Buy, borrow, pants question

brentac

I'm a fairly new listener. I've only been listening for a couple months but I've heard over 50 episodes in that time frame. I have a question about your rating system. Why don't you guys rate them as you really plan to act? Meaning don't say "buy" if you aren't going to really buy it. It's weird to hear "great issue. Loved. I give it a buy. But since its 3.99 I won't really buy it." (At which point I say to myself that you should just order that particular title on DCBS).

Chuck_Melville

The rating system is based on the quality of the book, without taking in the price mark. 'Buy' simply means the book is really, really good. It doesn't mean that they're going to actually buy it if the price is (to them) prohibitive. They could just as easily say "this book is worth five little old ladies" (as one comic reviewer in The Comics Journal used to do; the idea being that the book was so good that it was worth running over five little old ladies to get to the shop and purchase that book), but what's the difference, really? This system is associated with the gang here, and it gets its point across. It doesn't need to be literal, or else a lot of us would be dropping our trousers every time we run across a bad title at the shop.

Peter

Buy/Borrow/Pants first came into play in July 2009 in a State of the X-Universe episode with Brian and Rob from the Uncanny X-Cast. On their show, they have the rating system of Buy/Borrow/Pass - in that ep they were brought on to analyze the X-Books at the time title by title. One of the X-Cast guys suggested that Pass should change to Pants because Pants wasn't on the ep. As a way to poke good humored fun. So, in honor of that ep and their show, it became a thing from there on out.

As a co-host, it wasn't about what I was going to do, it was my suggestion for the listeners. I rated a book buy if they should pick it up, borrow if they should maybe wait until the arc played out or hold out for a trade. And pants meant skip it altogether.

Buy/Borrow/Pants is just one of those moments that came naturally on the show - which is always the best way for those things to happen. So many of the segments developed or were named "on-air": Off the Rack, Murd's Time Bubble concept, the short lived Game on, Mayo Report, etc.

And that's your CGS history for the day. :)

brentac

Oh I heard a retelling of that story about pants. It's just a little weird to hear "buy" when sometimes it means "I'm going to buy and sometimes it means you should"

I like when they say what they are going to do because it gives more insight into the Geeks opinions. I like when they show their bias towards something. It's more real. And frankly, for most people the price of an issue does factor in and I don't mind hearing that

Pants

Peter said:

Buy/Borrow/Pants first came into play in July 2009 in a State of the X-Universe episode with Brian and Rob from the Uncanny X-Cast.

That was Episode 660 to be precise.

The CGS Archives - they're FANtastic.

Floyd_Lawton

I always enjoy any forum topic that causes Peter to emerge from the dark and murky shadows from whence he secretly controls CGS and by extension the world! Mwuah, Mwuah, MWUAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!

(Sinister evil scientist laugh never translates to type well)

Peter

:))

Royal_Lantern

I always enjoyed the Buy, Borrow, and Pants rating system and it was fun when I first heard the story of its inception.

I like that rating system, that for our show we adopted it in a way to honor podcasts that paved the way for us like CGS and Uncanny X-Cast.

For ours though we do Buy, Borrow, and Snarf (Snarf being the little furball "comic relief" character in Thundercats that represents all of those "comic relief" character that just about every 80's cartoon seemed to need to have, but that I'm not particularly a fan of...hence the Snarf on our show meaning a Pass/Pants).

And in our case, unlike CGS, I have to buy all of the issues for us to cover them on a regular basis, so our rating system is just like CGS and Uncanny X-Cast in that it's our recommendation to the listener on whether we think they should buy it, borrow it (or wait for the trade), or pass on it altogether. Otherwise for us every issue would be a Buy because, well, I am buying them all.

shroud68

brentac said:

I'm a fairly new listener. I've only been listening for a couple months but I've heard over 50 episodes in that time frame. I have a question about your rating system. Why don't you guys rate them as you really plan to act? Meaning don't say "buy" if you aren't going to really buy it. It's weird to hear "great issue. Loved. I give it a buy. But since its 3.99 I won't really buy it." (At which point I say to myself that you should just order that particular title on DCBS).

Really? Because I go the free podcasts for hard hitting critical reviews too. I hate how you geeks have fun with this totally scienctific scale. I plan on suing the next time you say "Buy' but dont actually "Buy" it! You owe us all transparency in your review system CGS, you are confusing some posters with this light hearted system of yours. I too felt that a review system containing the word "Pants" as a selection should strive for more ethical behavior. Have you no decency.

brentac

Not asking for anything scientific. Not sure you can do something scientific with something as subjective as reviews to begin with.

I just like to know what they really think about titles.

shroud68

brentac said:

Not asking for anything scientific. Not sure you can do something scientific with something as subjective as reviews to begin with.

I just like to know what they really think about titles.

I would say their opinions are never vague in these reviews. What are you looking for beyond what they obviously say?

brentac

Pretty sure I made that clear. It's just weird to hear "buy! - but I'm not gonna buy it."

For what it's worth their issue reviews are actually my favorite part of the show. Just something that always sticks out.

John_Steed

brentac said:

Pretty sure I made that clear. It's just weird to hear "buy! - but I'm not gonna buy it."

..........

You call that weird? How about that guy who said "Pants" and was told by the saleswoman that he's on the household items floor, that men's clothing is higher up. Now, that's weird.