Sports Cards

There's outliers with everything. Newsstand could be seen as rarer since the stores could rip off the covers and return them for credit, whereas direct market, you were stuck. Plus newsstand copies are going to be handled a lot less carefully.

Last year I started re-buying the GI Joe issues that got me into comics. GI Joe #38 was my first ever comic, and I bought the next 11 issues to mimic that first subscription I had. I didn't care if they were a mix of direct of newsstand.

Probably like those people who swear that PC copies are better than numbered because they're technically rarer.  🙂 I have a few PC copies because that's what I got and to me they're still worth.

Remember when CD celebrated having 10,000 fans on Facebook, and they gave away a signed copy of Doctor Sleep? I'm sure the owner didn't care that it was a PC copy.

(Narrator: I don't care that it was a PC copy. Thank you @brianjamesfreeman

Posted by: @sock_monkey

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Yeah, these are often considered variants of the regular issues and actually are listed differently on sites like mycomicshop.com. I don't get it. Just like I don't understand why some collector's put stock in newsstand versus direct market versions of comics. 

 When I was a kid in The Bronx, we didn't have a comic shop anywhere nearby, so I was in an absolute panic when Marvel & DC started publishing direct-only comics. Somehow, and I still have no idea how or why, my favorite "Candy Store" (Local jargon for a newsstand...) started carrying direct-market books. Even the non-direct books had the little artwork in the UPC box. I don't know how or why they pulled this off, but they made a lot of local kids very happy.

@dannyboy121070 

I bet!

I got a subscription to GI Joe from school - issued were mailed in brown paper wrappers. Must have been 5th grade? We moved overseas shortly after, and that's when I discovered the Star and Stripes Bookstore. They had EVERYTHING. Spider-Man #275 was my first Spidey book. It wasn't much later when I discovered the X-Men and that was probably the last time I used my lunch money for lunch.  

Posted by: @tacomadiver

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@dannyboy121070 

I bet!

I got a subscription to GI Joe from school - issued were mailed in brown paper wrappers. Must have been 5th grade? We moved overseas shortly after, and that's when I discovered the Star and Stripes Bookstore. They had EVERYTHING. Spider-Man #275 was my first Spidey book. It wasn't much later when I discovered the X-Men and that was probably the last time I used my lunch money for lunch.  

 I had a subscription to KA-ZAR THE SAVAGE, which always arrived a month after the release date, having been read by everyone in the Post Office, lol. KA-ZAR was my favorite book...I read the omnibus a few years ago, and it does NOT match my memories, lol. So, so bad....

Posted by: @dannyboy121070

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and it does NOT match my memories,

I know that feeling so well!

Oh, boy. I completely burned out on this distraction. The level of variants, the large print runs, the seemingly endless level of rookie, prospect, numbered, and SSP cards and then the tiered values between raw cards, graded, and graded with certain companies, really takes this from a hobby to a crazy level of extrinsic valuations.