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Baker Romance
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13,509 posts in this topic

Dog, I think you're treading on thin ice with those words... :o

 

Tomorrow's comic news headline: "29dukedog was banned today from the CGC forums for blasphemy..."

 

I may have sounded a little snarky, but I'm actually taking their side. I get that, in order to be an impartial, third party, they need to be granted a little room to make a decision in a grey area, and not have to defend it to everyone. We employ them to make an essentially subjective call, just like we appoint a jury to render a verdict, or a judge to pass a sentence.

 

If they ever did provide written guidelines to their grading criteria, they'd get people arguing about their grades, and using CGC's own guidelines to try making a case against a particular grade. It's a can of worms that CGC just can't open.

 

I can also see how difficult it might be to actually quantify how many defects, and what kind of defects, are allowed in a particular grade. There are such a wide variety of flaws a book can have, and how do you quantify, not only each type of flaw, but the degree of those types of flaws, and the combination of different types of flaws, that are allowed in a particular grade? If you think about what the task involves, you can begin to understand how difficult it would be to actually write down a defined grading criteria.

 

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The more Grader Notes I see, the more I'm starting to figure out their criteria. Having to pay for the notes limits the learning process, but after seeing just a few sets of notes, you can start to discern the kinds and numbers of defects that warrant certain grades.

 

I agree that customer awareness of CGC's exact criteria might cause some folks to call them on mistakes, but what's wrong with some accountability?

 

Grader Notes, in essence, DO reveal CGC's grading guidelines. Regardless of "policy", making Grader Notes available shows they really don't mind letting us in on their grading criteria, but they do want us to pay for it.

 

And just to keep things on-topic, knowing exactly which and how many defects kill a book's grade would be very helpful to those of us who collect Baker, because many, many available Baker books have multiple problems.

 

 

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I agree that customer awareness of CGC's exact criteria might cause some folks to call them on mistakes, but what's wrong with some accountability?

 

I'm in favor of accountability, just a little vague on "exact". How does one go about quantifying the exact difference between a 7.0, and a 7.5, for example?

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That CL 25 looks very nice but if I saw it in person, I'd probably understand why it's a 5.5. A long non-breaking crease on the back will knock down the grade, not visible in a scan. I've pretty much agreed with their grades once I get a long look at the book in strong light. To me, eye appeal is more important than technical grade, especially when it comes to St. John romances, or any 50's books..

Edited by comicnoir
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That CL 25 looks very nice but if I saw it in person, I'd probably understand why it's a 5.5. A long non-breaking crease on the back will knock down the grade, not visible in a scan. I've pretty much agreed with their grades once I get a long look at the book in strong light. To me, eye appeal is more important than technical grade, especially when it comes to St. John romances, or any 50's books..

 

Apparently I did see this book in person in Chicago at Bedrock's booth. A very nice 5.5 and perhaps upgrade potential.

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That CL 25 looks very nice but if I saw it in person, I'd probably understand why it's a 5.5. A long non-breaking crease on the back will knock down the grade, not visible in a scan. I've pretty much agreed with their grades once I get a long look at the book in strong light. To me, eye appeal is more important than technical grade, especially when it comes to St. John romances, or any 50's books..

 

Apparently I did see this book in person in Chicago at Bedrock's booth. A very nice 5.5 and perhaps upgrade potential.

 

Many years ago, that copy was originally unearthed by our own Flex Mentallo (who I hope will correct me if any of this is in error). Around 2006, he sold it to a collector named Joe Serpico, and it was Joe who had it slabbed. Joe Serpico is responsible for a great many Baker romance books in the CGC census. In most cases, where only a single, low grade copy of a particular issue has been graded, it's usually due to Joe. He'd eventually acquired almost every issue of the St. John romance titles, and he slabbed them all in short order, the low grade and the high grade alike.

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From CLink last night.

 

RAD2715C20141015_154152_zps42a99747.jpg

 

Not a great copy, but a bit better than my current copy. Only two copies on the census -- the other is a 9.4. If I'm remembering correctly, that's the old label Church copy that Metro was offering for a while for $2,400.

 

They took it down in that mysterious purge of all their Church books some months back. So far as I know, it has yet to reappear.

 

Note that Baker did sneak a dame into the edge of the cover. :D

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That CL 25 looks very nice but if I saw it in person, I'd probably understand why it's a 5.5. A long non-breaking crease on the back will knock down the grade, not visible in a scan. I've pretty much agreed with their grades once I get a long look at the book in strong light. To me, eye appeal is more important than technical grade, especially when it comes to St. John romances, or any 50's books..

 

Apparently I did see this book in person in Chicago at Bedrock's booth. A very nice 5.5 and perhaps upgrade potential.

 

Many years ago, that copy was originally unearthed by our own Flex Mentallo (who I hope will correct me if any of this is in error). Around 2006, he sold it to a collector named Joe Serpico, and it was Joe who had it slabbed. Joe Serpico is responsible for a great many Baker romance books in the CGC census. In most cases, where only a single, low grade copy of a particular issue has been graded, it's usually due to Joe. He'd eventually acquired almost every issue of the St. John romance titles, and he slabbed them all in short order, the low grade and the high grade alike.

 

Joe paid a lot for my Bakers. (The money went to my project in India) I was very surprised when he let them go.

Edited by Flex Mentallo
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A few of those books, that seller originally won from my eBay auctions, over the past year or two. The Cinderella Love 26, which had been my first, one, and only copy of CL 26 for years, and which was not for sale at the time, he'd approached me outside of eBay and made me an offer I couldn't refuse.

 

His Diary Secrets 26 is pretty nice, and a tough issue. If I still needed one, I wouldn't hesitate to spend that much on a copy like that.

 

But the rest, I agree, are a little steep.

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