City Lights - Shakespeare Never Did This (2 Viewers)

hank solo

Just practicin' steps and keepin' outta the fights
Reaper Crew
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Founding member
I REALLY don't think so

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=370023720476

2ac6_1.jpg
 
Yep, that's a pretty crappy forgery of both signatures. There was no "signed and numbered" edition of this title either... if there had been I'm pretty sure that City Lights would have used the hardcover issue for it.

I sent this guy a message. Let's see what he does with the info.
 
the "1" in 100 is a very typically european-looking "1" too... people from san francisco don't write their 1's like that.
 
the "1" in 100 is a very typically european-looking "1" too... people from san francisco don't write their 1's like that.

Great call from Jordan. This is likely a European forgery. I have seen people write their ones like that and they are always from Europe.

You would think that a forger would think these things through. Also, if they forged a later edition and did not try to get greedy by trying to make this a limited edition and numbering this, they may have gotten away with it.

Bill
 
Not to turn this into an ebay hating thread, but there were some major changes to ebay that take effect on 2/20. Of course, the fees went up big time. Final value fees went up like 50%. Also the biggest change is that sellers will not be allowed to leave anything BUT positive feedback for buyers. What this will do is allow people to bid and then not pay without the seller being able to do anything about it. Also, it is assumed that this will increase feedback blackmail. The scenatrio goes like this:

Buyer buys a book from seller. Buyer takes 15 days to pay for the item. After it is paid for and received, the buyer sends the seller an e-mail asking him to post positive feedback. The seller does not feel that it is warranted. The buyer then tells the seller that if he does not leave glowing, positive feedback (which is all that he can do), then he will post negative feedback. At this point, the seller can only post glowing positive feedback. Imagine that the seller does this to 50 sellers. Now he has 50 glowing feedbacks, when he is clearly someone that no one would want to deal with. Now he buys an expensive book. Let's say that it is a $2000 first edition. He bids on it and pays promptly. The seller ships the book. The buyer receives the book and replaces it with a later edition worth $15 and immediatly e-mails the seller letting him know that he has mis-described the book. He returns the later edition book for a full refund.

This is all now possible for a disreputable buyer on ebay because of the changes that they just made. If you wonder why they would do this, I have my own theories...

1) Ebay makes money on the transaction either way
2) Fraudulent buyer then decides to hit it big and with his 50 positive feedbacks steals images off of the internet and selles books that he does not have for big money before folding. Leaving the ripped off buyewrs wondering how a seller with 50+ GLOWING feedbacks could possibly be a fraud... Ebay still makes their cut on the deal even though the buyer is out big money and the seller has moved on to another account to do exactly the same thing

Hopefully it will change back. There is outrage to the point that the biggest seller on ebay. A platinum seller with over 138,000 feedbacks and one that listed 10,000 items a wek has left ebay. I can only imagine that this will cost them some money.

I have a bunch of stuff that I was going to post on ebay (Buk, mostly). I'll probably post it here and not list it on ebay. Ebay has shown that it is only concerned with buyers, even though buyers do not pay ebay anything. Every dollar that they make is either from the sellers or from advertising. It is a scarry time to sell anything on ebay unless you know the winning bidder and know that they will not rip you off.

Expect a whole new market of scamming to come out of Nigeria on this one...

OK... I'm done complaining. I'll post my fixed price items on this forum. Then if they do not sell, I MAY take my chances on ebay. At worst, I'll get ripped off.

Bill



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Has anyone ever tried any other auction sites?

I registered on www.ebid.net when it started up but never really used it. I browsed for a while, but due to ebay's monopoly, there never seemed to be anything worth buying on there. I also suspect that for sellers, prices would stay low due to fewer potential buyers looking in. They still claim No Fees... so I might take a look one day.

I think Yahoo used to carry auctions. And a few other sites have appeared and disappeared over the years.

It has always struck me as a little strange that as time goes by and ebay increases its turn-over and profits and the number of people using it continues to rocket that they have really ratcheted up their fees and such.
 
ebay itself is making money, but its other divisions aren't (like skype). skype's service has gotten worse, and they can't figure out how to monetize it, which forced them to write off millions of dollars from skype's value (which they took as a loss). raising ebay's fees helps finance the expansion of the company in other areas.

the thing i'm most annoyed about is how i got this email asking me if i was "excited" about lower insertion fees. then, there was a little thing that told me there would also be "adjusted" final value feels. blegh- they're really the only game in town in my opinion. like i said on another thread, i'll take neg feedback before i let myself get scammed (unless it happens through paypal, with a SNAD claim), and i'll wait for it to get out of hand before i quit. i'm not a volume seller, so i'm less worried, although the horror stories i've heard from people with hundreds of auctions at a time are pretty bad.
 
eBay fee gouging aside (remember they own PayPal now too, so in effect get paid twice for every transaction), I think the changes to feedback are good, and I sell and buy on eBay.

I have 635 feedbacks on eBay and 0 of them are negative. 100% positive. You know why I have no negatives? Because I won't give the world's shittiest sellers (I've been dealing with a particularly awful one now for 6 weeks) a negative rating, because I am afraid of the retaliation negative rating.

When I don't give a shitty seller a negative I just give no feedback, which does not help the next potential buyer.

This is partly a mental problem I have trying to maintain that 100% positive, but hey, that's my problem. ;) But I know I am not alone and a lot of really, really shitty sellers skate by because people don't want the retaliatory negative.

Does it put the seller at a disadvantage? Yes. Will it make for more honest ratings overall? Yes.
 
it will definitely help buyers, but i fear that there will be a swing in the other direction: eg, "well, he didn't ship my ____ the minute i paid him, so i'm leaving a neg, fuck it." i thought the detailed ratings were good, because i can use them to leave a seller a positive at the same time that i can register my frustration that the book was not even close to "perfect condition." this way, i think it leaves the door open to scamming, since there are really bad buyers on eBay- i'm sure you've dealt with them, and they are able to do whatever it takes now to gouge you for partial refunds, or shipping refunds, or whatever they may dream up just so you don't have to deal with them leaving you neg. feedback. it sucks.
 
...there are really bad buyers on eBay- i'm sure you've dealt with them, and they are able to do whatever it takes now to gouge you for partial refunds, or shipping refunds, or whatever they may dream up just so you don't have to deal with them leaving you neg. feedback. it sucks.
Yeah, but it sucks like that already. As a seller I have just sent money back to people - not small amounts of money - on more than one occasion just to keep that dreaded fucking negative feedback away.

But as a buyer I have no way of making the situation "go away." I am stuck with the seller. Like I said, I've been dealing with one guy for almost two months who has my money and I have nothing. Oh, yeah, well, he says he shipped it and has insurance and receipts and he sends me a tracking number that is invalid.

So now what? Say goodbye to $350? He's an incredible dick, and if I left him negative feedback, he would retaliate in about 15 seconds. Even though, again, he's got my money and has no proof of sending me anything.

So there you go, as the seller, honestly, I'd eat the $350 to keep the good rep. As the buyer who is out the $350 I feel I have no recourse but negative feedback.

I'm sure if all I did was sell on eBay my opinion would be quite different. But my buying and selling is almost equally split, so I have to look down both barrels on this one.
 
mjp,
If you paid with Paypal you can dispute it. He has to provide real tracking info to avoid a chargeback....

Of course you have probably already though of this and may not be able to dispute it, especially if you fall through one of the huge holes in their protection plans...


Bill
 
No, this was a personal check sent and processed on Jan 15 according to my bank.

And this is my point - I would have NEVER sent a check to someone with a few negative feedbacks. But this guy had zero negatives out of a few hundred positives. To me, I let down my guard when I see that. You have to trust sometimes.

But if I would have seen feedback similar to what I WANT to give (and may still give, 100% positive be damned), I would have never sent a check.
 
the "1" in 100 is a very typically european-looking "1" too... people from san francisco don't write their 1's like that.

that's what stroke me too.
I maybe would not have seen the forgery on Hanks signature, but the #1 is clearly not American - even in Germany we know this. (well, it shows that some might NOT know.)

mjp said:
He'll never sell it now. Don't ask how I know.

How do you know?
 
Well, in spite of being told that this was fake, the seller never pulled the original listing (nor did he respond to my email) and has now relisted it with a lower BIN price. A-hole.
 
Hi,
I just sent him another e-mail, politely asking him to pull it. I was nice. Let's see if he is willing to pull it. It may not be a bad idea for others to weigh in with him on why you are sure that it is not real. Maybe he is not convinced that it is a forgery. Hopefully the mountain of evidence will convince him.

Bill
 
It's gone...

"The seller ended this listing early because of an error in the listing." Good to see he did the right thing. The term "error" seems a bit bland; what an error! Let's hope it was an honest mistake.
 
He seemed like an honest enough guy. I think that some people get it in their heads that they have a valuable item in their hands and when they are told that it is valueless, they resist, hoping that others are wrong. Then, after hearing it a lot, they realize that it is valueless.

He replied to me that he bought it from a bookstore in San Diego. Hopefully he can return it there.

Bill
 
I maybe would not have seen the forgery on Hanks signature,

That is what struck me first as a fake, unless Bukowski signed this book at the age of 12.:) I didn't notice the 1 though, but then again I'm from Europe. i did notice that the numbering was in black, instead of the usual red, en that the numbering was not on the colophon page.
Together we'd make a good team.;)

Pity about the book though, I would pay 18 bucks for an unsigned copy.
 
Well, someone is going to buy it, since it has a bid. Doesn't look like he is going to remove or change the auction.
 
Hi,
I sent him two e-mails politely asking him to remove this as it is a known forgery. He has not replied to either one. Truth is that someone will see it and knowing that it is a forgery will bid high and then refuse to buy it. He seemed like an honorable seller as the last time he removed it, but now, almost a year later, he relists it and has not pulled it when reminded that it iss a poor forgery. Maybe he does not check his e-mails often.

Pity, as this makes me suspect his ethics as a bookseller is he is willing to sell a book which is clearly a forgery.

At least the auction does not have a hidden buyer, so once it closes, the winning bidder can be told that it is not authentic. Of course, if the seller is a great buyer, it is possible that it will have already been paid for at that point.

I still hope that the seller realizes how confident we are that this is not authentic and has a change of heard and removes it, never opting to relist it on ebay.

Bill
 
I've been searching all over the net and cannot seem to find what the market value of a 1st edition hardcover of Shakespeare Never Did This is. Unsigned. Perfect condition.

Ballpark anyone?
 
Anyone else want to e-mail the seller and let him know that he is trying to sell a known forgery? I e-mailed him twice, but he ignored me both times. Seems he thinks that someone on this forum (or more than one person) will not be willing to bid this up and not pay for it to keep this off of the market.

It is one thing to sell something out of ignorance, but now it sure gives off the appearance that he knows that it is a forgery and just wants to sell it and get rid of it. If it were mine, I'd stamp the word "Forgery" on each signature and sell it as a nice book that was forged....

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=370076894233

Bill
 
It seems that the buyer was actually someone from Italy. Please PM me if you know who the buyer is. I just notified them of the item not being authentic. Hopefully this will teach this seller that this book will not be sold on ebay. His only chance of passing this off as authentic will be to talk a local bookstore into buying it, thereby passing a known forgery, which is a crime in almost every country in the World.

Bill

p.s. I wonder how long until I am threatened with a suit. I should keep a list, with e-mails so that I can publish them someday! Some of them are priceless. Nothing better than someone from Europe threatening to sue me. Do they sue me in the US or in their country? If they sue me here, it would cost A LOT. If they sue me in theirs, I just ignore it as I am not bound by the laws of their country. Plus, there is the real problem of jurisdiction. Something illegal in Netherlands or Italy may be legal here. It is all very fun, really.
 
So very sad to see this obvious forgery go for almost $120. Ebay is littered with forgeries in my field (books and music memorabilia). I've emailed fraudulent sellers many times pointing out that the item they're selling is fake and asking them in a polite manner to remove the listing. Usually to no avail. In serious cases where a lot of money is involved I point out that I would not hesitate to report them to ebay for fraud unless they cancel the auction. On most occasions I'm complete ignored. On a couple of occasions I even got a warning from ebay for interfering with other sellers.

ebay is just one huge money machine. They really couldn't care less as about authenticity as long as it brings in revenue. So very sad . . .

wt
 

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