Chris Perkins

Always assume that all the coins are just worth a few pence each, because that is usually the case! Of all the coins that I get offered the majority cost more to post then they are worth. Any that break the £1 value barrier will be mini miracles. I wish I had £1 for every time someone has told me that the coins look to be in much better than average condition (particularly with the brass threepences) only to find that they are they usual average circulated £2-3, or 2p each in the case of pennies and all the normal dates of everything else (apart from pre 1947 silver of course). azda, I think it's wrong to ever mention 'quite a few pounds' in reply to a newbie, because it only gets them excited and in reality the H/KN coins in average condition are usually worth sub £1. I'm a cynic after years of doing this - but that's how it is.

I feel bad now, re-reading it! In my experience though if people are a bit 'off' over email etc, for example when customers ask where an order is and you can tell they're about to call the police and between the lines they call you a criminal, because you've 'got their money' and they've waited 3 days! I find simply being bitingly direct but not vulgar or rude (at least not openly) and above all honest, generally results in an apology and some groveling. Quite satisfying really. It's amazing how many upset customers I've turned into pussycats.

This bloke just got on my *&*s! How terribly inaccurate of me to put the word 'conder' in the title. He starts his correction by quoting me (see description and questions): http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=180616704913 Is it just me taking it personally, or was that a bit anal?

Many thanks.

Not at all. You're welcome to promote the RCC and it's secret parking ceremonies, here.

I suspect everyone in the Western World is also the descendant of at least one Irishman!

Can you add me to your numismatic links page, Mr Reading Coin club? Perhaps a direct link to the forum and one to the main site?

Hang on. Del, you've got Hoolighan ancestors? Actually this inspired me to look at my genealogy records and investigate something.

Andy, sorry. It was me that zapped your account! I was trying to get rid of a flurry of spammers and I seem to have wiped out a real person by mistake. But you got back in, so that's good.

And you're complaining?! I can count my bullets on 2 fingers.

They must have inherited their unusual surnames owing to a strong trait of an ancestor! It's in the genes.

I can understand that. You don't want 12 year old friends when you're already 14 I think that unless you go barmy adding all the 3rd party apps (many of which can be malicious) then you're generally alright. Every couple of months someone in a 3rd world country wants to be friends, but that's improved too. I now have eleven 'likes', including me! It may be one of those things that goes viral and tomorrow I'll have 30,000 likes!

So that I don't look too much like a 30 something dinosaur I've created a facebadger page for predecimal.com There's nothing there yet and to be honest I don't know exactly what I'm going to do with it or if it will be a permanent thing. To encourage me, please 'like' it! Facebook There are also 'like' links from the home page and from the left hand pane of every (non forum) page. It will at least be a more 'live' extension of the email newsletters and may be inspiration for me to do and try new things. Push the boundaries of coin websites!

Yes, had that since the upgrade to the latest version. I have no idea how they get past it. I can only assume there is some poor Indian chap sitting in an internat cafe entering CAPTCHA's all day long. Or, innocent internet users are presented with fake CAPTCHA's (via trojan/viruses etc that look like they are part of websites) that are actually linked to web registrations for forums etc, without them knowing it. Then the spam bots do the rest. No idea! Perhaps someone has developed software that can read them.

Oh my giddy aunt. Those were accounts that were created before I added the question. It seems they can now get around the CAPTCHA wierd text character input, but they really shouldn't be able to get around the question. I thought about banning certain email accounts, but there are also genuine people that use the free email accounts (gmail is the spammers favourite).

Sorry, didn't notice that. Should all be gone now? Every day about 25 spam accounts fail to get in (i.e. become members). It's a constant battle. I have a feeling that the spam bots are targeting websites more than peoples email these days.

Where? I thought I'd zapped everything. Point me at it.

By way of a further attempt to prevent spam bots registering and posting, I have now added an additional feature to the registration process. All new members are presented with the question: 'What sex is your biological father?' No computer is currently clever enough to read/understand that and correctly respond. And, should a clever one be invented in the future, we all know computers can't lie and don't have fathers, so that should stop them in their tracks either way! In fact, to go one further: I hope the concept of artificial intelligence deliberating on whether or not it has a biological father may cause a meltdown and stop spamming forever - and that would probably qualify me for a Nobel Peace prize.

Doesn't happen yet.... But paypal usage is pushed very hard on German ebay, too. They make it out to be the safest way to pay etc. That's rubbish of course, as any payment method is only as safe as the person you're sending the money to! The Germans were much more used to doing bank transfers than the people of GB. I remember the days when i used to get umpteen cheques a week! Anyway, it is a liberty that people are forced to use paypal. As paypal is owned by ebay, why can't paypal payments be free as ebay already get auction fees? Selling cheap stuff or tight margin items simply doesn't make sense anymore. A friend of mine was actually banned for going below the threshold on the DSR. He was reinstated after calling them, but probably only because his sales value was pretty high.

As one of the founding members (back in the days when basically you me and young Oli used to use the forum for 3 way conversations!) you deserve a medal for that! And, so many interesting and very useful contributions too. I remain in your debt Sylvester. Top man. I think I was 25/26 when I started this. 32 now, and what a wonderful resource this place has become.

And the same from me! To the established members that I know and equally to the new faces.

Isn't that just a link farm website? It's only purpose seems to be to generate revenue from the ads. I could find no useful content.

I'm not really that much into World coins either though. And I expect it'll be 90% German.

Munich's a long way from me. I dunno, I'm not really into the German scene (after observing some time ago that all German dealers sell are over graded, over priced and over cleaned coins).

Oooo, I didn't know they'd put it on Amazon. The ISBN is right, but I don't know where they guessed the release date from! I better get my finger out.