of discussion, and not to make anyone feel bad for any marbelized chips they may own. To my knowledge, this issue has not been seriously addressed prior to Mark's posts. The issues are not so clear cut. Will the purchases encourage the artisans to focus on these chips to the exclusion of their repair work? Or does it merely help support their businesses and allow them to continue to repair? Is it different that buying unslabbed chips from a dealer that sells slabbed chips? Would it encourage those dealers to stick to unslabbed chip sales if you buy their unslabbed chips, or would it merely help keep them in business to keep hawking slabbed chips for sale?

I don't know, but I think it's worth considering seriously.

In addition, I think the efforts of David Spragg and others who made and maintain the fakes/etc. pages are terrific. I also can see value in maintaining examples of certain fakes/repairs etc. to help educate others. Perhaps someday the club itself will hold these chips. It would keep them for education purposes and off the market where they could ultimately be sold as something they are not.

I don't think we have to have all of the answers at this point to make the discussion worth while. Who knows what open discourse may lead to?

Michael Siskin