Whatever happened to these long-time dealers?

[tbob]

Ahhh, Teletrade! I remember buying a lot of vintage cards back in the day through it.
Most of you may not be old enough to remember when eBay used to post the user ids of anyone who bid on a card, unscrambled so you knew exactly who you were bidding against and who won the card. One of the best things about that was that you could contact the bidders and develop friendships with fellow collectors. We had an idea who the ‘flippers’ were and who actually was bidding for their collections. I still remember some of my fiercest competitors and great guys like ‘ockday’ (Alan) and ‘screwblue’ (Ohio State fan, Tim) etc. my memory is not what used to be but sometimes I’ll be at a National and someone of my generation will say whatever happened to uffda or Vendomecat etc and I have to smile as I remember what I like to call the silver age of collecting from the 80’s and 90’s when there were no sniping services and you had to stay up late and refresh and refresh at the deadline lol ��

[kkkkandp]

I still have my Excel spreadsheet with all those IDs and feedback ratings! 🤣

[LEHR]

Originally Posted by tbob

Ahhh, Teletrade! I remember buying a lot of vintage cards back in the day through it.
Most of you may not be old enough to remember when eBay used to post the user ids of anyone who bid on a card, unscrambled so you knew exactly who you were bidding against and who won the card. One of the best things about that was that you could contact the bidders and develop friendships with fellow collectors. We had an idea who the ‘flippers’ were and who actually was bidding for their collections. I still remember some of my fiercest competitors and great guys like ‘ockday’ (Alan) and ‘screwblue’ (Ohio State fan, Tim) etc. my memory is not what used to be but sometimes I’ll be at a National and someone of my generation will say whatever happened to uffda or Vendomecat etc and I have to smile as I remember what I like to call the silver age of collecting from the 80’s and 90’s when there were no sniping services and you had to stay up late and refresh and refresh at the deadline lol ��

I remember those days well. There were always a ton of auctions ending Sunday evenings and then late Sunday evening or Monday most would jump on the CU or other forums to show off what they got. And like you I developed a few hobby friends from those battles since as you said, you knew exactly who you were bidding against.
But like everything else, eBay had to f&@k it up.