Forums Discussing Chinese Coins

Coin Compendium Forum: (CCF)
One of the best forums in terms of learning about all things Chinese coins (non-fiat, fiat, buying, selling, general industry trends, etc...).
https://forum.coincompendium.com/index.php

Chinese Coin Forum: (CCF)
Another good forum regarding information around coins, and lots of buying & selling primarily of fiat coins. (recently, I read some good information around preservation of coins).
http://china-mint.info/forum/index.php

Feel free to add others, and elaborate on what you like about each forum, so newbies and old timers alike know what is out there in terms of information.

 

Chrome has a reasonable translation of Chinese language, so I would love to see some chinese forums added

 

Between the two, I prefer the Chinese Coin Forum. The Compendium forum speculates quite a bit and its difficult to get hard facts or direction. The compendium forum is a bit difficult to navigate for me and follow. There's too many threads, sub threads, redirects and I eventually gave up reading. The content mainly focuses on modern Chinese Medals and other art medals. So to me there's a distinct difference. There is a lot of content in this forum if you have the time.

The China-mint has some power players that drop knowledge bombs and the information is generally on target. There also seems to be a wider contributor base here so perspectives are a bit more varied with a bit of dealer presence, which is beneficial in its own right. I've found a lot of information and contributed to several different topics. There are some contributors who are bias towards Medals and others towards China Panda coins.

Occasionally both are guilty of pumping up chinese coins, but I think that's to be expected.

 

I participate in both places but i have found that the welcome is better in CCF and i have found the Chinese Coin Forum to be a pretty unfriendly place generally. It seems that in relation to Chinese Coins there both have their preferences and favourites. I have read the ramblings of the power players and i must confess to not being bowled over by this generally.

There is sufficient overlap by members here that anything of real interest is likely to appear here, CCF, Chinese Coin Forum and The SIlverForum too at the same time.

 

The unfriendly welcome is typical. lol, I got the same feel but after some time and more specifically contributions they eased up. It did take some time though.. I will say, thanks to that forum, I have built a significant panda collection and made some good connections with fellow panda coin collectors.

I think both forums serve a purpose and are useful to beginners trying to do research on what they will decide to collect. Just as this forum is balanced between phyical pm's, medals, and trading virtual pms.

 

I came to the various Chinese coin forums by way of Google in early 2014 while researching Chinese coins. I am a member of the three forums already mentioned here. I also visit several other forums such as Goldclubasia and the Silverforum. I have learnt from all the forums as they contain a wealth of numismatic information.

You will also notice that each forum has its own percularity but if one focuses on the raison d'etre I still feel that you can only get a well rounded education in Chinese numismatics by reading what all the forums have to offer and other internet sources plus printed material. With time and experience one should be able to distill out what makes sense to each one's collection and investment philosophy and goals.

I have to say that Silverstackers is the easiest place to be out of the three forums. The crowd is pretty laid back although highly knowledgeable. This doesn't mean they allow unwholesome activity; I have seen them swing into corrective action a few times now.

LBC used to have a more diverse spectrum of MCC discussions. You will still see those in the archives. However, in recent years it seems to have focussed more on current market condition commentaries as well as discussions of mainly new issue low mintage medals (a.k.a. non-fiat coins). This is not meant in anyway to be negative. In fact I like collecting new release medals as they offer a lot of exciting designs and are always pushing the boundaries of minting technology. One thing I have been ill at ease with is that readers are now literally forced to click the eBay affiliate linked price-reveal and other links whereas in the past your reading was smoother as the price information etc was there for anyone to see and not worry about being loaded with affiliate-link and other cookies.

Coin compendium (forum) (CC-Forum) used to be more of an academic type resource where people from all the forums contributed information to build a massive searchable database of Chinese coins and medals. In recent months the LBC Chinese coin discussion blog has transferred to the Coin Compendium Forum. This runs the risk of polarizing what used to be a neutral cryptic academic coin resource environment.

Chinese Coin Forum (CCF) has by far the most diverse written resource material with respect to Chinese coins and medals. Very experienced members have selflessly put down a huge amount of knowledge there for use by the less knowledgeable and for further studies in this area. Yes, in recent months there seems to have been a preponderance of buying and selling related posts but this corresponded to the recent upsurge in gold bullion prices and specifically pre-2010 gold panda coin prices. Apparently some members wanted to sell some of their long held coins. CCF is also a safe place to buy and sell coins due to peer surveillance and pressure. You also keep more of the proceeds rather than paying a sizable percentage to eBay, Paypal and other vending host services. It remains to be seen what future trends in postings will be. However CCF cannot by any stretch of the imagination be thought of or portrayed as a buying and selling forum. That is not factual.

And now the 800 pound elephant in the room!

CCF can at times be an intimidating place to be especially if you already harbor biases about the forum. I have seen new members indicate in their introductory postings that they had already made up their minds about whatever they feel is "wrong" about the forum. At times there is silence, silence to certain postings and possibly certain individuals. From the archives I can see that there was a time when talk was more casual and free but there was a dustup some years ago which was very acrimonious and the effects possibly linger there. I feel some individuals there may be less trusting, maybe as a protective mechanism. I wasn't there when there was trouble and I do not know the details with any degree of certainty. I now keep away from talk relating to those dark days.

I joined CCF after I had already been posting for some time at LBC. It didn't take long before I got into some fist fights over presumed disrespect and wrongful accusations but those days are gone. I don't think that I am still an unknown entity there and I don't sense any personal hostility there. I have learnt the most at CCF and I have enjoyed the support of several forum members who have continued to enrich my knowledge base both within and without the forum. Just as in silverpv's experience several members assisted me to build my sets.

Pandamonium has implored on several occasions over the years for the public attacks to cease but they still continue up till date. Though none of the two forums in question can claim innocence in the matter the attacks emanate disproportionately from LBC/CC Forum postings. If I was to assign numeric figures I would say 95% or more. I have often wondered why this continues. My conclusion is that there must be a presumed strategic advantage gained by going always on the offensive. I have been on both sides of the fight but I now mind my business and focus on why I am here.

If anyone was unjustly treated, time heals all wounds as long as you let it happen. Nobody is a saint. I don't know any that is here on earth.

Everyone has a right to collect what they like, be it pre-2010, post-2010 or a combination of the two, medals/non-fiat coins, recent and old issues, low mintage and/or high mintage items.

In conclusion all these forums and other sources of information on Chinese coins and medals have made life much easier for the collector. You can imagine how much in the dark most of us would have been in their absence. All the forums are important to us and I hope they all continue to be viable.

 

Goldclubasia and another Singapore coins forums have went quite.

I view Glodclubasia as more selling, photo and some updates. Not many new members and active members. Admin does not push activeness. A whatspps group have been set from one of the Goldclubasia member in singapore.

Both founders of Globclubasia have left if I am not wrong.

 

Have you guys seen that service that was supposed to compete with the price guide?

 

I looked at the web site once and I didn't think it would be useful for me BUT there may be individuals or organizations that may find it useful.

 

They sent me an invitation but I never tried it out.

 

btw, I do have to say.. Even this place can be unfriendly. lol Just ask RMC, Republic Metals Corp, when they first came in... hahaha

 

There are always some strong head people in every places to disturb.

 

I registered on ChineseCF. I would like to follow it more often, but I just don't find time, so I didn't make a single post yet. I read some posts on CoinCF. There I found some more data about Xi-Shi for example. I agree with what someone mentioned before that CoinCF is a little bit "messy" with all the links and stuff.

Even though there are many benefits of specialised forums, I prefer to stick with one or a few. Quite some time is needed to follow everything. Not to mention if you want to be an active member.

I like SS Forum. Most of debates are on quite high level. Sometimes I wish some posts would be move to other subforums as some people just post stuff where they think. I think in the past it was more active, but maybe it just need some new hit series.

 

Compatibility and collegiality are two important determinants of which forum to belong to and post on. Where do you feel most comfortable with? Where is your presence acknowledged and tolerated? Yes, some of your posts will be off-key, wrong or stretch the imagination. But which forum accepts you and your "warts"?

Forum posting has never been about being an expert and being always right. No. Forum communications should be about like minded people stretching their imagination and testing boundaries with the full assurance that "your forum" will not go into either catatonic silence or rip you apart for some (minor or imagined) intransigence.

I remember in my younger days, several decades ago, when I used to hobnob with the 'senior guys'. They tolerated my presence and were always heaping praise on me for what I now see was crap. They tolerated my presence and did not do anything to destroy my confidence and drive.

Post only where you feel free, confident and happy.

 

Having so many different choices is a good problem to have. I have been experimenting with the way CCF works. Basically it's the exact opposite of LBC. LBC was one continuous thread that stretched for over 5000 posts before we finally made the switch to CCF. Now, CCF has lots of topics, but none of them are super huge. The benefit to the LBC way is you only have one place to look for information. The benefit to the CCF way is everything is organized (like a library catalog) so you can find what you want to read much more easily. If you don't know what you want to read, the LBC way might be better. So, I have maintained my "MCC list" at CCF so we can have a big long continuous thread, and whenever discussions branch off, I split them into new topics that you can easily find.

Everyone learns differently, and that's why there are different forums that each have their own "style".

My latest project has been to figure out how to put it all together, to surface the best information from each source. Reddit seems ideal for this. So, I have started several Reddit groups that I hope will make it easier to find information at all of the forums, news sites, etc. They're all very new, so there isn't much content yet, but maybe we can collaborate to turn this is into a thing.

* https://www.reddit.com/r/ChineseCoins/
* https://www.reddit.com/r/ModernChineseCoins/
* https://www.reddit.com/r/Panda_Coin/
* https://www.reddit.com/r/Gold_Panda/
* https://www.reddit.com/r/LunarCoin/
* https://www.reddit.com/r/PhysicalCryptoCoins/
* https://www.reddit.com/r/ModernCoins/
* https://www.reddit.com/r/CoinInvesting/
* https://www.reddit.com/r/CoinFakes/
* https://www.reddit.com/r/ArtInvesting/

The catch is I can't post stuff from the forums I personally operate, as a matter of principle against spamming. What I CAN do is post other people's stuff. This is actually a very good idea from the Reddit people. Obviously authors are biased in thinking their stuff is great, so Reddit prefers content submitted by someone other than the author. I can post numistacker's videos, barsenault's photos, etc, but I can't post my own stuff. It's a simple formula that works to surface the best information, from any source.

So what does SilverStacker's say? Is this something we can use to help each other find the best info? At the very least, it seems like an option worth exploring to see what happens.

 

As far as I am aware, no one at any of the forums I operate has ever endangered the lives or property of members by publishing their identities and/or false accusations of financial fraud crimes. As a market promoter, it is my duty to care for the safety and welfare of market participants, to ensure the health of the entire market. The china-mint.info forum is a threat to the market, and the moment this fact became apparent, I decided I needed to challenge their dominance and provide a safer alternative for people with wealth and families to protect. I built that forum, and I feel responsible for what it has devolved into after I left on November 18, 2012. The only reason you don't hear about kidnappings more often is because people pay the ransoms to get their children back, and they keeps their mouths shut. Kidnap insurance would not exist if this never happened.

Be wary of chronically hostile people. The internet enables them to do enormous harm to you and your family in mere seconds. Once the information is out, you can never get it back again. Your life, your wealth, and everyone one you love can be destroyed before you even get around to reading the forum posting that caused it.

 

Does this mean you'll be shutting your site down and importing into reddit? I've seen your recent posts and it is more redirecting/x-posting nightmare. The whole point of reddit, is to share/consume useful articles and discuss quickly and timely. So many of your links, link to another link, to another link. Also, are you trying to replicate your forum in reddit? Self promotion is ok as long as its not over done, the community will decide what is useful and what is not. The subreddits live or die by the community in the sub. So when you are spread so thin, it will be difficult to get the best information from the best people because the information is 1.) not easily consumed 2.) limited due to the number of contributors 3.) spread across multiple subs. 4.) Contributors won't know where to stay. It's not your traditional forum style and I think that's why people like it. The sub is the forum /destination and the article is the thread. A threads lifetime is dictated by the participation. If you limited your sub to a badon thread and posted all your findings there, then that is a bit closer to the intent of reddit. There you would be able to moderate and curate the articles and rebuild your community and siphon off users from other subreddits that are interested in your style. The only thing to watch out for are moderators banning you for too many cross posts. You should also look at morezone, he's an avid collector of chinese medals and collectibles on youtube. I do believe there is quite a lot more information and contributors to source from. It just takes a little letting to go to from owner/curated driven to community/curated driven.

Also, your passive aggressive tone of the CMF forum surprises me. It's been almost 4 years since that's done but you still call them a threat. I've been there for a year and over a dozen transactions (local and international) and I have no clue what you are talking about when it comes to saftey or fraud. Both discuss some words of wisdom on saftey of your investment, but that is more speculation. I tend to stick with fiat pandas as you would call them. Several of them have made me money.

With all that said, since you are a contributor. What do you think of the current market? Where is it heading? What needs to happen for the market to correct and reaccelerate? What provides the best value right now?

 

I think the CCF (Badon's site) is very easy to follow. Bravo to Badon for making the switch from LBC to CCF, a much easier way to follow and track information. All one has to do is go to this site:

https://forum.coincompendium.com

And then scroll down to recent post, and you get a snapshot of what is trending for the last few days. If you want more details, you scroll back to the main site and drill down as you see fit. Bravo Badon. Excellent site, and it continues to evolve.

That other China Forum has really morphed into buying and selling transactions, IMHO. Take a peek for yourself, scroll down to recent posts: http://china-mint.info/forum/index.php

 

It is difficult to imagine how you can make an objective assessment of CCF (Chinese Coins Forum) given the grudge you bear against the forum as a result of your (self-inflicted) experiences there.

Unfortunately you are importing the toxin into silverstackers. Isn't LBC/CoinCompendiumForum big enough for you to continue the propaganda attacks from there?

Why bring it to silverstackers? We can do without it here.

What is the strategic importance of these one-sided attacks? What are you trying to achieve? I thought you were doing so well there!

I hope the moderators are monitoring this activity!

 

There is no grudge. It's just people choosing between an old forum that is withering because people are afraid to post there, versus other alternatives that are full of friendly and helpful people. Sometimes I think it's best to just not mention the china-mint.info forum. Nothing good ever comes from it. I used to refer people there, like barsenault tried to do in this topic, but it ended up as a disaster too often. Knowing what I know about that forum (I know a lot more than what is public since I built that forum myself), it would be tantamount to maliciousness if I kept encouraging people to go there.