EK 1939 The Great RK debate ?

[Dietrich]

Just a quick sidebar, can we please use the word "thread", instead of "threat".......... They are distinctly different things. Thanks!!

Sorry! I'm still a freaking foreigner. No bad intention, just a mix-up!

[deptfordboy]

Hello

Actually this isn't true. I made a request to the Imperial War Museum in London to examine all of their Iron Crosses, whether displayed or not. The request was granted and I was left with the awards in a room and able to photograph them, handle them and examine them in detail. I can't speak for other countries museums, but here in the UK what you did at West Point is certainly possible.

Incidentally, the only RK that I was shown as being in their collection was a cased, unflawed, S&L. I'll dig out my photos and notes at some point, (they are still packed away somewhere having not long since moved house), as the one in the IWM has provenance from 1944 if I remember correctly.

Yes, I was thinking this also. If you introduce yourself properly, European museums are just as 'researcher-friendly' as the USA. Personally, I have had good experiences with the British Museum, who were happy for me to rummage around in their archives for Iron Age gold torques back in my student days, and with the Cantonal Museum in Zurich.

Gilbert

[Troy Tempest]

Wow! I have just spent an hour and a half reading all eight pages - whew! I most certainly am not an authority on any award, just an interested novice, and after reading this thread I now know just how much of a novice I am! I certainly don't profess to understand everything that has been posted here, but I am much the better for reading all of this. Thank you all for your most illuminating posts on the mighty RK! It has just made me all the more curious about all aspects of collecting German militaria. My own collection is very tiny, having only just started, but it's good to know that there are some real experts, armchair or otherwise, here to pester with questions. Thanks!

[PKeating]

Well, the militaria websites started off as promotional tools for bent dealers. Then we went through all the grief as "difficult" types posted truth. Truth didn't fly as far as the geeks running the two or three mainstream websites were concerned. Check my name on those sites: banned...expelled...excluded. I ain't the only one! Quite a few of us set out to tell it how it was...and we kept getting banned, deleted and so on. In the end, I think the majority of readers don't give a toss about what's real and what's not. If it shines, it's real...or as good as...right? There'll come a time soon when fakes from the 1960s and 1970s will be real! I look at the auction house lists these days and I see fake after fake...and I know who made this stuff.

But nobody wants to hear truth...

PK

[Troy Tempest]

I noticed that in the eight pages(!) that you and others had said you knew who the 'bent' dealers may have been, and I think I read about a RKT selling his RK twice, why can't you say who they are on these pages? Is it a legal thing? Would it leave you open to a possible law battle? Once again, I freely acknowledge my 'innocence' in regards to this side of collecting, but isn't a 'name and shame' policy possible?

[Colin Davie]

Many posts on these types of forums, are of this ilk..

STUKA 87 writes.. I have just bought this Assmann pilot badge and notice it's left wing has 1342 feathers on it, where-as KRIEGSBOMBERS Assmann pilot badge left wing only has 1263 feathers, I have analysed the 1764 Assmann pilot badge images I have on my computer and having counted all the left wing feathers the average seems to be 1271, this is confusing me, it my badge fake?

For a laugh I would've asked for the stats on the right wing... but seriously given the quality of fakes these days I understand the need.

Another type of post altogether is the type where a troublemaker like Prosper takes on some dealer, lets call him DANGER MOUSE to avoid throwing any more un-necessary rocks, there will always be bum browsers of the likes of DANGER MOUSE who will call Prosper names and attempt to ridicule him and his stance, but the silent majority will watch and learn from him. Thank you Prosper for what you have done for this hobby over the years, I feel you must feel like a one man army some times, and are not thanked often enough, but at the end of the day, when I am old and sitting on the verandah dwelling on these past days it is the PROSPER v DANGER MOUSE type posts I will remember with the fondest memories.

There is also the undeniabe fact that those posts of Prospers have advanced the hobby by a country mile for the better. Just my humble opinion.

C

[PKeating]

Colin, thanks for the kind words. I just do what comes naturally! Troublemaking, I mean... Ah, yes, "Dangermouse"! He shot himself in the foot with that one, didn't he? You could close your eyes and hear what was left of his cred on its way to the ocean via the sh1thouse pipes. I admit that I still get a grin out that too. Oh well, if I've managed to save a few people a few quid and that heartache that strikes when you realise you've been done, that's good enough for me. Fakers and their frontmen and shills are as bad as muggers. They are robbers. They steal from people. And then you have the dealers and collectors who rip off elderly people. That's as bad as posing as a gasman or something to get into some elderly person's flat and stealing their householding money. These people are typical of the kind of dealers behind the other two militaria websites. And then there are all those guys, the "historians" and "authors" who persuade veterans to hand over their photos and photo albums, which are then exploited for gain without any money going to the veterans or veterans organisations. Shining a light on that scam got me banned from the AHF. Interesting, isn't it, that for all the effort that goes into casting me as a sociopathic pariah, I have never had any trouble here on this website, despite occasional efforts by various shills with grudges.

PK

[PKeating]

I noticed that in the eight pages(!) that you and others had said you knew who the 'bent' dealers may have been, and I think I read about a RKT selling his RK twice, why can't you say who they are on these pages? Is it a legal thing? Would it leave you open to a possible law battle? Once again, I freely acknowledge my 'innocence' in regards to this side of collecting, but isn't a 'name and shame' policy possible?

Why not name and shame here? For my own part, I come here for the peace and quiet. For an explanation of that, read the above two posts. They only touch on the tip of the iceberg.

Bent dealers have often been named. There is a whole section devoted to bent dealers on one forum website. They do not sue! They know that if push really came to shove in a legal battle, they would lose. I suppose that one might be open to legal action in theory but in practice, it is extremely hard to take legal action over something written and published on the internet, particularly if one does happen to be a militaria dealer with a rather doubtful reputation. I was threatened a couple of times with legal action. In one case, the proverbial $100 letter was received by the ISP who passed it on. It ended up scanned and posted in the offending thread, causing general hilarity. As for the original, I put it to appropriate use, carefully refolded it and sent it back to the attorney. He was in Catsfart, New Jersey and I was in France. What was he really going to do? Especially as what I had written about his "client" was pretty well-documented. Had I been in NJ or even in the US, he might have had a case for sending a noxious substance through the mail. There again, I am not daft: I would have sprung for Fedex just for the satisfaction of it.

One of the things that often makes me grin is the spectacle of idiots falling out on the internet and threatening legal action. These clowns are usually using ridiculous pseudonyms. Now, as one lawyer explained to me, if I threaten to beat up or kill "SS-General" or "Dickiewaver" because they have insulted me for dissing their guru dealer and their Friday worship patterns, I am not guilty of anything at all because these people do not legally exist, as such. They do not use their real names. Interesting legal point. Of course, were I to find out who they really were and harm them, I would be guilty of assault or murder. But making a threat on the internet to someone whose real identity is unknown is a bit of non-starter in terms of lodging a complaint with the FBI, as these idiots os often threaten.

The other amusing one is when a dealer or an eBay shark threatens to sue for copyright infringement if the images of whatever fake they happen to be peddling are used to illustrate a thread warning people about such fakes. In fact, the dealer who used the "Dangermouse" handle to which Colin refers tried this ploy at one point. He started plastering copyright notices across his images. Fine! I put copyright notices on images from his website downloaded before this, just to wind him up, and went into overdrive. It comes under "Fair Use", you see. One can also argue that images used to promote goods for retail purposes are in the public domain, as long as you don't profit financially from reusing them.

Anyway, naming and shaming certainly happens and there really are no legal ramifications, as long as one observes basic rules of engagement by keeping to the facts, exercising care in how one phrases things and avoiding common abuse etc etc...

PK