Hi everyone. I’ve been quietly lurking, reading and learning from you all for some time now. But am making this my first, official post.
My name is Jeff Meyer. I’m the founder of GoCollect.com and I’m on a mission in 2019 to work towards making collecting better… whatever you may collect. GoCollect has focused on comic books for years, but is entering the video game space with various collector tools, including a soon-to-come price guide and robust sale tracking solution that the hobby is currently lacking. When a single game has countless variants, it’s important to appropriately assign each sale to its proper version. And, in my opinion, it’s important to be able to distinguish those variants in your collection.
NintendoAge has been my go-to resource for understanding this hobby. The information available through the database of consoles and various forum discussions is priceless. That’s where the story here gets interesting…
GoCollect has officially acquired the NintendoAge web site and its sister sites. As a heavy collector of golden age comics, I’m well aware that news like this can be taken very personally. And I want everyone to know that it’s personal to me too.
The GoCollect team and I are not looking to step in and shake up the site with all sorts of changes. That’s not us. We’re not some big corporation trying to make a buck either. We’re collectors with a passion for technology. The site works great - why make big changes? Instead, we’ll look to maintain NintendoAge as-is while we organize information that can be used on the upcoming preview release of the video games section of GoCollect.
We will debut the preview release at the Charlotte HeroesCon on June 14, 2019. The preview release will be a trimmed down version of the tools to come, with a focus only within NES and NES PAL titles.
I welcome your questions and feedback, good or bad. Over the next week, I will pay close attention to this thread and look to address questions and concerns publicly about once per day.
I’m hopeful that most folks see the good we’ll bring to the hobby. I’m personally very excited by it and can’t wait to meet many of you. Dain has shared amazing stories with me about how awesome the people are out here and I’m ready to experience this season of growth with all of you.
Sincerely,
Jeff
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UPDATE 5/25/2019
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I'll post answers to questions within the thread and copy them here to keep things tidy.
How will GoCollect be funding the site?
We may put up some basic ads here and there, but nothing crazy or intrusive. NA will likely feed links into GoCollect where it makes sense down the road, but there’s no agenda to push anything down the throats of the existing community here. There are no lofty goals to monetize NA or put the burden of any sort of cost on the community to continue use. NA will remain a free service.
What about my Patreon donations?
First off, the fact that you’ve got a donation setup is really cool. But, moving forward, please feel free to cancel your donation. GoCollect is definitely a for-profit company, but we’re not in a position to force profits to come through the NA site. Our business is already setup to absorb the types of expenses that came along with maintaining NA.
How will GoCollect be different from PriceCharting?
PC has some cool tools that GoCollect won’t have any time soon (like they’re lot bot - very cool). But the biggest difference will be better analytics for game values. GoCollect will list more information about each known sale (including pictures) and will categorize those sales to things like the specific version of the game. Think about how many variations there are of Super Mario Bros. GoCollect will track and organize each sale by matching it the appropriate variation. Also, now that Wata tracks this info in their grading, it opens the opportunity to be far more specific about sales that have been graded rather than just one catch-all bucket.
Is Dain still the Evil Overlord?
There’s really only room for one Evil Overlord. And I’m not confident I can fill those shoes. Dain shall always hold the title, regardless of his future activity. And unless he requests otherwise, he’ll always have administrative privileges on the site. I want to respect and protect Dain’s time, privacy and any decision to be involved with video games moving forward… whether that’s totally walking away or eventually diving back in strong… or anything in between. I will personally always look to Dain for guidance whenever and wherever he’s willing to provide it.
What about SNES? And other consoles?
GoCollect will track all consoles. However, the “preview release” will just be NES in order to push something out there for all of us to play with. I would expect other consoles to work into the fold in rapid fashion once we clear about a 6-8 week development hurdle post-preview release.
What about the sister sites?
Nothing changing. I’m going to keep the news here just for the sake of organization.
Why would GoCollect want to buy NintendoAge?
Information. Not only are we looking to leverage all of the game data, but our editorial staff is going to be using forum posts to bring better education and information to the hobby as a whole. This place is a treasure chest of insight and info from the folks that know the hobby best. And I’m not the type that would feel comfortable telling my staff to simply research NA and reword everything. And, yes, I now have the ear of any existing collector here that’s willing to listen. You can expect to see news about GoCollect features here and there, but we have no intention of it being spammy or overpowering in any way. In fact, if it feels that way to you - RISE UP! The community has a voice and I respect it.
Will my data be sold?
Hell no. I wouldn’t want that done to me so I won’t do it to you. I’m sure we’ll eventually implement some sort of newsletter email or something. But if you don’t want to get it, you’ll have the option to opt out. I’m on a personal mission with GoCollect to “make collecting better” (whatever you may collect) and being shady pushes that in the wrong direction.
What about everything Darth Vader said?
He’s entitled to his opinions… and he has my respect for holding them. So hopefully he respects mine as well when I simply say - he has it all wrong. I believe I addressed each of those concerns in the answers above, but feel free to call me out on anything.
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UPDATE 5/26/2019
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I’m having a tough time deciphering the speculation from the questions. I want to give answers, but I’m not ready to debate on the speculation stuff, nor will I address the seemingly personal attacks. I think we all need a little time with this.
Moving forward, if you ask a direct question, I’ll gladly answer
Will the site layout change?
No
Will there be membership costs on NA?
No
Will there be membership costs for the upcoming games section on GoCollect?
Not anytime soon. Possibly never, but no promises at this early stage. All archived and price tracking info for video games will be available to anyone with a free membership. It will be different from the comics area in that regard.
Why was this posted in the “wrong forum?”
I like the forum it was posted in. It feels like a discussion for the collecting community, more so than simply news. In hindsight (there’s a lot of that going on for me at the moment) it may not have been the best decision, but I really like the outpouring of feedback it’s created thus far. I seem to have hit the right audience here.
Who exactly bought the Carolina Collection?
Jeff, not GoCollect.
Was the Carolina Collection purchased with the intent to profit?
No. That’s probably tough for many to believe… and I’m probably going to sound like a pompous a-hole when I say this… the amount of work it’s going to take to sell these pieces isn’t worth my time from a profit perspective. I bought the collection for 2 reasons: (1) the amount of information that lives in this collection is invaluable to me and my engineering team as we build a portal of video game information on GoCollect. (2) I’m a collector! And I have a nasty addiction for the good stuff. I didn’t purchase NA with the intention of buying the collection… I didn’t even know it was what it was until I experienced pieces of it at Dain’s house. The moment I realized NES collecting was far more robust than I realized, I saw the value in the history and information that sat within it. As a collector, you often need to buy in large lots to get that good stuff. But I only collect the high-end of my interests (which are many) and don’t really have the room to house everything. Selling the vast majority of the collection will be fun for me - both in meeting new people and getting deeper learnings within this niche.
Is GoCollect some big, cold corporation?
No. We’re an LLC with a single member (yours truly) and less than 10 employees, most of which are engineering geeks that also dig collectibles.
Can we do more with PAL?
I’ve personally been fascinated by this within the Carolina Collection. However, I’m not really sure I want to make changes to accommodate here on NA. There will be a lot of PAL archiving within GoCollect though and I’d enjoy hearing thoughts about how to make the best of things there, including discussions around the subject.
Can we make suggestions for improvements?
Absolutely! But to be fully transparent, I’m not really equipped to develop a bunch of change here on NA at the moment. Should we start a suggestion box thread?
Is GoCollect on an evil mission to exploit the information assembled by the community?
Evil? No. Exploit? Possibly by definition: “make full use of and derive benefit from (a resource)” BUT who will be deriving benefit here? In my eyes, it’s the collector. The GoCollect team will be going through and organizing information so that it can be more easily absorbed by the collector… so that it can be a good resource for learning. Since when is organization of publicly collected knowledge a bad thing? The amount of time it will take to pull the factual information apart from the discussions is going to be a lot of work. Yes, GoCollect is likely to inadvertently profit from the collection of that knowledge, but we’re not going to hide it behind any sort of payment wall. We’ll share it freely to any site visitor.
Why weren’t the admins and moderators notified?
In hindsight, it may not have been the best decision. I can own that. And I’d like to apologize to anyone (possibly everyone) that was offended. We didn’t want to put them in a position where they felt like they would be forced to be supportive. From what I’ve seen, these folks are a HUGELY important. They run things with near-zero oversight. I don’t want to change that. And I want everyone to speak freely. And publicly.
Why is it the admins and moderators still haven’t been contacted?
That goes back to the answer above, but again hindsight tells me it wasn’t the best decision… but I’m going to let it play out. I will be doing a round up with everyone soon. In fact, I’m thinking it might be best to take a democratic approach to things as we move forward. So that the admins and moderators feel like they have an outlet to discuss the concerns and desires of the community with site ownership. I’m open to all ideas and promise to get the ball rolling within the next couple of days once the questions calm.
Are private messages going to be accessed/scanned (e.g. when sourcing information for GoCollect)?
No
Are private forum topics going to be accessed/scanned?
No
Are private sale transactions going to scanned and used value information?
No. Private transaction happen all the time and I’m not going to attempt to uncover insights from your personal history. That’s between the buyer and seller. We won’t use it.
Will [GoCollect] sales tracking remain exclusive to certified games, or also (/at a later point) include non-certified games?
We’ll track both raw and certified games. To begin, we’ll track within the following groups: Cart, Cart w/ Manual, CIB, Sealed, Certified, Other (as a honeypot for potential, future breakouts). Note that for anything non-certified, we won’t be tracking by grade. For certified stuff, we will be able to organize by individual grading metrics.
Are there plans to expand to sales tracking of non-game items related to the video game collecting hobby (consoles, accessories, "paper") down the line?
Yes! Although I can’t really speak to how far down the line that will be. Dain’s collection of non-game items was a major factor in my decision to purchase. The history within the paper items is so dang cool. But I don’t have any idea how to track sales around it all just yet. Would love input at some point. Archiving the information will be a major focus before we are able to track sales around those things. Dain’s collection will give us an amazing head start there
Will GoCollec take on employees or freelancers from the NA audience?
I’m open to it. Anyone that feels they should be paid to continue should get in touch with me. I am currently looking for folks to help organize and digest the information from forum posts.
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UPDATE 5/28/2019
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What consideration was given to offer the purchase to other interested parties?
Sorry, but I’m not sure. This isn’t a conversation I recall having with Dain. However, given that my interests we rooted in information, I would welcome any conversation from folks that have the respect and trust of the community regarding how you may be interested in getting involved in the business side of things.
Is there a post quota?
I’m really not sure what that means. No quotas from my end. This was originally mentioned in relation to a subscription fee. Not clear on the tie-in, but please see previous answers about no fees.
Can I remove all of my posts?
You can feel free to do whatever the system allows you to do.
Can I have all of my posts automatically deleted?
Give me some time on this, because I’ll need to have my engineers investigate a do-able course of action. I can’t yet guarantee my willingness to accommodate, but will follow up once I have clarity. Note that all I have control over is what appears on this forum. Your posts have been scraped, archived and repurposed by many, many websites over the years prior to this acquisition. Archive.org is the simplest example that comes to mind: https://web.archive.org/web/*/nintendoage.com
How do I take legal action against GoCollect, LLC?
Please have your attorney initiate contact via [email protected]. We take all contact of a legal nature very seriously. We make the assumption that all claims of wrongdoing have merit and are worth internal investigation.
Does the community’s concerns matter? Why the daily pause between updates?
Your concerns mean a lot to me. A lot. I’m only human though (unfortunately), and need to set aside time to go through things thoroughly. I believe that if I were to do that continually, we’d find ourselves in a state of further confusion. I really want to answer everyone’s questions, but I have to protect my own sanity by not responding to all of the speculation that speaks directly against the answers I’ve already provided. I pride myself on being an honest guy, but fully realize that those who don’t yet know me haven’t come to that conclusion for themselves. As time passes, I’m confident you’ll see me for me. By voicing your questions and concerns, it helps me see you for you… but as individuals and as a community that’s bound to have differing opinions.
Can we get clarity on use of information from forum posts?
Indeed! I see the forum posts as a reference for research… just like it’s always been for any individual that’s visited without a membership since day #1. No one from my team will be doing any sort of copy/paste unless it’s put in quotes and the source is cited. And just as my team would cite references to any source of research, they would do the same for any information gleaned here. This is an example method of appropriate citation: https://academicanswers.waldenu.edu/faq/73141
If GoCollect decides to charge subscription fees for the video games information, can existing NA members get Grandfathered in to have free access?
Again, I don’t see that being the case, but I am publicly pronouncing that if it ever comes to be that I will accommodate any NA forum members that had active accounts prior to today (5/28/2019). So simply put - yes.
How will GoCollect track raw game sales?
We’ll assign sales of raw games to their counterparts in the database. However, we won’t assign those sales with an associated grade like we would if it were actually graded. This is similar to how the existing tools do things, which does require a bit of manual investigation. However, we hope to assist in that investigation by providing extra information like pictures from the sale and appropriate classifications of variants (when known).
Can we edit the title of the thread?
I’d rather not. I’d prefer to preserve what’s unfolded to show that I’m not “that guy” who tries to cover his tracks just because he can. But I do like the suggested change!
How can you have a beard like me?
LOL! 2 words - get lazy. I never thought I’d be able to grow a beard. Once I made the decision to muscle through about 3 months of looking like a teenager refusing to shave his first facial hairs, it started to slowly look better. And now - my wife won’t let me shave it. She says I look “pervy” without it, which is a little bothersome because we were together over 20 years before I grew it. So a few months back I decided to go through another lazy stage and let my hair grow. That’s been even tougher, because I’ve had super short hair my entire life. Aren’t you glad you asked?! http://assets.nintendoagemedia.co..." target="_blank">http://assets.nintendoagemedia.co..."); background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-size: 11px;">
Can members get paid for the posts they’ve done in the past?
Sorry - I can’t do that. But I can offer compensation to anyone that would like to assist on the gathering, organizing, citing and further documentation. Given all the efforts of the mods/admins to date - I feel it’s best to give them the opportunity first.
Can we improve security on NA?
Need a little time on this one too. My engineering folks will dive in and I will report back once I have more information and (hopefully) some solutions.
Will NA get monetized like crazy?
Nope. Seriously everyone - the site doesn’t get enough eyeballs to make enough money to counteract the outpour of disgust from the community that would likely result. If ads do ever get added, it will be minimal and pertain to collecting.
Can we wipe out anything private and start fresh?
It certainly wouldn’t bother me to wipe out the things that aren’t publicly available. However, and I’m guessing here due to not having explored/used those areas myself, aren’t those the types of things that involve more than one person by nature? Some may want to retain that info. This is another topic I will bring up with my engineering team and report back on.
Where is all of the NA memorabilia?
Yup - I have it! There are some things that I want to hang onto for myself. But there are many, many NA items that are no games and have direct ties back to this community. I would enjoy dispersing it, but “who gets what” is going to be tough. I’m 100% open to ideas here.
Why am I just now appearing after having registered back on 5/15/2018?
That’s when I stumbled upon the site when video games first popped up on my radar. I registered an account and found it again when I went in to set myself up since the system told me my email was already being used. Simple, but the question felt like it deserved an explanation
Will private collections be mined for “interested parties?”
No. That would be a super-shitty thing for me to do or allow. Not gonna happen.
What happens to the site once all info is gleaned?
I’ll continue paying the bill so long as there’s a community that’s using it. The monthly costs are well worth the Karma.
Daniel Greenberg, George Mason University Game Design
