Beckett.com being redone again?

Philip J. Fry · Jul 7, 2010

Dear Beckett User,

Please allow me to introduce myself – I am Brian Gulledge, the new President of Beckett Media LLC. I have recently joined the company with a primary focus of correcting, improving and growing our online presence.

Over the last few weeks, several customer emails and phone calls have been forwarded to me regarding our current website and some of the quality issues we experience. Rather than playing the politically correct game to explain what we are doing to improve the situation, or giving the standard “Thank you, we are working on it,” I feel that being frank and upfront with you, the Beckett community, is much more appropriate.

For the most part, the site is poorly architected without the code and technical infrastructure to handle the scale of users that want to access our data. Part of this is a good problem to have, as the data is of great value to collectors, dealers and traders, and more and more customers have joined over the last few months. From the feedback you have given us, our data is top notch and second to none. It is the access to and speed of acquiring that data that accentuates many of the experienced issues. This frustrates all of us.

Not to bore you with too many details, but the current data set is massive (226 million products and billions of lines of content), and with the existing programming architecture and structure, the current website is not something we can easily correct for stability or scale.

Our solution is to build a new website while doing our best to stabilize and improve performance of the existing site. It is the only way we see to create a more user-friendly and speedy environment to meet the needs of our growing customer base. The new team that has been assembled on this project is world class. Many of the websites this team has created and worked on are among the top 100 largest traffic sites in the world.

Our expected timeline to launch the new website is the end of the December. Why so long? Because we are committed to launching a clean customer-centric site that can deal with the increasing traffic, speed and data demands while being careful to retain your user information, collection interactions and community relationships that make our product so unique.

In the short term, we will continue to work diligently on solving existing speed and time-out errors. Please be patient with us. We have heard you loudly and clearly, and that is why this talented new team is in place.

Most Sincerely,
Brian D. Gulledge
President

http://beta.beckett.com/group/185223/?t ... iewArticle

200lbhockeyplayer · Jul 7, 2010

Wasn't this their mission two years ago?

vwnut13 · Jul 7, 2010

Isn't the current Beckett still in Beta? :lol:

JzWand · Jul 7, 2010

Their site sucks. Put it back to the way it was a few years ago and problem solved.

RiceLynnEvans75 · Jul 7, 2010

I think it's a nice change of pace to actually see the head of something come out and address people instead of hiding from their faults like every other person does nowadays.

Philip J. Fry · Jul 7, 2010

The part that bothers me is this:

Many of the websites this team has created and worked on are among the top 100 largest traffic sites in the world.

Traffic means nothing if you don't have quality, and as everyone here knows already, the quality over at Beckett now sucks in terms of site usability.

200lbhockeyplayer · Jul 7, 2010

RiceLynnEvans75 said:
I think it's a nice change of pace to actually see the head of something come out and address people instead of hiding from their faults like every other person does nowadays.

You mean like when Upper Deck's President Richard McWilliams came out a few years ago and said he didn't know that redemptions were such a problem and that he would make it so that no redemptions took longer than 45 days to redeem?

Sure, he addressed a problem, but it's still business as usual.

notjomommasclint · Jul 7, 2010

wow at launch it will only have taken them 2 years to notice, observe, address, and correct the problems? two things about the ease of the upcoming new site:

1. if you have to watch a video on how to use the site then its not customer friendly.
2. if you have to tell me i just dont understand the site and it will grow on me because it is all around me you still fail.

i wonder if the ud choice poll and their placing amongst the hobby has anything to do with this final realization that their site = bland, cold, broken, and unfriendly. i hope they get things on track because beckett is still a great information gathering tool.

200lbhockeyplayer · Jul 7, 2010

Philip J. Fry said:
The part that bothers me is this:

Many of the websites this team has created and worked on are among the top 100 largest traffic sites in the world.

Click to expand...

Traffic means nothing if you don't have quality, and as everyone here knows already, the quality over at Beckett now sucks in terms of site usability.

Just because they may be using a company that has produced top **** sites, doesn't mean that the "sexcess" will crossover into this industry.

jeremy · Jul 7, 2010

did i post in this thread and it got deleted?

Card Magnet · Jul 7, 2010

I had to stop by Beckett to get a print run on something, and I saw the headline about the new Beckett Pres. addressing site issues.

Do you know what the really ironic things is? Yup, the site timed out when I tried to go to the article. I literally loled.

hofmichael · Jul 7, 2010

notjomommasclint said:
wow at launch it will only have taken them 2 years to notice, observe, address, and correct the problems? two things about the ease of the upcoming new site:

1. if you have to watch a video on how to use the site then its not customer friendly.
2. if you have to tell me i just dont understand the site and it will grow on me because it is all around me you still fail.

i wonder if the ud choice poll and their placing amongst the hobby has anything to do with this final realization that their site = bland, cold, broken, and unfriendly. i hope they get things on track because beckett is still a great information gathering tool.

The bolded part is the only reason I miss the site.

miguelcabrera · Jul 7, 2010

their checklist is good. everything else sucks.

RiceLynnEvans75 · Jul 7, 2010

200lbhockeyplayer said:
RiceLynnEvans75 said:

I think it's a nice change of pace to actually see the head of something come out and address people instead of hiding from their faults like every other person does nowadays.

Click to expand...

You mean like when Upper Deck's President Richard McWilliams came out a few years ago and said he didn't know that redemptions were such a problem and that he would make it so that no redemptions took longer than 45 days to redeem?

Sure, he addressed a problem, but it's still business as usual.

Yes, because my post meant that it has NEVER happened before. ::facepalm::

Seriously people, are some of you this bitter in real life as you are on the internet? Everyone knows that the Beckett site is an abortion right now. The new president (not the old one, someone new) has acknowledged that there are issues and it will be addressed. His article is essentially what he told me in an email a month ago and that they have a target of the end of the year. That doesn't mean it's going to be fixed in five minutes. At least give the new guys a chance before raking them over the coals just because.

pigskincardboard · Jul 7, 2010

Philip J. Fry said:
The part that bothers me is this:

Many of the websites this team has created and worked on are among the top 100 largest traffic sites in the world.

Click to expand...

Traffic means nothing if you don't have quality, and as everyone here knows already, the quality over at Beckett now sucks in terms of site usability.

Proper database architecture is all about traffic and they should definitely have people that're working on heavy traffic sites. Anyone that's done database coding and calls knows that perfect coding is only a start to getting the beast functioning properly. I'm willing to bet my pants that this is nothing more than a database access issue and improper caching of results.

If they've recorded any kind of records/site traffic, they should be able to get 95% of requests fulfilled in under half a second.

They shoul've ponied up the big cash a long time ago.

Also, how awesome is it that they just admitted providing terrible, non-functioning service to their entire customer base. The reason people don't get "honest" is because they'll end up getting "sued"

cgilmo · Jul 7, 2010

jeremy said:
did i post in this thread and it got deleted?

yes, it got deleted

it was a ******* post

G $MONEY$ · Jul 7, 2010

This message is about 2 years too late. I was so upset when Beckett changed their site in the summer of 2008, but hey, in the long run it ended up working out the best for all of us

011873 · Jul 7, 2010

Just wondering, before I click on the link do I have to watch a video so I can learn how to understand the email?

RandomH · Jul 7, 2010

They honestly had one shot and they failed hardcore.

200lbhockeyplayer · Jul 7, 2010

RiceLynnEvans75 said:
200lbhockeyplayer said:

RiceLynnEvans75 said:

I think it's a nice change of pace to actually see the head of something come out and address people instead of hiding from their faults like every other person does nowadays.

Click to expand...

You mean like when Upper Deck's President Richard McWilliams came out a few years ago and said he didn't know that redemptions were such a problem and that he would make it so that no redemptions took longer than 45 days to redeem?

Sure, he addressed a problem, but it's still business as usual.

Click to expand...

Yes, because my post meant that it has NEVER happened before. ::facepalm::

Seriously people, are some of you this bitter in real life as you are on the internet? Everyone knows that the Beckett site is an abortion right now. The new president (not the old one, someone new) has acknowledged that there are issues and it will be addressed. His article is essentially what he told me in an email a month ago and that they have a target of the end of the year. That doesn't mean it's going to be fixed in five minutes. At least give the new guys a chance before raking them over the coals just because.

My response has nothing to do with bitterness, nothing at all.

And while I applaud those in charge stepping out into the firing range, it means nothing. That is what I meant.

Sure, in December, Beckett.com could be an amazing site, but I'll suspend my belief until it comes to fruition. That said, Beckett has nothing to offer me at this point in my life. I can find the PR fodder on countless websites, if I want card values I'll go to eBay, and I don't need their forums/newsgroups.

The new president has a challenge no doubt. Not only does he have to rebuild the city, he also has to rebuild the bridge.

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Beckett.com being redone again?

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