not. But
it is disturbing when my friend wants to paint me as something I am not
and I am not a Heritage supporter as you characterize. I disagree with
Geraldine's approach, and I have commented. If Heritage truly screwed up
their consignment, there should be a solution, but Geraldine has to have
more than "I know I sent them, even though I have absolutely no
darned proof". At some point you just become a whiner.. Take what
you can get and move on and forget about it. Otherwise, get a bottle of
Pepto Bismol
Rich
-----Original Message-----
At 07:59 PM 6/8/2012, Bruce Hershenson wrote:
Allen
Now I'm VERY confused! Is the "piling on" that bothers
you the criticism of Heritage? These threads actually started out with a
bunch of die-hard Heritage supporters "piling on" against
Geraldine, and only David Kusumoto stood up for her!
But be that as it may, let me address your comment to me about me not
"needing this situation".
For quite some time, Heritage has (or had) a page on their site showing
how many more page views a day their entire site gets than mine (and they
name my site).
They believe this is a strength they have over my business, and they are
trying to exploit it (I will leave out a discussion of the merits of
comparing ALL their visitors from a huge spectrum of collectibles
to mine).
But when I REPLY to a discussion about a strength in my business
over theirs (I do not initiate it as they do in the example above), you
say I don't "need this situation"!
Why exactly is this so? If there is something factually incorrect in what
I have posted (here or anywhere) please let me know and I will retract it
and apologize.
Here's an example of what I consider a VERY valid observation of a
major difference between our two businesses:
Isn't is a HUGE conflict of interest when a major auction house
own major shares in grading companies, and that they buy graded items
from their own auctions and also directly from people who contact them,
and then have them re-graded higher by companies they partially own, and
then re-auction them to people who bid with a snipe program the major
auction house itself owns (and at least some of those bidding have no
idea the sniping company is owned by the very company they are bidding
with)?
Now if you see no conflict in this, fine. But I don't see what is wrong
with my raising this factual query, just as I see nothing wrong with them
showing that their entire site has more visitors than my site.
Bruce
-----Original Message-----
On Fri, Jun 8, 2012 at 9:44 PM, allen day
<[email protected]>
wrote:
Howdy y'all,
I am not going to pretend to speak for Mrs Kudaka; she is a member of
MOPO; she has every right to post as she sees fit, just as her detractors
have every right to label it as horse hooey.
What I perceive as 'getting old' (besides myself), is the 'piling
on'
However, there is a great balancer in all this ... delete
key.
BTW ... please use the delete key on this message ASAP
ad
-----Original Message-----
From: Rix Posterz
<[email protected]>
To:
[email protected]
Sent: Friday, June 8, 2012 10:20 PM
Subject: Re: [MOPO] Bruce vs Heritage inventory & auciton
services
Geraldine,
Personally, I send all of my high-end pieces to Bruce H., but, man.
all this constant negative B.S. about Heritage Auctions is in my
estimation truly getting old. Even if Grey Smith was the Devil
incarnate, I'd be growing weary of your constant diatribes I have
no doubt that most members of Mopo feel the same way. but are too
polite to say what they think it to you. If I'm wrong, Mopo. please lie
me on a bed of nails and let Rich find great pleasure in urinating on
me!
For all of us,
Geraldine, please silence yourself about all this worn-out bullshit,
Sincerely,
Rick Ryan
rixposterz
-----Original Message-----
In a message dated 6/8/2012 6:49:55 P.M. Pacific Daylight Time,
[email protected]
writes:
Seems to me the director of a professional auction
company would not say, "Don't worry, we have your posters tagged and
inventoried" unless they did have them tagged.
Seems to me, a professional auction company doing what is close to a
billion dollars worth of annual sales would have a very good
double-ledger type of accounting software tied to a database which could
help staff evaluate poster's worth and track it's movement through their
system. That same software would not allow an employee to simply remove
it's existence from their inventory.
Seems to me if a professional auction company has high end Signature
auctions and weekly low-end auctions, posters going in the low-end
auction would be in the same database.
Seems to me, if a company like Bruce's which does a high volume of
annual sales is capable of keeping track of their customer's inventory, a
company like Heritage, which specialized in high end Signature auctions,
should be able to keep track of inventory....
The question is, does a high end company like Heritage depend on
their customer's inventory to evaluate a poster's worth or a shipment?
Doubt it.
-----Original Message-----
From: John Waldman
<[email protected]>
To:
[email protected]
Sent: Thursday, June 7, 2012 10:55 AM
Subject: Re: [MOPO] Bruce vs Heritage inventory & auciton
services
Seems to me a professional auction company would tell the customer to
do a inventory. Not everyone knows what to do when they are
selling something at auction. It's not an everyday occurrence
after all.
A little customer service goes a long way.
JW
-----Original Message-----
From: Geraldine Kudaka
<[email protected]
>
To:
[email protected]
Sent: Wednesday, June 6, 2012 9:40 PM
Subject: Re: [MOPO] Bruce vs Heritage inventory & auciton
services
These conversations move very rapidly, especially when one gets loopy
after a lot of hours writing emails. My apologies...
I don't know if you've been following the discussion about our
submissions to Heritage and our stock -- which we had been told by Grey
were tagged and inventoried -- "disappearing". We were never
paid for them and they weren't returned.
After Heritage only listed a portion of our posters on their
inventory, Rudy Franchi told us Heritage didn't want the common posters
-- like the Judge Dredd double sided transparency posters used in light
box marquees we had sent in our first consignment batch -- and suggested
we consign the higher valued posters to Heritage, and common posters like
the aforementioned Dredd to Bruce.
I posted my submission to Bruce on MOPO because there was a lot of
talk about my responsibility for sending an un-inventoried lot to
Heritage. In fact, some MOPOers said I was to blame for their
"disappearance" at Heritage because I hadn't inventoried them
or pursued Grey about their status.
Well, at the same time we sent our 2nd batch of posters to Heritage,
we sent an equal sized consignment batch to Bruce. Like the Heritage
consignment, this consignment to Bruce was not inventoried.
I haven't been posting Bruce illegally appropriated my goods because
there wasn't a problem with payments or returns.
The deal was straight ahead and worked without any effort on my
part.
And if Bruce wears a kilt or has good legs... well, I couldn't say.
-----Original Message-----
From: Rix Posterz
<[email protected]>
To:
[email protected]
Sent: Wednesday, June 6, 2012 8:55 PM
Subject: Re: [MOPO] Bruce vs Heritage inventory & auciton
services
Wait...maybe I missed something. Does Bruce wear a kilt? Is
that what you're saying?
-----Original Message-----
In a message dated 6/6/2012 5:44:47 P.M. Pacific Daylight Time,
[email protected]
writes:
I did forget to mention you, Bruce... Sorry.. Mistake as you were the
inspiration for my disgruntled attitude... Your regular payments to our
Paypal account was what kept Heritage's lack of payments in the forefront
of my mind.
Even though your company has done phenomenally well -- an
inspiration for any ebay seller that yes, there is life after ebay --
Heritage gets more press because of their huge glossy catalog and high
dollar items...
But you've proven that reliability is more important than big
glossies.
Reminds me of a producer I knew who accidentally started investing in
coin operated laundromats. He loved it. Said all those quarters were the
easiest way to rake in the money, and he didn't have to deal with whining
actors and residuals. All it took was a part time handyman to keep those
machines running.
Quarters add up faster than big checks that never clear.
-----Original Message-----
From: Bruce Hershenson
<
[email protected]>
To: Geraldine Kudaka
<[email protected]
>
Cc:
[email protected]
Sent: Wednesday, June 6, 2012 7:45 AM
Subject: Re: [MOPO] Bruce vs Heritage inventory & auciton
services
Thanks much! That is the huge advantage of having 26 people working
here, compared to just a handful (or just two) at many other places. And
of course it is not just your consignment, but all the ones we receive
(which can be very daunting, since we receive thousands of items per
week, of all sizes, from all countries, and from all years). This past
Sunday we even added TOYS to our Sunday lineup!
Our job is to make it EASY for collectors to dispose of unwanted
items, and to help them get more than they could if they sold them to a
dealer. If they need to have notarized lists of what they sent (complete
with videos of them placing the items into packages and taking them to
the Post Office!) then we no longer serve that function, and our
consignors will go elsewhere.
Bruce
-----Original Message-----
On Wed, Jun 6, 2012 at 12:12 AM, Geraldine Kudaka
<[email protected]
> wrote:
One point, which Sean inspired me to put into my email rebuttal -- is
actually a very important point which I didn't bring up earlier because
it wasn't relevant.
The same day we shipped out this 2nd batch of 30-40 un-inventoried
posters to Heritage, we also shipped a batch of the same 30-40 batch size
to Bruce.
We packed them at the same time, and took them both to be shipped,
insured... of course.
Bruce immediately responded by email, and we started getting sales
reports & payments to our Paypal account.
In fact, it was Bruce's regular payments that caused us to start
questioning why we hadn't heard from Heritage.
So here's to Bruce, for handling out 30-40 un-inventoried posters in
a responsible, professional way.
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