Wizard: Shamelessly Profiting on Death…Again
The other day, Mr. F’n brought up Wizard’s auction of Heath Ledger covers on eBay.
Since then, I’ve looked into the issue a little more.
The Ledger covers weren’t the only Wizard magazines being auctioned off. Makes it appear like it is just a coincidence that the Ledger covers were out there, right?
Wrong.
The Ledger covers were the only ones to receive a one day auction. This came two days after his death. It appears to be just about the only issues of theirs that are getting serious bids. Going through their auctions that were still up as of Friday, the only magazine auctions were all put up the same day as the Ledger cover, which lends to the appearance of it being cover for their profiting on his death.
Going through their feedback, as well, would seem to demonstrate that selling their magazines through auction is a rare practice, as there were no comments (positive or negative) from buyers of auctioned magazines.
It would seem that Wizard learned from the Captain America fiasco, especially since they didn’t price any at $1000 this time.
I attempted to get Wizard’s side of the story by e-mailing their media contact, Drew Seldin. Initially, he extended an offer to discuss the topic over the phone. When I expressed my schedule wouldn’t work for being able to dedicate time to a phone interview, he declined official comment via e-mail, saying, “You know what at this point let’s just pass as I can’t get into all this stuff via email.”
