Is it ethical to alter cards and sell them without disclosure?

Snowman · #1 03-20-2024, 06:05 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by gunboat82

Kurt used a tortillon to massage the wrinkle. Someone in the pro-doctoring camp would say that's fine as long you say "massage" instead of "smash," and "tortillon" instead of "spoon."

You say that as if there is no difference between someone gently dabbing water onto a card with a soft, rolled up, wet piece of paper vs smashing the shit out of it with a piece of metal. You're free to disagree with both techniques, but let's not pretend that the two are equivalent.

gunboat82 · #2 03-20-2024, 06:49 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Snowman

You say that as if there is no difference between someone gently dabbing water onto a card with a soft, rolled up, wet piece of paper vs smashing the shit out of it with a piece of metal. You're free to disagree with both techniques, but let's not pretend that the two are equivalent.

And you say "water" as if Kurt uses "water." If Kurt is peddling regular ol' distilled H20 as his proprietary "Card Care" "polish and spray" solution, then that's a separate conversation.

Peter_Spaeth · #3 03-20-2024, 06:51 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by gunboat82

And you say "water" as if Kurt uses "water." If Kurt is peddling regular ol' distilled H20 as his proprietary "Card Care" "polish and spray" solution, then that's a separate conversation.

Ask Kurt if he's willing to drink it.

Snowman · #4 03-20-2024, 08:47 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Peter_Spaeth

Ask Kurt if he's willing to drink it.

I see we have a new litmus test. Would you lick your cards?

steve B · #5 03-21-2024, 09:35 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Snowman

I see we have a new litmus test. Would you lick your cards?

No, they don't taste good.

vintagerookies51 · #6 03-21-2024, 11:09 AM

To echo what others have said, this poll is meaningless without a definition of altered. People then fall on a spectrum of how far they deem something to be acceptable, and won't be captured by 2 or 3 poll responses. Personally, I couldn't care less if a card I buy formerly had a stain on it. I see it as no different than someone wiping away some dirt on a vintage car they're trying to sell. But if that car had a part that was replaced without disclosing it (or a card that had color added to it without disclosure), that's a problem.

Mark17 · #7 03-21-2024, 03:45 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Snowman

I see we have a new litmus test. Would you lick your cards?

Quote:

Originally Posted by steve B

No, they don't taste good.

Actually the Cracker Jacks taste pretty good; the more stains the better. T205 and T206 don't have much taste, and T3 taste awful - like old cardboard.

Of the post-war issues, cards cut from Milk Dud boxes taste the best.

Snowman · #8 03-21-2024, 04:02 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mark17

Actually the Cracker Jacks taste pretty good; the more stains the better. T205 and T206 don't have much taste, and T3 taste awful - like old cardboard.

Of the post-war issues, cards cut from Milk Dud boxes taste the best.

Well, now we've arrived full circle. Is there an obligation to disclose that you licked a card? Surely, some people here would consider it fraud if you opted not to disclose this info at the time of sale.

gunboat82 · #9 03-21-2024, 02:10 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Snowman

I see we have a new litmus test. Would you lick your cards?

This might have been tongue-in-cheek, but I'll bite. A core premise among many defenders of card soaking is that distilled water is acceptable. Presumably, distilled water is acceptable because they've used it before, seen no adverse side effects, and made their own determination that it doesn't change the card's composition once it dries. They can't make the same assumptions about Kurt's Card Care solution because Kurt doesn't disclose what's in it.

So the litmus test would be "if you're not sure you can safely drink Kurt's Card Care because you don't know what's in it, then you shouldn't be making unsupported claims it works just like water."

And, no, I wouldn't lick my cards. But if I did, I'd consider them "Altered - Saliva Added."

Peter_Spaeth · #10 03-21-2024, 02:24 PM

I guess the good news is much of this may be moot when the hobby moves on to counterfeits so good they can't be detected. Then the name of the game will be to alter cards to make them look worse, to ward off any suspicion they just look too nice for what they are.

raulus · #11 03-21-2024, 02:57 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Peter_Spaeth

I guess the good news is much of this may be moot when the hobby moves on to counterfeits so good they can't be detected. Then the name of the game will be to alter cards to make them look worse, to ward off any suspicion they just look too nice for what they are.

Actually reminds me of a story about pearls (and a trade, since we all love a good trade) from a recent WSJ article.

Relevant bits here:

In 1917, Maisie Plant, the young wife of a rich businessman, couldn�t stop admiring a magnificent double strand of pearls from Cartier. The Parisian jeweler was looking for a U.S. headquarters in New York. Pierre Cartier offered to swap the necklace, priced at $1 million, for the Plants� mansion on Fifth Avenue and 52nd Street in Manhattan. Maisie�s husband, Morton, promptly agreed to the trade.

What happened afterward is a cautionary tale.

Why would an industrial baron like Morton Plant�with vast holdings in railroads, steamships and hotels�trade his elegant mansion for a few shiny lumps that came out of an oyster?

For millennia, pearls had been prized around the world and were often more valuable than gold or even diamonds. In 1917, the $1 million the Cartier pearls fetched was worth at least $24 million in today�s money.

What neither Plant nor Cartier could know was that just months earlier, Japanese entrepreneur Kokichi Mikimoto had industrialized the technology to create cultured pearls.

Mikimoto was soon mass-producing them. The price of natural pearls began collapsing in the 1920s and stayed down for decades.

In 1957, after Maisie died, her Cartier necklace sold at auction for $151,000.

In recent years prices for the finest natural pearls have rebounded. In 2015, a Cartier pearl necklace comparable to Maisie Plant�s sold at a Sotheby�s auction in Geneva for about $7 million.

Even so, that�s about one-third of the price of the Plant necklace in 1917, adjusted for inflation.

Cartier got the much better end of that pearls-for-real-estate swap. In 2016, a comparably sized, less-renowned property two blocks up Fifth Avenue from the landmark Cartier building sold for $525 million.

steve B · #12 03-21-2024, 09:32 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Peter_Spaeth

Ask Kurt if he's willing to drink it.

Or provide a MSDS as he should.

Snowman · #13 03-20-2024, 08:42 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by gunboat82

And you say "water" as if Kurt uses "water." If Kurt is peddling regular ol' distilled H20 as his proprietary "Card Care" "polish and spray" solution, then that's a separate conversation.

I don't know what he uses in his card spray. But if it doesn't leave any residue behind and it doesn't damage the card, then it doesn't alter the cards.

gunboat82 · #14 03-20-2024, 08:51 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Snowman

I don't know what he uses in his card spray. But if it doesn't leave any residue behind and it doesn't damage the card, then it doesn't alter the cards.

Fair enough. In Brian's Bob Ewing example above, can we stipulate that the mustache doesn't have to be disclosed if we call it "natural growth?" And removing the mustache again is fine as long as it's "shaving" and not "erasing?"

brianp-beme · #15 03-21-2024, 01:06 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by gunboat82

Fair enough. In Brian's Bob Ewing example above, can we stipulate that the mustache doesn't have to be disclosed if we call it "natural growth?" And removing the mustache again is fine as long as it's "shaving" and not "erasing?"

Unfortunately Ewing's mustache is not natural, being a construct of horse hairs and porcupine quills, and is held on by adhesive that would leave sticky residue if this facial hair substitute was removed. Ethical calisthenics would be required if I were to remove the adhesive and decide to go down the nondisclosure route.

Brian

4815162342 · #16 03-20-2024, 10:20 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Snowman

� if it doesn't leave any residue behind and it doesn't damage the card, then it doesn't alter the cards.

I believe George Costanza said something similar.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Pro

Casey2296 · #17 03-20-2024, 10:55 PM

Semantic rabbit hole, the value has increased on some of these cards so much we should disclose any work like a fine art listing does.

EddieP · #18 03-21-2024, 07:56 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Casey2296

Semantic rabbit hole, the value has increased on some of these cards so much we should disclose any work like a fine art listing does.

So true. And the information provided is very exhaustive. It will note the type of and reason for the restoration, the year the restoration was done, the person who did the restoration, and the name of owner who commisioned the restoration.

packs · #19 03-21-2024, 08:21 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by EddieP

So true. And the information provided is very exhaustive. It will note the type of and reason for the restoration, the year the restoration was done, the person who did the restoration, and the name of owner who commisioned the restoration.

These lengthy descriptions and histories belong only to the upper crop of art. Most of the art up for auction will not include lengthy histories of the piece or any special documentation. Perhaps you might know the previous owners name or the original owner's collection it originates from, or the original gallery that sold it, but more often than not with modern art you won't get anything other than your painting.

View Poll Results: Is it ethical to alter and sell cards without disclosing that they were altered?
Yes, it is perfectly acceptable and ethical to sell an altered without disclosing this to the buyer	5	4.24%
No, it is unethical to not disclose alterations the alterations	34	28.81%
No, it is unethical to not disclose the alterations, and it is fraud to do so	79	66.95%
Voters: 118. You may not vote on this poll

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