I guess this FBI investigation might be a little more involved than I first thought. Here's the story SCD just posted on our home page:

Just a couple days after the New York Daily News broke the story about FBI investigators issuing multiple subpoenas to appear before a grand jury investigating fraud in the memorabilia business, a source close to the topic shed a little more light on the significance of this fast-moving industry story.

"It will be much bigger than Operation Bullpen," said an anonymous source. "This one's going to affect established hobby leaders and organizations. I think good always comes out of shake ups. I think it's going to put the hobby on a good long-term course and I think it will probably start creating the need for some true regulation.

"I think the hobby's been in need to look at the way they do business for a long time, especially when the numbers got bigger. With the increased success of our industry comes increased responsibility. We've (the hobby) reaped the rewards of increased success but we haven't become more responsible for how we've conducted ourselves as an industry."

According to the New York Daily News, agents spent several hours Thursday, Friday and Saturday at the National, sports memorabilia's largest annual convention.

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Leon Luckey is the owner and moderator of, arguably, the hobby's most popular message board, the Network 54 Vintage Baseball Card Forum, http://www.network54.com/Forum/153652/. With 900,000 views per month and 10,000 unique IP addresses, it may not even be that much of an argument.

Last week Gavel Chat had a chance to talk with Leon Luckey for the first installment of this week's series of Q&As.

Gavel Chat: Did you start the message board?

Leon Luckey: No, I did not start it. The Network 54 Vintage Baseball Card Forum(VBCF) was started by Elliot Bassin back in September 2001. He managed it for approximately a year and then handed it to another collector, Bill Cornell. After approximately a year-and-a-half of moderating it, he handed it over to me. I've been running it for the last two-and-a-half-to-three years with the help of two other moderators.

There was no advertising at that time on the Net54 VBCF. It was basically given to me to take over and moderate and I felt advertising would allow me to put more time into it, develop it operationally, and to make it into what it is today.

GC: Did you ever think the board would be as popular as it is?

LL: No, not really. It wasn't started out to go that route. It was started out to stay small, and then when I took it over I knew a lot of people personally in the hobby and they kind of came over to it with my invitation. Then when I added the banner advertising it seemed to double in size almost overnight.

GC: Just because the banner ads legitimized it?

LL: It's hard to say. More people started looking at it for whatever reason. It did seem to legitimize it though I would not want to say ad banners specifically did it.

GC: Would you ever consider selling it?

LL: I've been approached by some companies and I am not interested. You never know what the future holds, but it's a hobby and I enjoy it, and as long as I enjoy it I will probably do it. Certainly if someone else took it over it would change the demeanor, at least a little bit, because whoever is running it is going to have their own little pet peeves and so forth. But, for right now, I'm enjoying it and I'll continue doing it.

GC: How tough is it to moderate the site?

LL: Not that tough. Most of the time it's a lot of fun. Numerous times there are decisions that have to be made when someone is asking for something and no matter what decision I make, one of the people involved in the situation is going to be unhappy. People will say 'Why did you lock a thread,' or, ' Why did you delete something.' No matter what I say it's not going to be a good answer for them.

As most people know, my biggest pet peeve is anonymity on the board, which is allowed in benign-type threads, but when there's any controversy or strong opinions, anonymity is not allowed.

GC: Is that to protect you?

LL: That's to protect everybody. It has nothing to do with me. As the owner of the board, or moderator of the board, I am not legally, or otherwise, responsible for what anyone else says. I've been threatened to be sued at least a half a dozen times for what other people have said. There's a federal statute, the Blogger's Statute Section 230, which protects chat board moderators. I mention that statute and those people seem to go away. It’s a very strong statute and protects me well.

GC: Do you have any interesting stories that happened on the board?

LL: Yes, a few. During the last seven years of the board there have been quite a few different interesting threads. One that comes to mind is the longest running thread that there ever has been, which had to do with fake autographs, and it had approximately 800 posts on that one subject. That thread received some national media attention too. It really brought to light some of the problems in the autograph industry. I would say that was one of the best threads that the board has had.

GC: I notice a lot of auction house owners and big collectors participate. How important is that to the board?

LL: Well, it adds some credibility. Certainly there are some of the biggest collectors in the hobby that do participate. Many of the other ones at least lurk, which of course is not actively participating other than reading the board. I get e-mails weekly from people who lurk and who would be considered hobby icons.

GC: Do you think that the board has impacted the way grading companies do things or the way results on vintage cards in auctions take place?

LL: Absolutely. Since there are so many people who participate and talk about the grading companies, there is no doubt that the board has led to some positive changes in the hobby. One such subject is the authentication of memorabilia, where the ownership is by the same person who authenticated the item up for sale. I'm pretty sure the board had a hand in the transparency of that ownership. In other words, if you're authenticating a bat, and you're selling it and you own it, then that information needs to be disclosed. That has not always been the case. That one change in particular has come about much to the credit of the Net54 Vintage Baseball Card Forum.

GC: You are a collector, correct?

LL: Yes, I collect prewar baseball type cards, meaning I'd like one card from every set, pre-World War II. I also collect the packaging and other ancillary items surrounding the cards. It's been a lot of fun.

GC: Where do you display your collection?

LL: Well, most of the valuable stuff is in a safe deposit box. I do have a website, which is www.luckeycards.com, where I have my personal collection and offer a few other things for sale.

GC: And you started an auction?

LL: Actually “we” did. A friend of mine, Scott Brockelman and I, three to six months ago, did start an auction house- Brockelman and Luckey Auctions. It's going very well. We're having a lot of fun with it and taking in consignments every week. We're set to have our second one in a couple months, September 29th. We plan on having two to three per year. Our first auction went very well. We certainly learned a few things in the process. As we go forward we expect it to be better and better. The website is www.b-lauctions.com or brockelmanluckeyauctions.com.  Our goal is to be the friendliest and most cost effective way to sell your valuable pieces of history (mainly baseball cards). As of now almost no one in the hobby offers as low of rates as we do, which is very important to many collectors. We give as much attention to a $200 lot as a $10,000 lot, whereas most of the larger venues either won’t, or don’t.

GC: The gas prices, the poor economy, do you think collectors are spending less on pre-war cards?

LL: For the most part, I believe we (vintage collectors) are a different demographic. I do think it affects some of the collectors, but the majority of prewar collectors, while not immune to the economy, have discretionary funds to buy the things that they really want. I do think that some of the mid-range items and some of the lower valued items have decreased in price, a little bit, due to the economy. But the really rare crème de la crème have continued to go up.

GC: Where do you see the prewar card hobby going?

LL: I think it will keep increasing, though probably not quite as quick as it has over the last five years. I think it will continue to increase as more collectors come into the vintage market.  Also people realize that money in a CD or a fund or a treasury note isn't quite as fun as what a collectible is.  It seems the Net54 board has also helped the hobby in that there is a venue to discuss what is going on in a very safe and friendly atmosphere.

GC: How's eBay been lately, as far as buying and selling?

LL: To me, my personal trend with eBay has been that I have quit selling very much through it. There are several reasons for that. The fees have gone up exponentially over the last year, they've hidden bidder’s identities and buyers can no longer receive negative or neutral Feedback from sellers. They've really taken what used to be a great system and messed it up, in my opinion. I would say that there are less people than before participating on eBay, in the prewar space. Even after all of that, it's still the biggest prewar venue there is. So, it's still out there and still relevant, but in my opinion it's gone down a tad.

GC: What's your take on shill bidding in major auction houses? Do you think it goes on?

LL: Well, I do think it goes on. Whether it's shilling by the auction house or shilling by a friend of somebody who’s consigned an item. My definition of shilling is placing a bid that is a false bid with no intention of buying the product. So, hypothetically, if I had a friend bid on one of my items in an auction because it’s not selling for enough, he wouldn’t really have to buy it if he won it. Most auctions don't allow you to bid on your own item, though there's nothing they can do about a friend bidding on your item for you. In our Brockelman and Luckey Auctions we have made every effort to address this situation with some unique rules and made it where there is no reason for shilling to take place.

GC: You have a banquet at the National for board members. Tell me about that.

LL: It's a lot of fun and it started seven years ago. In 2002, there was about 20 of us going for a steak dinner and it was Dutch for everyone. In '03, make that about 35 people, '04 make that about 55 people and in recent years it has kept getting bigger and bigger. Last year we had about 125 folks attend it and this year we are expecting about the same number. About two to three years ago, after I took the board over and since I had some funds coming in from ads, I went ahead and used some of the funds on the dinner to help subsidize it. There have also been good sponsors the last few years, including the SGC grading company. This year SGC and Beckett are helping to keep it free to all participants, with myself kicking in what is left to pay, from the ad monies. This will be the third year that it will be catered and free with an open bar for six hours. It’s a really good time to get together with your hobby friends, sip a few cocktails and have some good ‘ole fun!

Last year, we had the Old Cardboard magazine editor, Lyman Hardeman, speak at the banquet. We also had Doug Allen of Mastro Auctions and Brian Wentz from BMW Cards say a few words. This year, tentatively, I’ve scheduled for a couple auction house presidents, a writer of a book, a grading company director of grading and their senior grader to say a few words.