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This argument has me very confused.  Because certain collectors don't want/don't care to track their collection to a certain level of detail, they desire to have that abililty be removed for those that actually DO want to list to an extreme level of detail.

If you don't want to go through and figure out which of the one, two, or 17 asterisk cards you have, then DON'T DO IT!  Don't complain about the people who do want to do it and actually care about such things.

It's as old as people complaining about the many variations/inserts that are in today's packs and saying that's why they don't buy packs any more.  To me, that's a simple misunderstanding of supply and demand.  Topps, but producing the millions of parallels, actually keeps the cost down for the average collector by raising supply of the product.  If there were no inserts and only base cards in every pack, the packs would cost far more than they do today because there wouldn't be nearly as many cards available to put into the packs, therefore lowering the supply.

The crux of the argument isn't about todays "on purpose" variations (different photos etc...) but it is the late 80s and 90s stuff that some people find confusing. As I mentioned earlier (and I think later tonight I will send a message to ADMIN to see if this is possible) if a user could turn VARS on or off on a specific set these totally different view points would become moot. As an example lets take 1991 Donruss. If you don't care what border version or "inc." version you have, and just want one then if you can toggle the VAR off when adding your want list then when a team or player collector chooses "add all missing cards to want list" 3 copies of one card with the VARs won't be added to your wantlist. When I trade (and I am looking at this from a trade perspective) these VARs show up in my wants even though I am not interested in them. I don't begrudge anyone for the way they collect or how we catalouge. With say Topps and O-Pee-Chee stickers of the late 80s the multiple "Super Star Backs" create many many VARs, and I have actually helped other members through IRs to add these to the checklist, even though I am not interested in them. If a way to "turn off the VARS" per set can be done that would help things, but until that happens (if it can happen I am no coder) everybody just needs to be dilliegent.

My thinking is that it is called The Trading Card DataBase and as such should try and identify every different option of a particular card with the exception of obvious printer malfunctions.  If we want to have a historically correct way of identifying every card made this is a must.  I would even argue that maybe are notes should be more inclusive to explain why these errors exist if it is known.

For those who do not want to collect the variations they have that option.  I'll use me as an example.  I'm currently trying to collect Cincinnati Reds team sets.  While going through the list I dont even put all the options on my wantlist only one card of the same player from that set.  However, when it comes to the Barry Larkins I want to make sure I have all the variations and for this reason I love the fact that others are more eagle eyed than me and notice these changes.

This is my point as well.  It seems like the "complaining" (for lack of a better term) about the existing functionality is from those people who just don't care how their collection is tracked.  They want to get rid of the functionality because it is an inconvenience to the way they track their own collection.

As I've said before, I know this is an issue for the site and that not everybody is as careful as I am with logging a collection.  So, if I am looking for a specific variation, I will reach out to the person that has it on their trade list first before proposing the trade.  Many times my inquiry is ignored, other times I get a response of "I don't have it."  Occasionally I get lucky and the person has the card I want and is willing to trade.  I don't view this as an inconvenience, I view it is a thrill of the hunt.  It seems that I am in the minority in this.

It sounds like it should be fairly straightforward to toggle that option on/off as others have suggested, but I doubt that it would be.  If you are a player collector, for instance, and already have 1 1991 Donruss version of Ernie Riles in your collection, how would the system know that?  What if one variation is far more difficult than the others to obtain and that was the one that the system decided to put onto your want list?  To me, this is just part of the care and feeding of my various lists.  And if you get an offer that includes a variation that you don't particularly care about, then just decline or counter the offer.

Granted, I don't do much trading on this site simply because my collection is very much of a niche when it comes to the variations, and therefore most folks don't actually have what I am looking for to trade.   But, that doesn't decrease my enjoyment of the site and or my want or desire to contribute as much as possible.

The real question that should be addressed is are we losing members / scaring off new ones away?  There is no way to quantify that but I'll go out on a limb and say no.  First, there are over 30,000 members and 15,000 tracking their collections. That seems like a lot. Second,  the website just hit 3 MILLION images submitted. Wow. If we truly had a membership crisis, I don't think we would hit that number.  Lastly, for everyone complaining about 3 or 4 card variations from the 80s, have you seen modern sets. Every card nowadays has a variation or parallel. Some are difficult to identify. Do we eliminate the tracking of parallels because people can't be bothered to properly identify their cards. No way. So we shouldn't do it for the older sets either.

This whole “argument” isn’t really an argument at all. This is not a post where I was wondering what member opinion was regarding our listing practices or how they collect. Nor was it a complaint in any way, shape, or form. I have said many, many times that I don’t agree with the way things are listed here 100% of the time (sorry, but an 8x10 team photo is not a trading card in my book), but I deal with it anyway because this isn’t Jason’s Trading Card Database. It was also not an attack or finger pointing at those who collect variations or the like, nor do I care how you display them. Quite frankly, the only time I give a darn about what someone collects is when I want to send them cards, via trade or PIF. I think my entire point/question has been missed, which I figured would happen.

I simply wanted to vocalize my concerns again, this time with an example of an actual occurrence of exactly what I’m worried about happening. We cannot go back and change what has been done already, and I don’t believe we should. Site precedence has been set – to reference an earlier comment regarding the Topps checklists from the 1970s, I was the one who started those IRs after the difference was brought to our attention in a separate IR, and I believe that I noted that despite me not having a preference one way or another, and not being affected by it, the precedence has been set that we treat these as separate cards. I think documenting actual variations is absolutely what we should do – but I also think a line will have to be drawn somewhere, and I’m worried that when that line is drawn, it’ll be too late.

I guess the only thing productive that I hoped would come out of this thread was an idea like rmpaq5 had – one that I’ve had slightly in the back of my mind for a while now. Alas, I am not “code-savvy” and have no idea if it’s possible or how it would work. What I do know is that I hope I’m wrong, and the case that I described in my first post is one of the rare ones, and does not become a recurring theme. I also know that I shouldn’t have brought this back up, and should have just kept it to myself, and that apparently I am the only one with this concern – so as I stated in the beginning, I’m probably making a mountain out of a molehill.

Regardless, call it thinking out loud, random thoughts, or rambling, but please don’t call it a complaint, an attack, or me asking to change anything. Thanks.

Totally agree!

There does not seem to be a perfect way to list these types of variations that would please everybody. Not sure how much computer coding it would take to toggle on/off as has been suggested.

Here is one thought I will put out there that I have not seen mentioned.

For the small number of sets like the 1991 Donruss Baseball where all or most cards are affected with a variation.

Create several catalog listings (call them related so as to not offend anyone with a word such as parallel,subset,insert, etc.).

One for INC (No period)

One for INC.(w/period)

One for factory variations

A fourth which could be any one or combination of the above types for all those members who do not care to differentiate between them.

Lets call it "unspecified/undetermined Variation" or some other term and include a release note with an explaination.

A huge bonus to splitting like this is that when the new variations are added they would be completely separate sets, the original set would become the unspecified (all cards shown would be the correct variations by default). At this point those who care could check their variations and put them into the appropriate variant set.

I just noticed that the 1991 Donruss I have were incorrectly listed due to the b variations being created after I had my cards listed.

Just food for thought.

Ed

Yes the question was  "Are we losing or scaring off members because of the all the var in sets?"  My answer is NO.  

Have we gone too far with them??  At time I would say yes but as several members have said this is a database for all cards.

As far as 30,000 members    But what is the number of active members?   I find a lot of members that joined and spent less then a month here and never come back or add any cards.   I could but do not plan on look up how many members have loged in in the late 30 or 90 days.

I watched this site for months before I joined just to make sure I would fix in.   Yes I do not want to list all my cards as It take a long time.  But it was worth it.   I have asked several other collectors to join the site most did look but did not think it was a site for them.  Not becuse of the Var but other resons.  

I did think we all would love to customiize areas of the database to fit our own needs.    I would love to add my want list from here to COMC and that site just shows me the cards on my want list.  There may be areas that Adim may be able to fix for the best of more members.