Conditions in Comicster
Last night I bowed to popular demand and added "condition" as a field for issues in Comicster.
Hardcore collectors like to maintain the condition of each issue they own (mint, very good, poor etc). I've never bothered with that, since my comics aren't really worth anything to anyone else. (Many of my older comics were bought in a news agency and have the price written on the cover in biro!)
I try to resist the urge to add too much to the issue data-entry form. I don't want Comicster to stray too far from my original vision of a program that's really only there to count your comics, and have a fun browse around your collection. I mean, I could add all sorts of garbage to it, but ... well, check this out:
Here's a screenshot of Comicster's Issue form:
And here's a screenshot of the first tab of the corresponding form in collectorz.com's Comic Collector (a commercial product). Click on it to see it full-sized:
Which one do you think looks easier to use?
Comments
# Euan
5/04/2006 6:21 PM
Jesus... that second one is hideous!
# mabster
5/04/2006 6:35 PM
And it's just the FIRST TAB!!!
This is why I don't mind if Google AdSense puts ads for other comic-collecting programs on Comicster's site - none of them look as good as Comicster!
# Euan
6/04/2006 3:46 PM
Not that your bias
# mabster
6/04/2006 4:01 PM
Not that my bias what? :P
# Brian
23/04/2006 8:56 AM
Well..as a pure hobbyist I still like to know what condition my comics are in. What they're currently worth is interesting too. I agree that simpler is better, but I think that for any software handling a collection certain information is a must. Condition and value being two of them. Knowing it's age (publishing date) is fun too.