I just got off the phone with PSA. We spoke in length about their position on Art Academy. This was my interpretation/opinion on the call. Their current position is the procurement of the card matters in relation to authenticity. I explained the differences between extra copies of retail merchandise, extra copies of cards awarded for free, stolen vs gifted to employees. They still strongly consider how the card was released.
If it were possible to track the extra copies, that would potentially help ease the restriction. Perhaps compiling a thread similar to this one could help the situation. IMO a strong majority of the cards were sold from winners, and the extras are not the majority. Obviously the cases where winners haven’t sold are the easiest to track. Hopefully with more data PSA can ease the restriction.