[OT] Blazing Bid Feature Possibility - Feedback Sought

[Archive]

Posted By: Trae R.

Firstly, Leon many users of the forum use our site, hence this posting. I can email everyone privately if you like but a public discussion seemed fitting.

A Blazing Bid user emailed this feature suggestion today. What do you all think about it?

"What if you set up your site, so that if 2 or more bids were programmed for the same item, only the highest one would get triggered? That would be a huge incentive for users to come to your service since the more users who snipe with you, the higher likelihood that they would avoid getting bid up by someone else's snipe."

The computer would be comparing the bids, so the snipe amounts would still be as private as they are now.

Thanks




---
"There ain't much to being a ballplayer, if you're a ballplayer."
-Honus Wagner

[Archive]

Posted By: Jon Canfield

Trae - Just want to make sure I understand what this feature would do...

Say I want to bid on a T206 Cobb so I enter a snipe on blazingbid for $1000.

John Doe, also a member of blazingbid, sees the same Cobb and he wants to bid on it too so he enters a bid on blazingbid for $1200.

Blazingbid will recognize that two DIFFERENT people have entered a snipe for the same card so instead of entering my snipe for $1000 and John Doe's for $1200, it would only enter John Doe's for $1200 thereby not pitting two members against each other?

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Posted By: D. Bergin

Sorry, but as a seller this almost sounds like reverse shilling to me.............if there is such a thing. You would be colluding to lower realized prices based on your pool of bidders.

Maybe I'm missing something. It may be legal, ethical, whatever but it smells funny to me.

It's one thing for a few guys who know each other to let the others know which lots they're interested in. It's another to do it among a large pool of bidders who are unrelated outside of using the same sniping program.

It could also encourage people to throw higher then normal bids in to cancel out competitive bids if they know a fellow collector is using the same program.

[Archive]

Posted By: Jon Canfield

Assuming what I said is correct, my thoughts are two-fold. As a purchaser, I like the idea as it could possibly save me money. However, as a seller, I'd hate it as it could leave tons of money on the table for me.

Also, I feel as though most eBayer's use more than 1 snipe service just inc ase one crashes. I know I do on items I really want. So, if blazingbid members have 2 different snipe accounts, the function would be useless.

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Posted By: Jim VB

Trae,

I understand what you're trying to do and why, but agree that it will cause you some major problems.

If you have a working relationship with Ebay in this venture, they will oppose it because it will depress selling prices.

All sellers will have a problem for the same reason.

What you're proposing is to pre-screen a certain percentage of bids, sort them out and only enter one.

Good for buyers. Bad for sellers and auction companies.

[Archive]

Posted By: Matt

"Good for buyers. Bad for sellers and auction companies."

I guess the question is, if Trae is providing a service for bidders, then (assuming it is legal) does it really matter that this is bad for sellers? As opposed to auction houses who need to weigh their decisions based on the impact to both buyers and sellers, Trae's business is focused only on bidders so he shouldn't need to.

[Archive]

Posted By: D. Bergin

"I guess the question is, if Trae is providing a service for bidders, then (assuming it is legal) does it really matter that this is bad for sellers? As opposed to auction houses who need to weigh their decisions based on the impact to both buyers and sellers, Trae's business is focused only on bidders so he shouldn't need to."



Well, considering Trae's business model works off another company's platform I would think they would have a say in the matter............and I don't know of any auction company in their right mind, Ebay or otherwise who would go along with this idea.

[Archive]

Posted By: Matt

Dave - absolutely; if ebay wouldn't allow it it's not even a question. I just don't know what kind of arrangement Trae has with them; I assume they don't have that control over his site; otherwise he wouldn't be asking.

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Posted By: Dave F

Well...

I use Trae's service and think its terrific. If this was incorporated however, I'd never sign into it again. I don't like the idea I put a snipe in at $1500 for something only for someone else to sign into the sniping service and put a snipe in for $1350...no wait, then they see their snipe won't register. They put two more snipes in before beating me at $1550...and then I'm done. Might as well just put a straight bid in on ebay three days ahead of time.

[Archive]

Posted By: Matt

Dave F - I didn't understand Trae's suggestion to work like that - I thought you wouldn't know ahead of time if someone else had a higher bid or not; otherwise it's not sniping at all.

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Posted By: D. Bergin

I think the snipe will still register with the service. It just won't be sent to Ebay when the time comes if there is another snipe of higher value inputted through the same service.

If I'm reading it right, I don't think anybody will know if their snipe went through or not until the auction is already over................unless they put a snipe through well before the auction actually closes.

Which is another loophole that might cause a problem.

[Archive]

Posted By: Dave F

Matt-

Then if thats the case, I thought that was how it was set up now. Surely right now if one person puts in $1400 and one person puts in $1150 it will only register the highest when the 5 seconds hit.

[Archive]

Posted By: Matt

Dave F - right now the $1150 and the $1400 would both get submitted and (assuming no other bids for the sake of clarity) the $1400 bidder would win at $1155. The suggestion is that since the $1150 is going to be outbid anyway, that it not get submitted to ebay at all; giving the $1400 bidder the win at one increment above the current bid (again, assuming no other bids).

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Posted By: Jon Canfield

Dave, if the two bids are from different bidders, both register. Let's say the item is at $100. The $1150 snipe will go in bringing the price to $105 (or there abouts). The $1400 snipe will register bringing the price to $1160 (or there abouts).

Under Trae's suggestion, the $1150 snipe won't register because it's lower than the $1400 snipe, therby letting the person who placed the $1400 snipe win the item for $105 (or there abouts).

[Archive]

Posted By: paulstratton

If Jon's example is correct, then you will see all BINs, reserve auctions, high starting bids and almost no pure, no reserve auctions.

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Posted By: Dan Bretta

I don't like this idea at all...and I think it will cause tremendous headaches for Trae and Blazing Bid. There will be tons of complaints...If I place a snipe I want it to go off no matter if I'm outsniped or not.

[Archive]

Posted By: Trae R.

I knew this would be a very thought provoking topic, as it was one in the same when I read the original email suggesting this. It's quite ironic on one hand as we went through a great deal of trial and error in the development phase to handle the possibility of two people (or more, up to 25 in our case) sniping the same item.

Given the very valid arguments it's safe to say that we won't be implementing the feature. We're always open to ideas though, please send them on if you've got any.

Thanks




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"There ain't much to being a ballplayer, if you're a ballplayer."
-Honus Wagner