Beckett suing COMC over database

[200lbhockeyplayer]

When was the last time there was a discussion of Beckett in a positive light?

Seriously.

Their unique and proprietary pricing methods are as secretive and scientific as a chicken drop...and as relevant.

Rally the nerds...shut down the Beckett servers.

 

[smapdi]

The fact that it's against TOS to quote Beckett's values on Beckett's own website always struck me as odd. Protecting copyright is one thing, but defending a dollar value derived from some secret algorithm as a trade secret is another.

 

[jpcz]

What's a beckett?

 

[mchenrycards]

I'm not saying Beckett never published another book after the first one. But the Beckett Price Guide is still basically the same as it was 30 years ago, each new edition just tacking on the latest releases. It covers the mainstream sets, with a smattering of the more readily accessible oddball stuff. It left out an enormous amount of regional, vintage and minor league sets. It wasn't until the Standard Catalog hit the shelves that anyone was really pursuing such a comprehensive listing. Which Beckett didn't do until 1996 (though their Alphabetical book was always more comprehensive than the price guide). So while their price guides were THE de facto standard, and the only "big" book of the time, they were far from comprehensive. They were just the only real game in town. I'm not attempting to de-legitimize Beckett's place in the history of the hobby, just point out that they are clearly not playing with a full deck in their current pursuits.

Either way, the current corporate owners of what is left of Dr. Beckett's legacy are trying to claim they have the only set of checklists and that anyone else who might want to build a set of checklists can only do so by stealing from Beckett. Both assertions which are incorrect.

I feel bad for the handful of hobbyists who actually work for Beckett. I get the feeling that if they were given a little more freedom, the whole brand could remove some of the tarnish it has accumulated in the last decade.

I think you and I are on the same page here. There is no doubt that Beckett removed a good deal of content in regards to odd ball sets and regional issues all in the attempt to save space in their guides. I do know that many of the other larger "coffee table" catalogs did the same thing which upset many hobbyists. For Beckett to lay claim to the fact they have the only checklists to build from is absurd. That is a claim that may have been legitimate 20 years ago but now, thats just crazy talk.

And I agree that the collectors who are now involved behind the scenes at Beckett have to feel that their hands are tied in so many ways. I would love to see that magazine empire be given back to collectors (Dr. Beckett WAS a collector at one time) and allow it to regain its position in the hobby it used to enjoy.

 

[PeteD]

I remember going to an card show wayyyy back in 1997 and a guy (card shop owner at the time) had a brand new 1997 Bowman Jose Cruz Jr rc for $50!!! I asked why so high...he said because eventually that's what it would book for in Beckett.
I scooped up all the Halladay rc's for a song.

 

[refrank]

The lawyers for Beckett are blowing a lot of smoke in that there were, are, and will be other guides and checklists. Charlton published an annual hockey price guide in Canada (don't know if they still do) for years (at least 20 years) that was as content rich as Beckett's. Standard Catalog has been around forever. There were a bunch of price guides back in the day that preceded or paralleled Beckett (guy name Ron Erbe had one that was heavy on cabinet cards as well as contemporary cards).

I use COMC a lot and I like it. I'm hoping that this nonsense on the part of Beckett goes away quickly, I'd really hate to see a TO keep the site down for an extended period. I think COMC's current effort to develop their own pricing guidelines from the ground up precludes any rational claim that they are violating Beckett's copyrights.

And for what it's worth, I have found Beckett's website and marketplace annoying and needlessly difficult for the last 20 years.

 

[A_Pharis]

The lawyers for Beckett are blowing a lot of smoke in that there were, are, and will be other guides and checklists. Charlton published an annual hockey price guide in Canada (don't know if they still do) for years (at least 20 years) that was as content rich as Beckett's. Standard Catalog has been around forever. There were a bunch of price guides back in the day that preceded or paralleled Beckett (guy name Ron Erbe had one that was heavy on cabinet cards as well as contemporary cards).

I use COMC a lot and I like it. I'm hoping that this nonsense on the part of Beckett goes away quickly, I'd really hate to see a TO keep the site down for an extended period. I think COMC's current effort to develop their own pricing guidelines from the ground up precludes any rational claim that they are violating Beckett's copyrights.

And for what it's worth, I have found Beckett's website and marketplace annoying and needlessly difficult for the last 20 years.

Bingo. If anything - Beckett should be mad that someone else is able to utilize that information in a far better manner than their marketplace.

 

[digicat]

I remember going to an card show wayyyy back in 1997 and a guy (card shop owner at the time) had a brand new 1997 Bowman Jose Cruz Jr rc for $50!!! I asked why so high...he said because eventually that's what it would book for in Beckett.
I scooped up all the Halladay rc's for a song.

Cruz Jr was one of the top prospects back then.

1997:
#1 = Andruw Jones
#2 = Vlad Guerrero
...
#12 = Jose Cruz Jr
...
#23 = Roy Halladay

 

[AmishDave]

This was the last time Beckett had anything good in it. It's been irrelevant for over a decade now:





I seriously hope they go outta business, because their pricing is off, their message boards turned into an absolute cluster XXXX, where you alienated a whole generation of collector's (not just baseball) and their checklists are so outdated and antiquated that they make the Geo Metro look like a safe car if you were to get in a catastrophic accident.

 

[autocut]

I call BS on a lot of things. Beckett price cards that don't exist and omit cards that do exist. I haven't bought a Beckett price guide in years because, to me, it's worthless.

Sent from my HTCONE using Freedom Card Board mobile app

 

[TNP777]

This was the last time Beckett had anything good in it. It's been irrelevant for over a decade now:





I seriously hope they go outta business, because their pricing is off, their message boards turned into an absolute cluster XXXX, where you alienated a whole generation of collector's (not just baseball) and their checklists are so outdated and antiquated that they make the Geo Metro look like a safe car if you were to get in a catastrophic accident.

I hear there's a pretty sweet collection on the other side of that page, too!

 

[Austin]

My local Barnes and Noble stopped carrying the various Beckett Magazines a few months ago.
I don't know if that's a nationwide decision or an individual store's decision, but no more spending a few minutes reading the magazine at B&N here. (Yes, it takes just a few minutes to read the entire magazine's "articles.")

 

[Casebusters]

This is what I use beckett for the most!

http://www.beckett.com/venue_manager

 

[autocut]

The first thing comc should do is request that Beckett provide their price value sources. If they make up their book value and claim to be the only source, wouldn't that be against anti-trust laws?

Sent from my HTCONE using Freedom Card Board mobile app

 

[IUjapander]

Another thought. Why isn't beckett suing Zistle or SCF (I think they have a checklist database, could be wrong). Zistle even lists prices on their site. The reason is because those sites are not continually eating away at the Burbank, I mean beckett marketplace bottom line.

 

[A_Pharis]

Why isn't Beckett suing the big time eBay sellers that put BVs in the auction titles?

 

[BBCgalaxee]

I Think comc is in the wrong here

 

[RiceLynnEvans75]

They're just pissed because COMC can start and finish an update to their site in under a year while they're working on year.........6. I think?

 

[PeteD]

Cruz Jr was one of the top prospects back then.

1997:
#1 = Andruw Jones
#2 = Vlad Guerrero
...
#12 = Jose Cruz Jr
...
#23 = Roy Halladay

don't forget Travis Lee...he had some of those too.

 

[LWMM]

What really struck me was paragraph 24 of the preliminary statement, which states that:

On 6 December 2013, Beckett terminated the final agreement and requested that COMC "remove all [Beckett] data from [COMC's] site immediately." COMC responded by stating that Beckett's termination was invalid.

One way of reading this is that four months before the agreement was set to expire, Beckett tried to cripple COMC by taking away their method of organizing cards. COMC had hardly started on its own database by this point, and thus would likely have been crippled for months, causing massive (and possibly irreparable) damage to its business.

It's unclear what Beckett's reason for terminating the agreement was, other than their general assertion that COMC's scraping of Beckett's checklist and pricing data amounted to stealing. Beckett also claims that around January 2014 COMC announced that it would compete directly with Beckett, ignoring the fact that three weeks previous Beckett had terminated their relationship. It sounds much more as if Beckett perceived COMC as a potential threat, and tried to strike first.


That said, some of the main issues raised in the lawsuit are:

1) Did COMC violate the original agreement by scraping Beckett's database?

2) Was COMC entitled to use Beckett's data after Beckett's December 6th attempted termination of the licensing agreement?

3) Is COMC using Beckett's proprietary data in building its database of cards?

4) Is COMC using Beckett's proprietary data in its suggested prices for cards?


I'm not a lawyer, nor do I play one on TV. However, my take on the above questions is below.

1) Beckett claims that COMC "stole" its checklist data by scraping its checklists and pricing data before eventually signing several licensing agreements allowing it to use such data. Beckett states that this occurred before an agreement was signed; that a license (one of several) was signed in March 2013; and that COMC scraped its data in summer 2013. Thus, either COMC scraped Beckett's data multiple times, or Beckett's claimed facts are in conflict.

Despite calling it stealing, however, Beckett concedes that their agreement “is silent on how COMC was to obtain Beckett’s data”, which can also be read to mean that COMC had the right to take the data (be it by scraping or other methods). Although Beckett calls it stealing, their real argument seems to be that COMC having Beckett’s data will lead to COMC using the data illegally.

2) Although the agreement was to go until March 31st, Beckett states that there was a termination clause that could be invoked by either party for "good cause". In the lawsuit Beckett claims that "good cause" was defined by the agreement as "Beckett's discontinuation of any of the services set forth in this Agreement." That sounds much more like a definition of exercising the termination clause, however. "Good cause" may not have even been defined by the original agreement; this sometimes happens, as a definition could end up excluding unthought-of of possibilities.

Beckett doesn't even give a reason that they tried to terminate the agreement. All they say is that they decided to stop licensing its information to anyone, and there is also the claim that COMC stole its data by scraping it. Unless COMC’s scraping was somehow in violation of the agreement, nothing I read in the lawsuit sounded like good cause to terminate the agreement.

3) Beckett's argument here boils down to paragraph 29: "Because it is in possession of the database, COMC is in the position to, and likely will, misappropriate millions of lines of valuable data that contain Beckett’s trade secrets.” They claim “on information and belief” that this has already happened, but gives no evidence that it has. Beckett furthermore claims that “Beckett’s data and content media cannot be legally ‘recreated’”, which is fairly absurd. COMC is doing what Beckett did when it started: creating a database based on card and manufacturer information.
Anecdotal evidence (the COMC challenges and the rocky transition) also suggests that COMC is not using Beckett’s information.

4) Beckett can make a case here. Although COMC is using its own sales history, those sales were generated from prices that were set with Beckett’s values as a framework. As such, it can be argued (and Beckett does claim) that COMC’s sale prices are a derivative of Beckett’s values. One would likely have to look at the numbers to get a better sense of this one (percent of sellers who price at close to 100% BV, correlation between sale prices at BV, etc.).



There are some other elements to the lawsuit, and some more quibbles that can be raised with Beckett’s arguments and reasoning. The most substantial ones are discussed above, however. From what I read in the lawsuit, I tend to take COMC’s side on this one. There are substantial holes in Beckett’s logic, making it appear that it is simply trying to take down a competitor.


tl;dr, I know