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Contacting sellers of fake fossils/wrong listing is a better solution sometimes


-Andy-

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Today in online shops and auction sites, we see listings that are outright fake or with wrong IDs.

 

Often, the first thing that comes is anger. "Why would he sell theropod indet. as raptor?" "That Keichosaurus is obviously fake!" "That's horn coral, not a T-Rex tooth..." etc. And in our anger, or need to prevent others from falling into the trap, we might post on the forum or spread it all over FB to warn others of this seller.

 

Yet have we given the seller the benefit of the doubt? What if he/she made a genuine mistake?

 

Recently I posted a thread filled with sarcasm and rage-humor on how a coral was marketed as an expensive sea bird fossil. It was too easy to ID the seller from my title and pictures. The mods thankfully closed the thread. Fossildude19 then contacted the seller, and reported the listing on the auction site. In 2 hours time, the listing was taken down, and the seller apologized for his mistake. The problem was solved quick and clean.

 

I do not deny there are plenty of sellers out to scam. I do not advocate mercy for them, but I wish to tell you guys(and to remind myself) that some sellers are guilty of ignorance, not malice, and we should give them(and the auction site) a chance to remove their listing first. I know some of you are thinking - dealers have an even bigger responsibility to do their due research, and their laziness or mistakes causing buyers to lose $$$ isn't to be taken lightly. I agree. But we don't need to start witch hunts for them.

 

All in all, I used to think reporting listings on eBay didn't work, but Fossildude19 proved it does. So give it a try guys; you can refer to this thread on how to do it > 

 

Looking forward to meeting my fellow Singaporean collectors! Do PM me if you are a Singaporean, or an overseas fossil-collector coming here for a holiday!

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There will always be those few people who try to profit from someone else's ignorance. 

There will always be sellers who are not knowledgeable about the things they are trying to sell.

 

One need only look at the fossil ID sub-forum here, to realize that there are quite a few things out there that are regularly misidentified as fossils, or,... as to the type of fossil they are. :( 

 

The bottom line is that, when purchasing a fossil, it is best for the purchaser to research the item as much as they can.

If you do not want to waste money on an item that ends up being not what it was purported to be, then do your research. 

Knowledge is power. :) 

    Tim    -  VETERAN SHALE SPLITTER

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"In every walk with nature one receives far more than he seeks."

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I used to go about this approach on a site for handmade crafts and original vintage items.

It started as a place for HANDMADE, ORIGINAL, ONE-OF-A-KIND items.

About 2 years ago now I believe they went public and are now traded on the NYSE.

Since then sellers have been popping up with fossils, and minerals and wholesale lots even.

 

Before becoming public I would contact the company as well as the site and point these errors out, they would take them down by the dozens on my requests.

Since becoming public they still market themselves as a "Marketplace of individual sellers/creators of handmade or vintage items, art, and supplies"

Yet, more than ever companies are selling minerals and fossils with blatantly wrong information such as locales and even ages.

The last time I pointed out a wrong listing was about 6 months ago, the response I got back from them was that unless I can prove that the fish fossil (from Green River Formation) was not handmade I had no case to ask the seller to take it down or repost it with accurate information. I replied back that I have been digging those fish out of the ground as natural objects for 5 years. I got no response.

 

The conclusion I came to is that the company itself that offers the listings knows very little about anything that is being advertised, they are simply there to make their dollars and report earnings to their investors. Is it truly worth my time to go through each listing for accuracy?

 

Probably not, we should do what we can, but if we stress about every one of these listings it would take the lifetimes of hundreds of people to make sure they are all correctly presented.

 

I personally choose to use my knowledge to help people on an individual basis. Such as forum members or people that come and ask an opinion. The return on those situations is 100%. They are asking because they WANT to know. They WANT to have the knowledge to acquire these things and in the long run they will want to learn more. I have fossils on my shelves that when I purchased them or was given them I knew NOTHING about. After staring at them I had to learn more so I asked. As such, my appreciation for them has grown exponentially.

 

Sorry for the long rant, but yes misidentified finds bug the *insert your choice of expletive here* out of me. But I figure it is truly up to the buyer to make that decision based on facts and information they can acquire.

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Honestly, nothing bothers me more than paying good money for a fossil that you discover has been misidentified.  I totally agree with @FossilDudeCO on this account.  Perhaps the fault is my own, as I have been on the receiving end on more occasions than I care to admit.    My collection is limited to dinosaur specimens, mostly from the Hell Creek Formation.  Most of the mistakes have not been done with malicious intent, as the sellers are doing their best to identify isolated bones, teeth, and claws, which is not as easy as it seems it would be.  

 

I dont know how people begin collecting fossils, as maybe it starts in different ways for different people.  When my kids turned 3 and 2 years of age, they fell in love with the PBS show called "Dinosaur Train."   They were consumed by dinosaurs, and we would even download dinosaur documentaries on YouTube for them to watch.  We took them to the Smithsonian during the summer.  Without any knowledge of dinosaur fossils and how to identify certain specimens, I set out on a popular website to see if anyone had dinosaur fossils for sale.  This proved to be a dangerous proposition in many instances, as I started collecting without having any knowledge about the material itself.  I thought that I could just depend on the knowledge of the dealers themselves.  The truth is that you just can't.   You need to know about what you are collecting before you begin, and learning is a long process, as I have found.  Thank goodness that there are other collectors out there that are kind enough to share their knowledge with others.  

 

As stated, most mistakes are not done on purpose, but some sadly are.  A year or two ago, I purchased what was advertised as a juvenile T.rex femur.  When I received it, the shaft looked too straight to belong to a T.rex.  It was indeed a Struthiomimus femur.  A cool specimen, but not for the price I paid. I contacted the seller, and the seller insisted that they were correct.  No way it could be from a Struthi.  They wanted me to ship the fossil back at my own expense for credit on another specimen.  Not wanting someone else to be scammed, I kept the femur.  I check the seller's site every now and then. Recently, I noticed a Triceraptops vertebra that was found by some of my friends, and was purchased by the same dealer.  The vertebra that had no lateral processes when found and purchased, now "miraculously" has lateral processes.   I would suspect that they were grafted to the vert in order to get a higher fee from some unsuspecting buyer.  Very sad indeed!  These are the kind of dealers that make me angry and sad at the same time.  They refuse to take advice, will never learn, and have no desire to learn.  They are happy to prey on those who don't know any better, and they do it maliciously with no regard for anyone except their own bank accounts.  

 

How many people will do what I did, and just take a leap of faith into the hobby?  Not a wise way to begin.  On a brighter note, I'm happy to report that 5 years later we are still collecting, my kids still love dinosaurs, and I've learned so much,  with much more to learn.   

 

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My experience has been somewhat positive. For the most part any dealer I have notified of a mislabeling has thanked me an immediately removed or edited the listing.  I once contacted a seller that had listed a Megalodon tooth. All the description was proper, but all the pictures posted were of a '74 Toyota truck. He said he had no idea of the mistake. I'll bet he was wondering why there were no bids.

 

 

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I sometimes come across items that are way overpriced (whether they are misidentified or not), and I hate to move on without mentioning it to the seller that I doubt they will get anywhere near that much for it (more often than not I'll get an argument, like they think I don't know what I'm talking about)..

I guess the seller can ask for any price they want, and people won't pay if they think it's too much, the market will sort these things out. But what if a buyer does come along and naively shells out for that overpriced item? I'd hate to be that person.

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I hope eBay does better with fake fossil reports than they do with meteorites. eBay is notorious about allowing obviously-fake meteorites to be sold there. Several members of the meteorite community, including myself, have filed reports with eBay in an attempt to get them to do something about it, and eBay ignores every one of these requests.

 

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20 minutes ago, Bone Daddy said:

I hope eBay does better with fake fossil reports than they do with meteorites. eBay is notorious about allowing obviously-fake meteorites to be sold there. Several members of the meteorite community, including myself, have filed reports with eBay in an attempt to get them to do something about it, and eBay ignores every one of these requests.

 

 

Same with fossils from my experiences.

They don't care, they still get their commission.

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