CoinFacts Update

BrettPCGS

Hello everyone,

Thank you all for taking the time to voice your thoughts on the new CoinFacts layout and the removal of the “view all images” functionality. After speaking with a large number of submitters and collectors alike, I made the tough decision to temporarily remove those pages. This wasn’t a decision based on image duplication. This was a decision about privacy, how we handle your data, harassment, accuracy, and liability. Simply put, at the moment a few bad apples, as well as some undermanagement over time on our part have created enough issues spread across the platform that it’s safest to put the image galleries into “time out.”

While this forum community hosts people who love being open about what they own and what they collect, there is a massive majority of those in our hobby who don’t post on the message boards and don’t want their coins displayed publicly on the set registry or in an online gallery. To put things into perspective, in the last month (which was a high volume month) we’ve had right around 1400 active message board users while we have over 14,000 collectors club members. And we all know there’s tens of thousands of collectors who don’t have CC memberships.

I feel strongly that there are serious privacy issues here that need to be reviewed. If a collector goes to a coin shop, buys a coin, submits it with Gold Shield service and then chooses to put it into their safety deposit box there shouldn’t automatically be a picture of that coin posted in a comparison gallery. It’s their property, it’s their own business. As far as I know such a function occurs at no other certification service across all collectibles industries. Having your coins automatically put into a comparison gallery without your explicit consent is something that requires a serious examination on our end, no matter how accustomed to it we’ve become.

As many of you know, there were instances in the CoinFacts galleries in which coins featured were not of the variety they were identified as or had other mechanical/ classification errors. It absolutely breaks my heart that people who love to compare diagnostics, die pairings, varieties, toning, etc. won’t be able to for a bit. But in the meantime I’ll sleep better at night knowing they’re not looking at inaccurate pictures, which could lead to costly incorrect decisions for them.

Duplication is not the reason for this change as we are already in the process of developing the tech that will handle this issue separately.

I took in input both internally and externally of our organization and this decision was 100% mine. And I fully stand by it, unfortunately this portion of CoinFacts has been undermanaged for a few years and I’m in charge of cleanup. I would however, like to directly apologize to all of you for how this was handled on our end. I gave the thumbs up to roll out the new CoinFacts site on Thursday, not realizing the image removal was tethered to this release. I mistakenly thought I had one more week to prepare for this change, alas I hope this statement significantly clarifies our decision.

Oftentimes we use the phrase “one step back and two steps forward.” Right now, the image galleries on CoinFacts, which account for 3% of the total CoinFacts web traffic, are taking one large step back, in order to take incremental and more organized steps forward. Believe me, your voices have been heard loud and clear, and images will return to CoinFacts as we handle each issue mentioned above individually. CoinFacts is a free service we provide to the numismatic community and the responses from all of you have proven that it is worth our time and efforts to invest in improving this service.

One final note: Harassment towards Heather, David Talk, or any other member of our team on this forum, in person, or on the phone is 100% disallowed and I will operate on a zero tolerance basis. I’ve spent good parts of the last few days banning coin doctors and am all warmed up to have tough conversations. Being on this forum is a privilege not a right.

Thanks and best,
Brett Charville
President - PCGS