Another reminder that authentication is expensive, difficult and rare.

Expensive: Review of grants costs more than the grants themselves

the $40,000 (Canadian) cost of preparation for a grant application and rejection by peer review in 2007 exceeded that of giving every qualified investigator a direct baseline discovery grant of $30,000 (average grant)

Difficult: Baseball Fights Fakery With an Army of Authenticators

“No one touch it until the authenticator gets there,” a Yankees official instructed.

Authenticators carry rolls of high-tech hologram stickers. A bullet-shaped one is placed on the object. Removing it leaves polka dots of the decal attached and renders the removed sticker unusable. A second sticker, with a matching number and a bar code, is scanned by a hand-held unit, instantly recording the item into M.L.B. computers. The authenticator types in details — who hit the ball and when, for example.

Rare: Ebay leads to more fake antiques:

Our greatest fear was that the Internet would democratize antiquities trafficking and lead to widespread looting… It appears that electronic buying and selling has actually hurt the antiquities trade.

risk of arrest–is also removed by eBay fakes, since you can’t be arrested for importing forgeries. Should you import what you think is an illegal antiquity but it turns out to be a fake, you run little risk of prosecution

those dealers that provide private sales are some of the forgers’ best customers, knowingly or otherwise. In fact, the workshops reserve their “finest” pieces for collectors using the same backdoor channels