I applaud everyone for speaking their minds and offering their frank opinions.

I am sad to have to write this journal entry. But I can't sit here idle and not repond to what I believe are some erroneous expectations that Merlin and some other members have. But Merlin, please do not misunderstand, I am not singling you out personally, there are some members here who whine and complain, but cannot back themselves up with journal entries.

First, though, I must start by writing a little background, so you all can see where I am coming from. When I initially joined the Collector's Society back in 2006, the big selling point to me was being able to populate my sets with coins from either grading service. Before I joined I check out both grading services, trying to get a feel on fees, services etc. In other words I "shopped around". It came down to 2 items. First, NGC's fees were less expensive than PCGS and of course, the PCGS registry allowed only PCGS coins. So along with the idea of the Society, the choice to me at the time was clear, NGC.

Now, here are my beefs (so to speak):

1. Merlin, if your goal is to have registry sets populated with only NGC coins, more power to you. I do not try to tell anyone how to enjoy this great hobby of ours. But, it seems to me as you are telling me I CAN NOT have any PCGS coins in my sets.

Here is my reasoning for alloowing both:

1. As far as I can tell in the course of the 6 years of my membership, no PCGS coin in mine or anyone's sets received any kind of point bonus. A MS65 graded coin was the same score in spite of the slab it was in.

2. Conversly, no NGC coin received a point deduction.

3. Remember everyone, we are collecting coins, not slabs.

So, beef #2: I firmly believe part of NGC's decision was based on all the whining and complaining from some members about other people having PCGS coins in their sets. Here again, this was the rule, no one was cheating or breaking any rule at any time by having PCGS coins in their sets.

I will admit, I base my buying decisions on the coin; we all know the criteria; eye appeal, technical grade, cost and for me lack of butt ugly toning. You will never find a toned coin in any of my sets.

I truly believe a lot of this was some members who were in a lower position did it only to move up in the rankings. If I have offended anyone I'm sorry, but it rankles me to think I was playing by the rules, but now I'm having to make a decision to spend more money to cross over, or the time and expense to sell my PCGS coins just to be a member of this society. This reminds me of one member who whined and complained he didn't receive the #1 spot because he had pics and descriptions and the person who was #1 didn't, but who had about 4,000 more points.

Beef #3: To those who say allow PCGS coins but give them 0 points I ask, what's the difference between 0 point and no PCGS coins at all?

I think I better quit here, I have probably p***ed everyone off for speaking my mind, but I truly believe I had a nice selection of coins in some of my sets, but was told I wasn't wanted because some of them were in the wrong slab.