Thread Name: the decline of the modern library From: "acpertusi" <acpertusi@removed> Date: Mon, 28 Aug 2006 11:13:03 -0600 I finally figured out that it is the collectors themselves that are dragging down the ml prices! don't blame it on ebay, which is a free market function, that arrives at a price bidders thing a book is worth. I have heard collectors state, on numerous occasions, that no matter what the book or condition they won't pay more than $6 or $7 for it. I am not sure if this is what they feel any book is worth, or if it is all they can afford to pay. I spent $200.00 for the first edition of gatsby and I sold it on ebay for almost $1200.00. the price it sold at was=20 impressive, but so was the participation. rigth now there are great buys on amenities at great prices. why is nobody buying? because they are not all priced at $ 6.00? a collector recently said that he wished all the "big=20 spenders" "inflating" the prices on ebay would go away. Then he would be able to go back to buying ml's at=20 $2.00 each. another word for ebay is free market buying and selling and for collectors it should be know as=20 competition. live with it or get out. ------------------------------------- From: Scot Kamins <kamins@removed> Date: Mon, 28 Aug 2006 10:27:47 -0700 This is certainly true. Items are only worth what people are willing to pay for them. This, it seems to me, does not account for what seems to be a general decline in interest about the Modern Library. I may never be able to afford a copy of a jaceted first catalog 1.1, but as an ML enthusiast I want to know everything about it. ------------------------------------- From: "acpertusi" <acpertusi@removed> Date: Mon, 28 Aug 2006 12:30:19 -0600 your words crumple and fall to the ground. maybe we should call ourselves ml enthusiasts. that certainly is more accurate than collectors buying. what I said may have sounded cruel but the ml industry is at stake. collectors have to compete with ebay prices and get into the market. It is their lack of participation that is bringing prices down. ml enthusiasts, think for a second about fellow collectors that have amassed collection beyond your imagining, and paid price guide and ebay prices. now you want to have their entire collections rendered worthless. remember that these prices were established long before you came into the market. again, live with it or get out. ------------------------------------- From: Scot Kamins <kamins@removed> Date: Mon, 28 Aug 2006 11:49:35 -0700 Huh??? I think you misunderstand. I don't think what you said was cruel. I think it was absolutely accurate. I wasn't disagreeing with your thinking at all. >now you want to >have their entire collections rendered worthless. Where did you get THAT idea??? I still have quite a few extremely expensive ML titles in my collection. I don't want the market to go DOWN -- I want it to to UP UP UP!!!!! ------------------------------------- From: "Bill DiBenedetto" <billdi@removed> Date: Mon, 28 Aug 2006 13:04:25 -0700 I think there are two things going on in this discussion -- pricing and collecting. While pricing is directly related to collecting, collecting does not have to be related to pricing at all, at least as defined by the "free market." One can always opt out of an insane ebay auction -- I have done so numerous times on many editions that I really wanted for my collection. If the auction goes beyond the price for the same book through ABE or Biblio -- which probably are better indicators of market value than ebay anyway -- I will get the book that way. I have done this for many books when the bidding on ebay went too high. There is a yin and yang to collecting -- nothing beats the thrill of finding something for virtually nothing when you know the item is more valuable and will continue to appreciate in value, but I have also passed on books (or watches or whatever) that are too expensive because I'll probably find them at the price points I want to pay down the road. This has happened several times for me on ebay. I'm not into ML collecting to buy low and sell high, although I enjoy watching MLs increase in value. But that will happen with anything that's old and increasingly scarce. I collect MLs because I want to keep them and read them and pass them on to my children. Their market value is not crucial to me, a good home is. I think there is a decline in ML interest because there is a general decline in reading, and because the classic ML strategy disappeared in 1970, meaning that there is no real differentiation today between the current ML brand and any other hardback brand. For ML what is past is not prologue -- and it is a shame that RH has drifted so far from its ML roots. A generation of potential readers and collectors has grown up with little or any exposure to the ML that was once abundant in schools and bookstores. ------------------------------------- From: "Mike Mayer" <mwmayer@removed> Date: Mon, 28 Aug 2006 16:10:10 -0500 I would expect that buyers have always attempted to purchase books at the lowest price they can find, and sellers have always attempted to sell books at the highest price they can get. Over time the price that buyers and sellers agree on may change. Certain categories of collectibles seem to go in and out of fashion over time (apparently baseball cards are worth much less than they were several years ago). But buyers waiting for or negotiating for a lower price is also a free-market function. If buyers now realize that it is easier to get a certain title than it was pre-eBay, they may decide that it is not worth as much as it was before. If you had to snap up the one copy you finally found in a bookstore somewhere before eBay you may have been willing to pay a higher price than you do now that you can find multiple copies every time you search eBay or ABE.   ------------------------------------- From: "acpertusi" <acpertusi@removed> Date: Mon, 28 Aug 2006 16:49:51 -0600 Bill, please give me your definition of an ebay market gone insane. you talk about abe being a better buy than ebay. what about amenities? right now amenities has books being offered at prices lower than both ebay and abe. how many have you bought? have you ever looked at amenities? there was discussion this morning about the complete poems and selected letters of michelangelo. it's sitting right now on amenities. no one cared to look. It's not priced at $6 but what is, bill. ------------------------------------- From: Michael Watson <archetype@removed> Date: Mon, 28 Aug 2006 20:00:08 -0400 That's my copy for sale. I've listed a dozen or so MLs there since 5/31 at rational prices and sold zero. ------------------------------------- From: "Bill DiBenedetto" <billdi@removed> Date: Mon, 28 Aug 2006 16:39:09 -0700 My kingdom for a careful reader. I never said ABE is a better buy than ebay. Often it is in my personal experience but last week I was involved in an ebay auction where my winning bid turned out to be less than the price for the same book on ABE. I regret that I failed to mention Amenities in my list of options for buying MLs. It was not meant to be comprehensive. I regularly check Amenities, and up to now the books listed there are either ones I already have, or I am not interested in collecting. Nowhere in my previous screed did I mention a $6.00 buying standard. It's been a rare day indeed recently when I have acquired a good ML copy with a good DJ for less than $10.00 or $12.00. Or more. I think there are examples of insane bidding wars on ebay all the time, or if not quite insane, pretty incomprehensible. Of course if one is an ebay seller insanity is devoutly to be desired: one man's insanity is another man's trip to the bank. BTW, "ML industry?" what the heck is that about? Yep, we collectors are all titans of the ML industry. ------------------------------------- From: "Ed Postal" <info@removed> Date: Mon, 28 Aug 2006 18:07:47 -0700 I just listed a bunch on amenities with dj at $6 ------------------------------------- From: "JOSEPH HILL" <goodbooks@removed> Date: Tue, 29 Aug 2006 01:37:09 GMT Up, Down...to the dealer these words have monumental meaning....to the true collector.....?, with a passion for acquiring the books.....if no one in the country had any interest in ML, I would still collect them! The fashion of the times should not enter into the thinking of the true collector. -------------------------------------