Cup Faker Alert: Has Kenny Ao resurfaced (The Infamous Patch Faker)???

Tom, I'm glad to hear you're not involved with this moron. My apologies if came across in any way that you were, as that was not my intention.
 
spooner9ball said:
I hate the thought of the tampering, but I also really don't know why UD should take on this task. The quote below does make sense.....

"I am also not blaming UD in any of this but in my opinion if cards are being faked, people will eventually and slowly STOP buying singles off ebay and at shows. This will eventually and slowly HURT case breakers and the turn and burn crowd. They will eventually and slowly stop SPENDING so much money or stop completely which will hurt UD's bottom line at some point. "

... however, they are a friggin MACHINE. The secondary market has little to do with their sales outside of this point. Pontiac could care less how I soup up my G5; they have their money.

The sad reality of this situation is Buyer Beware is the only true defense. And possibly a flurry of punches to the mouth when he/ she/ they pop up at a show and someone who has had enough has had enough.....
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That's not totally true. If Pontiac found out you were changing their cars (after-market) and re-selling them as originals to make a profit.....trust me, Pontiac would have a BIG BIG problem. Upper Deck likely hasn't witnessed a big drop-off in profits yet because of the faking, and therefore considers it a moot-point. But believe me, if it starts effecting their bottom line, you'd be surprised at how quick the lawyers come out to play.

Unfortunately....not many people (inlcuding myself) have quite buying their products. This needs to start happening I think before anyone in Carlsbad will listen.
 
Im my opinion it is already too late for Upper Deck to pull off any action that will restore the massive damage this counterfeiting scandal has done to their company and the credibility of their memorabilia products. At this point, the best we can hope for is that the NHLPA eliminates the monopoly as soon as possible. Allow other companies to come in and offer a properly manufactured, licensed product, that some 10 year old with a sharp knife and a bottle of Crazy Glue cant tamper with.
As far as counterfeit deterence goes, Upper Deck has soiled the proverbial bed for at least the last 5 years. The fact is, an ever growing percentage of collectors wont buy their memorabilia cards any more, and the online selling prices for Upper Deck memorabilia products reflect this.
 
scandalz8hlx said:
That's not totally true. If Pontiac found out you were changing their cars (after-market) and re-selling them as originals to make a profit.....trust me, Pontiac would have a BIG BIG problem.
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I think he's absolutely right, but the analogy needs to be clarified. Say you buy a brand new car, fully assembled (akin to an unopened pack of The Cup.) You then pull the motor out (take the ARP out of the pack.) You then switch the cam or pistons for something cheaper, and reassemble the motor (insert a fake patch into the card.) Then you go to sell the engine, claiming it's stock despite the cheaper parts. The car manufacturer isn't going to give one lick that someone bought a motor off someone else that was supposedly stock when it wasn't.
 
Phaneufarama said:
Im my opinion it is already too late for Upper Deck to pull off any action that will restore the massive damage this counterfeiting scandal has done to their company and the credibility of their memorabilia products. At this point, the best we can hope for is that the NHLPA eliminates the monopoly as soon as possible. Allow other companies to come in and offer a properly manufactured, licensed product, that some 10 year old with a sharp knife and a bottle of Crazy Glue cant tamper with.
As far as counterfeit deterence goes, Upper Deck has soiled the proverbial bed for at least the last 5 years. The fact is, an ever growing percentage of collectors wont buy their memorabilia cards any more, and the online selling prices for Upper Deck memorabilia products reflect this.
Click to expand...

I agree with this post but I don't want to go down the "monopoly" road, because not only do I love UD products (and cards in general), but I believe that these scumbags will find a way to manipulate cards, no matter who makes them.

There is no doubt that UD is aware of the problem or tampering. Sure, they could hire some guys to sit tirelessly at the packing tables photographing and documenting everything in sight, but I would prefer to see some effort go towards implementing a simple technology that would serve as a clear indicator of whether or not a card has been altered.

I am a huge fan of the ITG Superlative technique - thin holders with a non intrusive sticker wrapped around the top of the loader - if the seal is broken, do not consume! I do not believe that permanently entombing cards in masses of indestructible plastic is the way to go, nor is it the most aesthetically pleasing.

I like the design implemented on the UD Ice quad jersey/auto cards - the memorabilia swatches are protected beneath a layer of acetate and remain very visible. I realize that some people like to touch or smell the memorabilia pieces (I've actually seen someone do that), but IMO, simply tweaking the design of certain sets would deter these morons.

Or how about using some SUPER adhesive glue to put the pieces in the cards to begin with - to the point where there is no way of removing the existing piece without obviously damaging some part of the card's design?

Cards in general are cheap on the secondary market today compared to a few years ago. That is something that isn't exclusive to UD. ITG Ultimate 9 just came out, and don't try to tell me that stuff is worth its weight in gold. The cards are nice, but can be had for fractions of fractions of the pack price, just like Cup cards.
 
Triple B said:
I don't think anyone is blaming UD for this, however I think collectors ARE looking to them to protect the integrity of their own products.
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Agreed. Though the sentiment towards UD for something they shouldn't be blamed for seems to be eerily similar to the same sentiment they've received for the number of issues they are to be blamed for.

I think if time goes by and UD takes a non-responsive approach then that changes everything. I have a hard time believing that Karvin doesn't care. The question is does he have the support at UD to take any measures in order to protect the integrity of this hobby?
 
NJDEVILS30 said:
Or how about using some SUPER adhesive glue to put the pieces in the cards to begin with - to the point where there is no way of removing the existing piece without obviously damaging some part of the card's design?
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Triple B made a similar suggestion. Basically there needs to be a way to put together the cards so that tampering = damaged and there becomes no opportunity for a scammer to be successful at doing so.
 
Seriously...why would the patch fakers quit? NOTHING has been done about it in the past, and I'm guessing NOTHING will be done about it in the future. We can do all the finger pointing we want, but what good does it do? Jeremys' archive has been a HUGE HUGE help to US people who know about it, but we at HI are a small part of the hobby. All these threads do is keep us informed as to what Ebay name the douchebags are selling under. Ebay doesn't care, Upper Deck doesn't care. It's all about money to them. Bruce and others had great amounts of proof that certain people were faking the cards, yet, nobody "that matters" used it to legally charge anyone. When a certain card maker (Upper Deck in this case) doesn't care about the integrity of the hobby, you know it's time to get out, as MANY of us have already pretty much done.
 
Even jail time doesn't always stop these people. Mintz Marin and Friedlander were charged, convicted and at least one of them did jail time in the 1990's if I remember correctly, and they still had stores filled of their bogus autographs in malls in St Catherine, Vaughan and Ottawa as recently as 2007.

I never saw eye to eye with RIchard Scott on virtually anything, but his and CSC's vendetta against these con artists was at least commendable.

http://www.faceoff.com/story.html?id=e4b16458-e4f4-4b35-883f-242453f6aefc
 
guy3050 said:
With all the proof we"ve seen lately,why d"ont Upper deck bring a lawsuit against these forgers,heres an interesting article how Louis vuitton won a battle against ebay
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I just finished looking at the original Patch forger thread and I gotta say it's pretty scary stuff.

But with this whole thread booming, I'm wondering if anyone has photographic evidence of the current cards listed and/or sold recently proving they're fake. I've recently been quite intrigued with this matter but evidence is always key. Sure if these ebay sellers are the same guy, whose to say the cards are fake? Many of the patch cards listed are not that spectacular.

I think a lot of people are commenting and assuming based on reputation and not substance. I'm not defending this guy in any shape or form, but I'm having a hard time seeing what wrong/crime is being committed this time around? I'm trying to take a unbiased point of view (as any OPP/RCMP would) and they would have a hard time getting anywhere with this. I'm a type of guy who loves to see all the details and evidence before I bash the heck outta them until they have no defense :D
 
I used to complain that ITG's UM holders were ugly. They were a big reason why I didn't buy the product. Well, they have grown on me and I have recently put together a pretty impressive collection of UM cards. And I now LOVE how they look; both the cards themselves and within the holders. They show really well.

I have NO concern that any of the memorabilia in these cards is fake or non-game used.

I have found my solution to the fake patch issue. And to be honest, I like it better than my prior solutions of starting websites and online archives and photographing cards at the UD manufacturing/packaging facility.

I guess I am lucky in that I have grown to love ITG's UM brand.

With all of that said, I completely understand UD's position in all this (understand, not approve) and Karvin's in particular. Karvin sincerely cares about us collectors and UD's product. He is good for the hobby. He battles for us. But he does not run UD nor does he allocate their resources.
 
gomaz said:
With all of that said, I completely understand UD's position in all this (understand, not approve) and Karvin's in particular. Karvin sincerely cares about us collectors and UD's product. He is good for the hobby. He battles for us. But he does not run UD nor does he allocate their resources.
Click to expand...

This is something that can't be overlooked.
 
I believe UD does care because while it is the secondary market it is their product and it affects the primary market, which in turn, affects their bottom line.

Legal action would require a lot of proof. Perhaps even more then HI has shown in the past. UD has no scans of their cards, they have no way of knowing what they put in the card or that it has been modified.

To me the best system would be to scan all major patch cards from sets such as The Cup, Ultimate, Black, etc. Put them in a database where the card is viewable if you enter the serial number which is on the back of the card.

If UD doesn't want to or can't afford that option. Perhaps they should take a page out of ITG's book and approach Beckett or SGC about slabbing their high end cards. That won't help the collectors with the cards already in the secondary market but would help going forward.
 
Kehfee said:
I believe UD does care because while it is the secondary market it is their product and it affects the primary market, which in turn, affects their bottom line.

Legal action would require a lot of proof. Perhaps even more then HI has shown in the past. UD has no scans of their cards, they have no way of knowing what they put in the card or that it has been modified.

To me the best system would be to scan all major patch cards from sets such as The Cup, Ultimate, Black, etc. Put them in a database where the card is viewable if you enter the serial number which is on the back of the card.

If UD doesn't want to or can't afford that option. Perhaps they should take a page out of ITG's book and approach Beckett or SGC about slabbing their high end cards. That won't help the collectors with the cards already in the secondary market but would help going forward.
Click to expand...


Without getting into specifics of why, just trust me when I say that your whole post is inaccurate and not feasible.
 
While I am disappointed with the faking of patches as is everyone else - I would like to take a moment and postulate as to why UD may be somewhat hog-tied when it comes to going after the fakers.

1) In the first place as has been discussed ad-nauseum, there are no photos cooming off the line of the state of these cards - PRE PACK OUT. Why is that important???? Because without UD holding the proof that they put the patches into products as a 1 color (etc), it becomes more difficult to prove that the current seller is the one that made changes to the product. Just because you have a scan of the card - when it first was sold on Ebay - that would not necessaily hold up in a court setting that the patch came from UD that way. All that could be concluded is that the patch changed from one to another version. The fact that the 1 color was on Ebay 3 years ago - does not allow you to lawfully conclude that the one listed today is a forged patch.

Please do not give me the grief of comments - that are not based on a legal aspect. Having someone say that they are having a live break and even showing scans as they do it - would not necessarily constitute a legal chain of evidence.

2) I understand that the value of the altered patches are significantly raised - even doubled and tripled!!! However, unless we are talking about Crosby & Ovie at the top - and Richards etc in the middle, the range of selling values is going from $100 to $250 or less. That means that the forger is profiting a $ 150 for this instance. Even with 4 or 5 at a time, it will be awful hard to get the police excited over a $500/$600 crime. And the fact that a lot of this is cross-border makes it even more difficult. And with the sellers using 3 and 4 different User ID's - this gets tougher by the minute.

Maybe we should ask Karvin how helpful the folks at Ebay are when they approach them with concerns???? I bet that is a real treat - you see how Ebay/Paypal treats us, I doubt that they are ready to divulge much to Upper Deck without much less than a court order. Look how hard it was when the Ebayers were aselling the Diamond #1 of 1 cards a few years back!!!

3) I think you would need clarification from Karvin on this - but I am not sure that fraud would be an accurate definition of the crime commited here as far as Upper Deck is concerned. More likely it would be Copywrite Infringement - and that is not fun by any means to prosecute on a case-by-case basis. We go back to the fact that these forgers are using multiple ID's and listings to sell these items. Again - it would be difficult for UD to get a Prosecutor to consider bringing action on a patch by patch case. Fraud is being commited on the buyeer of the altered patch - and I doubt that too many of you would want to attempt to entertain a Civil Lawsuit of an amount less than $150.


The real answer is only to stop it in the future.
The argument has been made that Upper Deck will see lower sales and decreased demand for product due to the consumers lack of trust. Well so far - I am not sure that I am seeing that with High-End releases like The Cup. The demand for this product is determined by the strength of the Rookie Crop involved and new and exciting subsets. I am not really sure that I have seen case values plummet on these products for any reason having to do with concerns about genuiness of memorabilia.

I would think that with the high-tech printers that Upper Deck is using , that some form of high-speed imaging can be intertwined into the process. It would then be a matter of having a relatively low priced hourly worker working for a month could easily do the job. That would cost less than the retail price of a case ($10/hr x 40/hr x 4/wks = $1600).
I know nothing about the printers that Upper Deck uses - but I did talk to a local company that does high end printing and they already use high-tech imaging to spot production flaws.

I just wanted to bring up a couple points - as I think that a certain amount of UD bashing in this matter is un-founded. Then again - I am sure that I am all wet also!

Bruce
 
The patch faking is getting pretty bad. Here is the one Gaborik Patch card that I tracked. You can tell it is the same card, not only by the serial number (41/50), but by the autograph....it's identical on each.


The original sale was for serial 41/50 with plain patch (real)
Cup07-Logos-41-50-eBay2-1.jpg



Then the buyer of that card altered the patch (or photo on eBay) and tried selling for more $$. Card is serial number 41/50
Cup07-Logos-41-50-eBay-1.jpg




Then a different seller tried again. Again it is serial number 41/50
Cup07-Logos-41-50-HI.jpg




Why do they do this?? Greed!!! $$$$$$$$$$$$$$

Sad the hobby has come to this.
 
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LMFAO

Now that is precious - like the 2nd version was a bit too nice - so let us remove the lettering!!!
 
suitman19 said:
While I am disappointed with the faking of patches as is everyone else - I would like to take a moment and postulate as to why UD may be somewhat hog-tied when it comes to going after the fakers.

1) In the first place as has been discussed ad-nauseum, there are no photos cooming off the line of the state of these cards - PRE PACK OUT. Why is that important???? Because without UD holding the proof that they put the patches into products as a 1 color (etc), it becomes more difficult to prove that the current seller is the one that made changes to the product. Just because you have a scan of the card - when it first was sold on Ebay - that would not necessaily hold up in a court setting that the patch came from UD that way. All that could be concluded is that the patch changed from one to another version. The fact that the 1 color was on Ebay 3 years ago - does not allow you to lawfully conclude that the one listed today is a forged patch.

Please do not give me the grief of comments - that are not based on a legal aspect. Having someone say that they are having a live break and even showing scans as they do it - would not necessarily constitute a legal chain of evidence.

2) I understand that the value of the altered patches are significantly raised - even doubled and tripled!!! However, unless we are talking about Crosby & Ovie at the top - and Richards etc in the middle, the range of selling values is going from $100 to $250 or less. That means that the forger is profiting a $ 150 for this instance. Even with 4 or 5 at a time, it will be awful hard to get the police excited over a $500/$600 crime. And the fact that a lot of this is cross-border makes it even more difficult. And with the sellers using 3 and 4 different User ID's - this gets tougher by the minute.

Maybe we should ask Karvin how helpful the folks at Ebay are when they approach them with concerns???? I bet that is a real treat - you see how Ebay/Paypal treats us, I doubt that they are ready to divulge much to Upper Deck without much less than a court order. Look how hard it was when the Ebayers were aselling the Diamond #1 of 1 cards a few years back!!!

3) I think you would need clarification from Karvin on this - but I am not sure that fraud would be an accurate definition of the crime commited here as far as Upper Deck is concerned. More likely it would be Copywrite Infringement - and that is not fun by any means to prosecute on a case-by-case basis. We go back to the fact that these forgers are using multiple ID's and listings to sell these items. Again - it would be difficult for UD to get a Prosecutor to consider bringing action on a patch by patch case. Fraud is being commited on the buyeer of the altered patch - and I doubt that too many of you would want to attempt to entertain a Civil Lawsuit of an amount less than $150.


The real answer is only to stop it in the future.
The argument has been made that Upper Deck will see lower sales and decreased demand for product due to the consumers lack of trust. Well so far - I am not sure that I am seeing that with High-End releases like The Cup. The demand for this product is determined by the strength of the Rookie Crop involved and new and exciting subsets. I am not really sure that I have seen case values plummet on these products for any reason having to do with concerns about genuiness of memorabilia.

I would think that with the high-tech printers that Upper Deck is using , that some form of high-speed imaging can be intertwined into the process. It would then be a matter of having a relatively low priced hourly worker working for a month could easily do the job. That would cost less than the retail price of a case ($10/hr x 40/hr x 4/wks = $1600).
I know nothing about the printers that Upper Deck uses - but I did talk to a local company that does high end printing and they already use high-tech imaging to spot production flaws.

I just wanted to bring up a couple points - as I think that a certain amount of UD bashing in this matter is un-founded. Then again - I am sure that I am all wet also!

Bruce
Click to expand...


Excellent post and I agree with all except for the bolded part. If you recall the the outcry when 08-09 The Cup was released in August 2009, you are now saying that it should be released in September. And trust me that it would take longer than one month. While the thought is nice, it is not feasible for UD. The reources it would require to capture the images organize them and make them public are significantly higher than $30k.
 

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