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rmpaq5
Posts: 1,980
Joined: Nov 2014
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| Sunday, November 8, 2020 12:01 AM | |
As one of the percieved "big guys" trust me Jenny and Jmetal these comments from other "big guys" are not directed at either of you, nor the majority of the site members.
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spazmatastic
Posts: 5,877
Joined: Dec 2014
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| Sunday, November 8, 2020 12:54 AM | |
WOW! This thread is all over the place. I don't know why so many people got some random itch in their pants, but I also know the incendiaries here. Don't think that this is the 1st time I've read this thread, but I had nothing to say earlier that hadn't been said already and usually articulated very well AND with examples. Calm the hell down people! It's just a card website. Your whole life is not on the line if you make a mistake, misunderstand the rules or are scared that you'll be blasted for doing something wrong.
I THINK the original point of this thread was: do it right or ask for help from someone to help you do it right. If people keep ignoring that, Admin might just take away all the options to add CL's for everyone and remove all the access that L8's have been granted to fix minor things fast. A CL missing 50+ cards is not a quick fix for us L8s, or even for Admin. A CL missing ALL teams is a very extensive fix that takes a lot of time as well! A CL missing a card or 2 is a very quick fix and understandable in some cases. Those claiming the "big guys" want it this way or not at all is just ignorance. All Level 8 members want to follow Admin's rules and we want everyone else to follow them. The Admin's gave us L8's the options to take some of their workload away so that they could focus more on making the site more functional and user-friendly. This site has made TREMENDOUS leaps in functionality in just the 6 years since I joined!!! Some people just don't care about how things should be done here and others just refuse to accept them. To those latter people I say, stop complaining about things you can't change! Figure out how to do it right.
Jenny and Jim, I don't see anything happening to get rid of this site. This isn't Zistle or the several other websites that got destroyed or bought by Beckett or that just petered out. The owners of this site have done a fantastic job at making sure Beckett could never take legal action against them for "proprietory information usage" whether that be info, images or otherwise. It also appears that the owners truly love this site and have no interest in selling to Beckett. Honestly, I don't think Beckett could afford to even make an offer for this site now. They spent so much money in legal fees against other card media in the past that they are getting really thin. They are desperate for cash now. They don't have the staff to maintain what they own and keep losing members at a rapid rate. I've been a member of the website since 2003 and a paying member for over a dozen years until a few months ago. They raised the prices with the most dramatic price-jump I've seen since I joined that site. Beckett is pricing themselves out of the business and collectors have found work-arounds for anything Beckett thought they were providing in the past. I'm almost 100% confident that there are more active users on this site now than there are on Beckett.com. I'd rather be on this site than Beckett and no other site is even close to those 2 in trading features!!!
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NO PWE's EVER!!! PLZ PM me 1st before sending a trade or buy offer. _______________________________________________________________________ Largest total PC card collections by Team, then Athlete (as of 3/31/23): STL Cardinals (MLB) - 8700+; Carolina Panthers - 2800+; GB Packers - 1700+ cards Mark Martin (NASCAR) - 2034 cards; Jimmie Johnson (NASCAR) - 1776+ cards; Jeff Gordon (NASCAR) - 1563; Ricky Rudd (NASCAR) - 828; Ozzie Smith (MLB) - 692+
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BOBSCARDZ
Posts: 4,973
Joined: Nov 2014
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| Sunday, November 8, 2020 4:34 AM | |
Some posts get a big "SOURGRAPES" from me. Yet others hit the nail squarely. I said that the TCDb is the GREATEST !, not sure how many times. I LUV it ! However, when an issue arises, the "big guys" get their panties in a bunch. NO REASON, to call us liars and the such. I am and will be a major proponent of change where needed, the history of an issue and suggestions to maybe fix it is not an assault on the "big guys", just a "lil guy" trying to help. I and many others do believe that some "big guys" need to change their style of addressing the crowd sourced membership. Not a big deal, just don't belittle us in the process. Many of the posts infer my involvement in issues, maybe so, but not enough to start a forum war. On the question of clarity, if I don't understand I ask, if I still don't understand, FAQ or not I ask again.....then I get lectured for not "getting it". We all have levels of understanding. If I went ahead without questions, I'm lectured again for doing it wrong. And yes it is very frustrating to help the site then. Anyway, I will continue trying, right or wrong, guidance or not, until I get it right. And "big guys" you do a fantastic job, just be patient with us that are trying to help.
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sandyrusty
Posts: 4,538
Joined: Dec 2014
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| Sunday, November 8, 2020 6:30 AM | |
First off, Firemedic1242, nothing here is directed at you. I honestly believe you were trying to contribute and unfortunately you frustrated a member who has seen these entries all too often and has continuously worked on the IR needed to correct them. I, like a few others who expressed the same, will not try to tackle some of the newer set checklists as I don't have the knowledge about card manufacturers and their insane methods of today to even attempt it. I stick to the years when card production was much more predictable and easier to make sense of. I hope you regroup and look to continue contributing to the site and as you learn more about the site, you increse the contributions as good contributing members are sorely needed.
As for the rest of thread, the vocal crowd with their attacks on the "big guys" has managed to alienate another one of the best members on this site. Congratulations! One more down and probably only 5 or 6 to go. Keep doing things on this site that go against all the rules clearly stated by the sole authority (Admin for those of you who don't / won't accept that there is only one). Many of you will not do what is necessary to gain the L8 permission level so that you can help out in some of the key areas on the site. Instead you rather continuously make demands on those who are and then complain about what and how it was done, and what wasn't beccause Admin said "No" to it. A recent example was the 1988-1992 Donruss sets. The demands to have every miniscule VAR of which the majority of collectors could absolutely not care less finally led to one of those "big guys" to tackle each set, asking for help from the rest of the membership. The majority of those who helped are those who really could not care less about the VAR but some of you who continuously demanded these be listed could not take the time to go through your own cards to help out. And saying you have so many thousands of them that you could not take the time to do so is a very poor excuse and speaks of laziness. Worse, one set was no sooner close to completion that demands were being made to tackle another set. YOU really don't understand the work that it involved for one set no matter how often it was expressed, and you could not even acknowledge the work done with simple gratitude.
All of you complaining about the "big guys" do not realize the work involved in resolving IR. Yes some are easy but some, especially when it runs through a whole set, takes hours to resolve, time I would rather be spending in sorting my own collection. I recently discovered a Panini sticker set that was wrongly listed, each sticker having its own listing even though most shared the card with another sticker. The checklist had to be amended to reflect the two sticker numbers, links to the players and teams established, and then the redundant sticker listings had to be deleted. I could amend the checklist and do the links but an IR for each and every one needing to be deleted needed to be submitted. It took me over an hour to do all of this and then one of the "big guys" had to resolve each IR I submitted. AND IT WAS A HOCKEY STICKER SET! I DON'T COLLECT HOCKEY BUT I DID THIS TO IMPROVE A VERY SMALL CORNER OF THE SITE! Maybe some of you who are constantly complaining should change your approach to the site instead of trying to change the "big guys".
This site may be its own worst enemy as it gets better and better, and more popular in the collecting world. In the last year, I have found that it is not only the things that are being wrongly done that has caused frustartions not only for me but for many others. As we have gained a larger membership, we are seeing more bad apples floating to the top. In the last year, I have found traders here are getting to be more greedy in what they ask for than what used to be very fair offers. This year alone, I have had 3 traders hold their cards that they promised me till they received those I sent out. I am not a new trader on this site so I can only think that their methods are ill-willed. I have more and more traders ask for vintage cards in exchange for new cards, 1 for 1. If you want to collect and trade for vintage, may I suggest you buy large lots of vintage and use the duplicates for trade to acquire those you need? After all, isn't that what those who do have vintage for trade did? I know it is how I got my traders. I have seen posts asking for trade offers - so I send in a trade offer only to be ignored (and yes, one of the complainers in this thread is guilty of this). I have had trade offers so lopsided, it is not even funny - when I countered and they accepted, they then came out with the lame excuse that it would be too expensive to send the cards. I also recently had one that tried to justify a hugely lopsided trade because it would cost him more than usual to send the cards. Does he think my postage is free???? I have frequently received trades with cards missing. A notable one is where I was supposed to receive the 2015 Topps Bryant card - it is now the only card I am missing to complete the set. In another more recent trade 10 cards were missing. Funny, all but one were HoF / stars or RC. Honest errors? Why is it the best cards are those we make omitting errors on? All this has caused me to turn my trading off for the time being as I was fed up with the greed of some of the individuals here. Who knows when or if ever will I turn it back on.
Yes a rant but also an expression of the frustrations that many of the complainers are causing many others on this site - to the point where you have successfully caused another one of our best members to throw in the towel. Am I alone in thinking these things? No as I have heard similar from other members that I respect greatly. The vocal crowd should sit back and listen for once instead of attacking the "big guys".
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Bruno -------- Check my Profile page to see my 2023 Goals and my Lists of sets near completion (5 cards or less) or sets getting close (less than 100 cards missing and 75% complete). https://www.tcdb.com/Forum.cfm/Page/B/ID/0/?MODE=VIEW&ThreadID=25745&C=0
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BOBSCARDZ
Posts: 4,973
Joined: Nov 2014
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| Sunday, November 8, 2020 8:27 AM | |
Bruno 
But too much falls on deaf ears. Whether it falls in learning the proper site mechanics or just trading. I read every word of your rant, your gripe is about proper trading techniques, I read them all. But does the rest of the membership, especially your traders?
I'm not bailing out, I'll try and do my part to the best way possible. There have been numerous issues over the years, but I've adapted and moved on. I have found many site techniques that have been valuable to me and my collecting style.
One more time, thank you ADMIN, THIS SITE is great, so are the members, kudos to L8s that do the grunt work ..... much appreciated ! I will continue without much change, just my nature. Everybody uses the TCDb in many different ways, that's great versatilty and use of this wonderful site. Have a good day everyone. Enjoy your collecting.
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bbcardz
Posts: 1,045
Joined: Feb 2018
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| Sunday, November 8, 2020 10:26 AM | |
I'm not an L8 but I appreciate the work put in by the L8s (and other volunteers) to uphold the high standards and reputation of TCDb.
Food for thought...
The dedicated L8s should ask themselves, are the posts of the "sourgrapes" crowd important enough ruin your mood/day?
(Hopefully the answer is "No, their posts will not ruin my mood/day".) I do understand the L8s frustration--they are pretty much working with the public (and most of us know how irritating that can be at times). They are volunteering their valuable time and skills to uphold the standards of the site. They are human and get discouraged and frustrated when others don't do the same when adding checklists. Fixing improperly uploaded checklists is a big timesuck. Another big timesuck is helping those who cannot clearly state their questions/intentions and then ignore or fail to comprehend the helpful advice given to them.
The positive thing about this is that L8s still encourage everyone's efforts to add checklists, even though a number of checklists have been improperly uploaded by inexperienced members in the past. If the frequency of mistakes is a significant problem--what steps can we take to solve this problem and eliminate/decrease the number of improperly uploaded checklists? If this is a significant problem, we need to make it easier for inexperienced members to see the TCDb links that will help them do things properly. Here's some possible solutions:
Step 1: Upgrade the TCDb forum so that the more vital TCDb FAQs/tutorials/guidelines/etc. are stickied to the top of each forum page. The location of links to help newer member improve their TCDb skills needs to be improved. Currently, these links are located at the bottom of the TCDb pages which are frequently missed by newer members.
The upgraded forum could also be used to sticky important forum threads such as those well-thought out threads by Dan that sink into forum oblivion after a week or two. (Dan's ATTENTION: New Members - Please read thread is now on page 9 with little hope of any more new members actually reading it.)
(fwiw, page 2 of the New Features (Proposed) tracker, there are four proposed features that could possibly be incorporated into an upgraded forum: Image Upload, Like Button, Mute Member and Subscribe to Set and Player Forums. Ironically, the link to the New Features tracker is nowhere to be found in the TCDb footer. Members who want to propose new features must somehow find out that they have to first click "Things To Do" to find the New Features link.)
At this point, I don't know if the current forum can be upgraded with stickies or whether we'd have to install completely different forum software and risk losing our current forum threads.
Step 2: Sticky the links mentioned above at the top every page of TCDb.
Step 3: Modify the TCDb Permissions in a way that will effectively improve member's skills and understanding of submitting IRs, uploading checklists, editing entries/notes/tags/TIDs/PIDs, scanning images, recognizing improper items, etc. Perhaps we should toughen up the permissions tests somehow?
Hopefully the items I've proposed will inspire more ideas on how to reduce timesuck issues on TCDb.
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JennyMiller521
Posts: 181
Joined: Sep 2018
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| Sunday, November 8, 2020 11:59 AM | |
I agree, this thread is ALL over the place. And is WAY to many people taking things offensively that never were intended that way (at least not from me). These are becoming essay repsonses about how terrible people are on this site (at least that's what I am getting out of it, correct me if I'm wrong). (assuming y'all want to be called L8's even though no one has actually answered that previous question) and no clue what an "L8" is but sure :) It seems these L8's maybe need to take a step back and take a break for a week or something because boy are they clearly frustrated with things. Things that are not even included originally in this post are just being poured out. Some are seeing people (assuming myself) as a "complainer" and a "sourgrape" and I really don't get how that turned into all that but sure :) I still have zero clarification from my thought 2 days ago of how come it takes more time to add some SP cards into an already created checklist than to redo an entire checklist. I'll assume because a checklist is copied and pasted from a different site? I honestly was under the impression from reading the rules before I started creating a CL that we are not supposed to copy and paste from different sources but rather create from scratch. And that's what I was doing, typing up every card number, player name, team name and noting if a Rookie Card. And I was using the format the site requested in their rules with the headings on the top of spreadsheet etc. I had spent over a half hour just typing up the first 120 cards and then had saw someone else had loaded it. So I honestly asked; wouldn't it be more time consuming to create an entire CL than add the SP cards. But then this turned south fast. So IDK what to tell you guys. People are trying to help and understand and it's getting no where at this point. I would suggest that maybe SP and SSP cards get their own section like inserts do so that when those surface (which typically that entire list does for a week or so after release) they could be easily added. But I am completely fine with seeing no one here wants suggestions or to have an actual conversation. I've only recently over the pandemic started having the time to interact on here with fellow collectors and have clearly seen this weekend that the forums are NOT the spot to have any interactions with anyone. And I'll keep out of everything here with trying to help the site. Since people are seeming to think "new members" (fyi I've been here over 2 years) are the issue and are causing "L8s" to want to leave the site. Even though I can guarentee you that is far from the issue; everyone controls their own reaction to others actions :)
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jimetal7212
Posts: 4,478
Joined: Dec 2016
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| Sunday, November 8, 2020 12:22 PM | |
It wasn't so much missing SPs; that happens and is par for the course. Getting as many SPs in as possible helps everyone though. There is nothing against copying information from a publically available source, cardboard connection for example. Note, publically available and not pprotected by any proprietary info, procing for example. A number, name and team are not protected info. The key is to convert it into this site's format to include any Note1 and, if applicable Note 2's. In this case I tried to ID as many VARs as possible and at least left a VAR: for Note2 so others could fill in the info.
Here, it was the uploading the entire checklist "basic" the information (number, name and team). In this case there were only 10 cards, out of 300, that had teams assigned. That would mean that someone(s) would have to go through and individually add teams which does take time. There were also numerous Note1's missing that could have been added. Admin has stated that checklists should be accurate and complete as possible upon first upload. I used the aforementioned site to get the basic checklist and converted it. It took less than 10 minutes to properly format it. It took a little longer to get as many VARs found as possible.
As far as the suggestion of SPs and SSPs being a separate set, again this is Admin's call. He has decided that they are art of the main checklist. You've noticed the discussions concerning VARs and holograms I'm sure. Those used to be separate sets until Admin decided to integrate all VARs into the main checklist. That way peole could see their true set completion % regardless of which VAR they had entered.
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When the sky is coming down When you feel like you're going to drown When you know the end is all that you've been looking for When the pain is too much to bear When there's no one who will care
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JennyMiller521
Posts: 181
Joined: Sep 2018
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| Sunday, November 8, 2020 12:44 PM | |
Yeah I could definitely see added teams as very time consuming especially if whoever is doing it is like me and doesn't know exactly what team this guy is playing for this year. I didn't know that the SPs were previously separated. And didn't realize using a CL from cardboard connection was OK to copy and paste. I could see where that's ALOT faster :)
On the topic of notes, RC obviously but what about Rookie Debut would that be RD or RC or nothing? Or All Star cards? Do those get AS?
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jimetal7212
Posts: 4,478
Joined: Dec 2016
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| Sunday, November 8, 2020 12:53 PM | |
Rookie Debut are shown as RD in here. One need to be careful because not all cards marked RD are true RCs also. All-Star cards are marked as AS. They had an Active Leaders subset in this issue. I could have used AL as the Note1, but I'm pretty sure AL is cemented as American League. I used LDR and in the Glossary I ensured that note was proper. Home Run Derby is usually HRD and so on. There is a glossary lookup if one is unsure what letters to used.
Edit: Forgot to add one thing about checklists. A noted key point you'll hear repeatedly on checklists is to ensure the information is verfied before publishing it. Other sites can tend to used number in place of the proper alphanumerics that actually exist on the cards. This is especially so on Panini products. You'll see sites, to include Panini itself, say the 3 is 1, 2, 3, etc when it actually two letters-two letters (or numbers). Example, I just did 2020 Donruss Night Moves FB. Site list the numbers as 1-25. The actually number was NM-TB (Tom Brady). And to further That JuJu Schuester-Smith's card is NM-JUJU, not JS or JSS. Had to look on eBay, COMC, etc. to verify.
JennyMiller521 wrote:
Yeah I could definitely see added teams as very time consuming especially if whoever is doing it is like me and doesn't know exactly what team this guy is playing for this year. I didn't know that the SPs were previously separated. And didn't realize using a CL from cardboard connection was OK to copy and paste. I could see where that's ALOT faster :)
On the topic of notes, RC obviously but what about Rookie Debut would that be RD or RC or nothing? Or All Star cards? Do those get AS?
Edited on: Nov 8, 2020 - 1:03PM -------------------------------
When the sky is coming down When you feel like you're going to drown When you know the end is all that you've been looking for When the pain is too much to bear When there's no one who will care
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