[drcy]

I think PSA photo slabs are ugly. To me, it looks like they're in Oscar Meyer hot dog packaging. And Becket's slabs aren't much better-- the proverbial plastic coffin. That's just my personal taste, and if someone likes slabbed photos that's fine. I'm merely voicing what I like, not saying what is right or wrong.

I've always been strongly against PSA condition grading photos, as many collectors would then trim photos to attain their desired grade. You can count on it. There's nothing wrong with worn edges and dinged corners on a photo-- I want number grade-centric card collectors to leave them alone. Trimming a photo ruins it in my opinion. A 1910 Ty Cobb news photo should have worn corners and a small wrinkle or two. That's how old photos are. They're old and old things have wear. To me, trimming a slightly rough edge on the 1910 Cobb photo is like removing the ball and clete marks from a game used Babe Ruth bat. The bat is supposed to show use. And I can promise you that if PSA started condition grading photos, out the paper cutter will come.

I find many trading card rules to be dubious as applied to cards, and even more so when applied elsewhere. Believe it or not, baseball card collectors are a strange breed with strange little rules for their card collecting fantasy world. They do things such as have never ending or resolved chat board arguments over what constitutes a rookie card or whether or not a trade card counts as a baseball card.

Duly note, I started off as a card collector and am a fan of cards. I have nothing against baseball cards or the collecting of them. I just see them as different than photos. And I have participated in the rookie card and 'what counts as a baseball card' debates.

One good point that was made and that, after reading it, I agree with is that if a photo is in a slab, the collector won't be able to examine it closely so the slab should give more details. Thats a good point I hand't thought of. Though that's more of a reason not to slab photos (see first paragraph).