auction house experience

[A. G. Maisey]

In respect of my ebay comments, I feel that I should be fair by saying that at a different stage in my collecting life, I would probably have bought from ebay, and from on-line auction houses.

However, I've been collecting for more than 60 years now, and I'm at a different point in my collecting than I was 30 or 40 years ago.

Roughly three times a week I get queries from other collectors asking me to comment on keris that they have bought from ebay or some other on-line source, sometimes the keris that I am asked to comment on are pretty nice keris, and at the price paid, they were a good buy, but even so, I have yet to see any keris referred to me in this way that I have had any desire at all to add to my collection.

Similarly, when I do take the time to browse the on-line sources I never see anything that I would be tempted to bid on.

The simple fact of the matter is that I collect on a different level and in a different way to most other collectors, so although ebay and other online sources might be good for a lot of people, they are pretty useless for me.

For many other people these on-line sources might very well be worth attention.

Its all a matter of what one wants or needs.