I just knocked dealer out of his seat!

I'm not trying to be the "vernacular police", I really want to know why a dealer would be "knocked out of his chair" by that. Has this dealer never heard the word shiny before?

 

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Perhaps he thought shiny alluded more toward 'polished' and that's what floored him?

 

Think you are flattering yourself a bit. If this is a mainstream dealer, those terms would be common knowledge for him/her. Nobody is going to say anything that would blow away any experienced coin dealer--they have seen it all.

 

Are you sure it wasn't an MS62.875?

 

I'm agreeing with you here friend. I say use whatever descriptive words you want. Every endeavor has certain "proper" descriptive words and self anointed purists that go around correcting someone at every opportunity can be annoying. It really doesn't make then look more advanced, just makes an awkward moment and is a turn off to newbs imo.

 

Agreed. And since we now have stars and + grading, it should be perfectly acceptable to apply whatever nomenclature you want, along with the corresponding acronym. Hence, when you all see a coin graded SDNP it can safely be assumed to be the acronym for "Super-Duper-Non-Pooper"

 

There was a company that did this at one time.

Compugrade was formed in 1991. They planned to grade coins by computer but quickly went under within a few months. Some submissions were put through the service before they closed their doors and surprisingly Compugrade even made a small batch of samples to distribute. Their slab featured a label on the top of the slab and used a very thick plastic which made them very hard to crack. Their normal production slabs are scarce, but the samples are downright rare.



By the way, you all should check out my F-15.3 Level 9 Stage 1 Morgan Dollar!

 

Hey FE21, I apologize for my previous post, your question wasn't about the grade or decimals, the question at hand is whether or not we've been "corrected" by a dealer and my answer is Yes. But I hope you know that he was trying to teach you something and his method just came across as being very condescending. Sometimes when a person tries to tell you something that you already know it can feel belittling, like they're questioning you're intelligence, but I'm pretty sure he was trying to help. Congrats on the new Morgan, it's a great addition to any collection and I really would love to see some pics!

 

I agree congrats on a coin you like! I always love it when someone obtains a coin they love, that is why we are all here.

Concerning the piece, I am always nervous about a split grade coin. I think you have received good advice, the obverse is usually the more important side to collectors. Myself, I always grade such pieces by the LOWER of the two sides, whichever they may be. I just bought a piece a week ago where the obverse was VF, but the reverse F. I refused to pay more than F money for it.

But, at the end of the day, its just money. Coins are more important anyway, and I truly am happy you found a nice piece you like. Good job!

 

Patents have been around since the mid '80. The underlying patents for such a device have been bought up by PCGS, so be ready for lawsuits.

http://www.google.com/patents/US5224176

http://www.google.com/patents/US5220614

and others, that tie up most possibilities. The drawings on some are quite interesting.

If it was easy to implement, PCGS would be doing it. IMO.

Jim

 

Maybe the dealer was just struck by the kid using the word "shiny" to describe an $80 coin he just bought? No doubt there was some sort of stereotyping going on as the term connotes maybe not just a lack of knowledge, but indulgence?

If I were looking at expensive coins with my son and he said he liked ones that were shiny, I imagine a dealer would say something like, "If you like shiny, for $3.95 Littleton Coin can hook you up with three shiny 1943 steel cents and a set of four 2009 Lincoln cents. Not only are the 2009 coins shiny, but each tail side has a different picture on it. It's pretty neat!" If he were less condescending, he might send me off to look at a few cheap proofs.

 

Ahem...pennies, please.

 

Just to clarify, I hope I'm not being condescending, and I'll go out on a limb and guess the dealer wasn't trying to be either. I'm new to the hobby, and a lot of the most helpful coin collectors, even dealers, have told me to stay away from the expensive stuff until I know what I'm getting myself into. It's sort of ironic that people I'd willingly give my money to have said, "Wait!" If I wanted to purchase a shiny gold coin for my son for his birthday, I can imagine dealers pointing me in the direction of an unc. president dollar for $3 instead of purchasing a $500 coin. My ignorance would probably show in my face and mannerisms, they'd assess me as not truly appreciating the coin as much as a long-term, more invested collector, and they'd politely steer me towards something cheaper, but will get the job done. It's kind of like scene in the comic book art-house in Unbreakable, except less insulting.

I'm just trying to figure out the vibe the original poster is sending.

 

See, there you go.

 

CoinTalkl

A prime example of what this forum does best. All the young collecter was saying was that his grandfather bought him a nice coin that he considered expensive at $80, which some on this site would consider a pittance. To show his appreciation, the OP thanked his grandad for the shiny (shiney) coin which is a term the general populace knows (those who think $80 is a lot for a coin). He then fancied that the coin dealer would have looked at him with surprise, because he was sophisticated enough to buy an exceptional coin and would then call it shiny. Enough, OK. This is kind-of beating him up.

 

Originally Posted by Kentucky Ahem...pennies, please

Should have included the smiley, hard to tell sarcasm without it

 

I thought it was well played. And you're right. We should leave the dealer alone.

 

As mentioned Compugrade did it, and so did PCGS. It was called the Expert System. It used computers to scan the coin and create a "digital fingerprint" of the coin (So it could be recognized if it was ever resubmitted.) and the computer graded the coin as well to at least one decimal place but they only used whole numbers on the slabs. The Expert System was consistant with its grading as well always grading the coin to the same grade each time. It was hyped in the trade publications in early 1991 and made it's debute at the one hundredth anniversary ANA convention in Chicago. (Compugrade debuted there as well.) They had an exhibit there showing it off and explaining what it did. They even had a grading challenge where you could compare your grading against the machine. (We were consistant the machine always graded one point higher than I did.)

After the convention Compugrade lasted for about six months but we never heard of the Expert System again. (Until PCGS came up with this great new concept of Secure Shield that scans the coin and creates a digital fingerprint so if the coin is ever resubmitted it will be recognized. Why does that sound familiar?) The problem was although the computer could grade and was consistent, it didn't always agree with the expert human graders.

And they weren't the only one working on computer grading. So were the ANA and Amos Press. In fact one of the reasons Amos Press bought ANACS in 1989 was to get their research on computer grading. But nothing ever came of it.

Oh and Accugrade also used decimal point grading on their early small sized slabs. They were roundly criticized for it because the prevailing attitude was "Nobody can possibly grade precisely enough to justify decimal point grading." And at that time ACG was NOT considered the bottom tier service that they are today. They were ranked #4 just behind ANACS and ahead of INS and NCI and several others. They didn't become the bottom tier service until around 1992 after NCI closed down. By that time most of the other services had closed except for some of those that today we would call self slabbers.

But patents are only good for I believe 27 years so the patents expired just about the same time as they came out with Secure Shield.

 

So prior to the TPG plus designations or CAC there was no such thing as A, B, and C coins? Of course there was. Even in the most general sense, this is the same concept as decimal grading. To prove a point, I've read many of your posts where you've opined that a coin was high end for its grade, so what you're basically saying the coin is a 64.7, 64.8, etc, etc, but only in a more generalized way. Just because PCGS/NGC is not presently slapping decimal grades on slabs, this in no way means such grades do not exist.

 

I heard that one of the TPG's uses, internally, a 700 point scale, essentially allowing for 10ths. I persoanlly think that makes more sense than the "+" and the CAC sticker colors (not stickering itself as that's just verification, but the up-grade). For coins where there is a bountiful market, like some silver dollars and halfs, and a very robust body of work/ratings to review, I could see merit to this. For most uncirculated, no as we don't fully utilize the 0-59, but for MS, sure, why not.