An Ebay Ethical Question Regarding Forgeries

I think was this a case of 'not as described' when it comes to the claimed catalog value.
Don

I will note one thing for accuracy. The auction lot stated:




It did not state what catalog was used, nor what edition.

Any seller seriously hoping to stay in business would mention this. The amateurs are easy to spot and I give them a wide berth.


Absolutely yes.


Yes, that is what a conscientious dealer wanting to stay in business, get repeat customers, and value their reputation would do.




Yes, definitely true. The more expensive the stamp, the more knowledge I would expect from the buyer.

Let's take this stamp for example, which is for sale here:

https://www.ebay.com.au/itm/NEW-SOU...254665175173



For a straight New South Wales collection, this is arguably the key stamp.

It's a forgery and the seller has been advised. The one 'signature' I checked is a forgery, as is the postmark and therefore IMO the overprint.

Now, if it was any other country I wouldn't be so confident.

At the higher end of the market, the buyer really should know his/her stuff.

"Any stamps that are worthy of being sold on their own merits will be pulled and lotted separately."

That is far from always true, at least in US lots. And who the owner is and whether he/she is still alive also plays into it. But I have seen plenty of large lots with individual items in them that could well have been pulled out but weren't. Om fact, over the last several years it is far more likely to find at least some of those types of items in large lots then to not find any.

Rev - What is "worthy" needs to be better defined but no auction house worth their salt is going to give away commission because they left real singles material in an album or large lot. I am talking about singles that are high quality, relatively high or just plain high catalog value and are always sought after. All of the better houses pull these stamps and lot them separately. They always have with my collections that I have sold. The rest is further broken down into balance lots that make sense. I am talking Siegel and other similar houses. It is another story if a house does not do their due diligence or just wants to move material in volume. That is another bird altogether although it does a disservice to both seller and house to not extract all of the dollar value possible.

My experience over the last decade is that even major auction houses frequently leave high end material that could be auctioned as a single lot in US large lots. Essentially those items help sell the lot so they wind up selling for more and the commissions are not lost.

Bobby - Interesting that the One Pound is a forgery. Judging by the handstamps a few collectors were fooled. Thank you for pointing it out. May I ask what exactly clued you in?

The perforations and the colours were the first thing, but for the latter, on a computer monitor that's nothing unusual.

The postmark was the key. There are no Sydney duplex cancels with NSW at the bottom of the datestamp. The NSW is in the concentric ovals.

The Georg Buhler mark, on comparison with the genuine, didn't look right, especially the dots over the U.

See https://www.filatelia.fi/experts/marks/buhlerg.jpg for the genuine.

I just checked the J SCHL mark. Also a forgery. The genuine marks are here:

https://www.filatelia.fi/experts/marks/schles.jpg and https://www.filatelia.fi/experts/marks/schles2.jpg

The seller's feedback also leaves a great deal to be desired.

Thank you Bobby. Great stuff!

I can think of two recent revenue-based auctions immediately that fit this criteria:

1. Aldrich's auctions of the John Lewis collection. Many of the balance lots had multiple premium individual items.

And the most egregious IMO:

2. The Curtis Collection auctions by Siegel. Some of the balance lots were egregiously compiled. There were MANY single items in those lots would have been single lots in any other Siegel auction, let alone those of other houses. IMO, they did the estate an extreme disservice lotting the items the way they did. It's almost as if they didn't want to be bothered.

Dan - Interesting observation on the Curtis Sale. Let us see what balance lots show up in the Gross sales. Sale Four is coming very soon which consists solely of 1847 issue related material. I assume that Gross had a complete revenue collection?

There are good reasons why some better items are left on a bigger lot. 1) The collection arrives in the avalanche of material that always shows up at the deadline and the auction house doesn't have the time to spend as much time on the lotting as they could earlier and the consignor isn't willing to wait for the next auction. 2) As others have said, things are left in intentionally to make the lot more appealing to buyers and it may not be the auction house's doing - sometimes it is requested by consignors to sell a collection intact.

Getting back to the original question, an auction house will not have time to check every stamp in a large lot, but they should spot check it here and there with an emphasis on the better items. They should certainly note stuck down or hinging/regumming. Forgeries could more problematic as the describer may not have the more specific knowledge to ID them.

Are any members able to explain to me, what is meant by the last sentence, please? I cannot grasp it. (In blue)

Situation:
Commentary on the Forgery of Martayan Lan (ML)
Works by Galileo Forged.
(A 10 million dollar book)

Bredekamp's first instinctive reaction to the possibility that ML might be a fake had been one of incredulity and despair: if that turned out to be the case, he wrote to Wilding, the "history of science could close its doors."

As unsettling and frustrating as the ML story might be, there is no need to despair. One can imagine that historians of science — and indeed whoever works with printed sources — will gradually accommodate the presence of forgery, joining other scholarly communities who have been dealing with it for centuries. As for the more fundamental issue that all narratives, including our own, contain constructive elements, this awareness is not fatal to truth. It is fatal to the illusion that truth can be other than a precarious and contestable achievement.

Being aware that truth can never be anything other than a precarious and contestable achievement. Thinking that the truth can be anything else is kidding oneself. Truth IS precarious and contestable.

I am not a fan of unnecessarily dense/obtuse writing. I hate Crimes & Misdemeanors.

You'll have to take that one up with Richard II's Parliament, I'm afraid.