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Message:: [QUOTE="900fine, post: 292998, member: 6036"]Thanks, everyone, for all the excellent input. Great thread. To make sense of it all, I had to back away from all the details, zoom out, and get the Big Picture. I asked myself the following question : Why even have a grade at all ? What's the real purpose ? There are many perspectives on that one. One important reason is commercial. We need an accurate, widely accepted grade so that two parties can have a reasonable discussion about price. So it makes sense to have a system where the many quality factors (surface, wear, strike, luster, etc on obverse / reverse and rim)... all those factors funnel down to one final "overall quality indicator" - and, for a given issue, all coins of that grade will have a similar price - though they may be very different in any single factor. That sounds like market grading to me - market oriented, based on technical factors, and a stable analysis method. "Market grading" and "technical grading" are NOT mutually exclusive. They are like Siamese Twins, joined together. They overlap. Market Grading requires technical talent, and Technical Grading has a commercial "reason for existence". Don't get me wrong... I'm not dumbing down numismatics to nothing more than crass commercialism. I have MUCH respect for numismatic scholars; we owe them much. Each of us has a love for the hobby which is non-commercial. But in this sport, market forces are dominant factors.[/QUOTE]