Shanus-REA suit

[calvindog]

Ryan -- I disagree on your conclusion on relative legal culpabilities but I applaud your sentiment. Kudos to you, you are to be admired for taking your stance.

Hank -- just because you have lots of great deals with people at shows for relatively minor dollars does not mean that the industry is mostly clean. It's not. There are millions of dollars of fraud committed by auction houses and other cretins in this hobby. Just because they don't advertise their fraud in neon lights doesn't mean it's not so. Maybe there will be a documentary about it someday and then you'll believe it.

[Hankphenom]

Originally Posted by calvindog

Ryan -- I disagree on your conclusion on relative legal culpabilities but I applaud your sentiment. Kudos to you, you are to be admired for taking your stance.

Hank -- just because you have lots of great deals with people at shows for relatively minor dollars does not mean that the industry is mostly clean. It's not. There are millions of dollars of fraud committed by auction houses and other cretins in this hobby. Just because they don't advertise their fraud in neon lights doesn't mean it's not so. Maybe there will be a documentary about it someday and then you'll believe it.

I'm going to take your word for it, Jeff, that there are "millions of dollars of fraud committed by auction houses and other cretins in the hobby." So stipulated. And I'm going to assume that you know a lot of things that haven't come to light yet, since as far as I know, even the Mastro /Legendary activities have only been investigated to this point. No indictments yet, right? And you are certainly correct that I've never been involved with auction houses for big money on the buying end, only selling, so maybe I've actually, and unwittingly, been the beneficiary of some of this.
So why are you big money guys still doing it? I wouldn't want to have anything to do with the sleazy morass you describe. And are any of the auction houses clean? Would you advise a total boycott of auctions? If not, how are the less well-informed going to proceed if you don't tell us who we can trust and who we can't?
I really do need the documentary because I live in another world altogether. And I still say, and maybe you will so stipulate, that if you take the dollar volume of all the honest dealings in the hobby (I'm talking web sites, eBay, shows, stores, private deals, honest auctions if there are any, etc.) it vastly outweighs the dollar volume of the scamming. What do you suppose the amount of sports memorabilia business on eBay is every day? Has to be in the millions, doesn't it? So maybe that volume equals the total of auction house fraud in a year? Does this bring our positions any closer together, then? Hopefully, at least the dialogue has improved, and that's progress.
Hank

[uniship]

I sort of agree with both Hankphenom and Calvindog at the same time. On one hand I truly believe there are hundreds of good, honest hard working dealers out there. On the other hand, it's impossible to dispute that there are some well-known bad apples that have a lot of influence in our hobby.

[ElCabron]

Jeff,

I didn't mean to imply there was actual legal culpability. I just meant they're partially responsible. A tiny percentage responsible. Still, a tiny percentage is more than the 0% it would become by not bidding with or consigning to shady auction houses. Some of the individuals discussed in this thread do actually have very real legal culpability, but that's not who I was talking about when I mention culpability. I try to leave the legal discussions to the experts, which there are many of on this board. Or maybe a better way to put it is that I try to leave those discussions to the guys who went to law school.

-Ryan

[Orioles1954]

Is shill bidding relegated to only "house owned" lots? As a consignor, would you "turn the other cheek" if you figured a house was shilling in your favor?

[calvindog]

James -- I mean Captain Obvious -- why do you think there is so much love still on this board for certain auction houses which are obviously crooked? Why do you think I took such a beating 5 years ago for proclaiming that Mastro was crooked?

[Exhibitman]

Does anyone know why it is not possible (or is it possible) to set up a snipe service for auction houses? I use auctionstealer for Ebay whenever there is something I want badly and most of the time I get the item for a fraction of my max. Is there a technical reason why a similar set-up would not work for an auction house? Perhaps the overtime periods?

[Orioles1954]

Sorry Jeff, it takes some of us longer. On consignor items, do you think shilling is/was done upon request or without their knowledge or both?

[19cbb]

Originally Posted by Exhibitman

Does anyone know why it is not possible (or is it possible) to set up a snipe service for auction houses?

Adam, the provider of the software used by auction houses must provide an API so developers/programmers can write applications consistent with the operating environment.