I have my opinion- but I'd like to hear some of you guys thoughts on this auction. I 'won' it- but check out the bid history and see what conclusions you come to (ignore the title of the thread ). I already reported the activity to eBay- and I'm being told it's 50/50 whether they'll help or not. I've talked with the person who listed it (left them a peaceful message explaining that I have a bad taste in my mouth due to the tampering- but also that I don't necessarily blame him). Most likely I'm not going to pay.
So- not a bad price on a cab like that at all- and it's local, so- what would you guys do in this situation?
*EDIT- most likely I'm not going to pay until eBay finishes their investigation, not necessarily "not at all"
Last edited by Battlesmurf on Wed Dec 10, 2008 7:26 pm, edited 1 time in total.
It does seem fishy, but that's a VERY good price. You'd probably pay that much for just 2 jamma kits, let alone the perfect condition dedicated cab that it's in. I would still take it if I were you, as I don't think you will see a deal like that for a machine in that good condition again.
lol- sadly, I'm thinking the same thing, though I can't really do anything until ebay finishes their investigation. I'm hoping there's a way they can just cancel douchebag's bids and let me and the seller hash out the rest.
Yeah, you can never tell with these "hidden bidder" auctions, not sure I even understand WHY people list things with hidden bidder. But I have seen newbie ebayers simply chip away at an auction price hoping to get just above the last bid. My wife is guilty of that. I try to explain to her to put in her maximum, and it will only bid up to that amount, or just past the last bidder's price...but she just doesn't like doing it that way as she wants to "win" yet not overpay.
Anyway, looks like a good deal for that cab, as I've seen people asking much more on craigslist.
lol- yeah, I'm not complaining about the price or anything- the cab is a nice find. Not necessarily the way the bidder bid- but how he retracted. The same bidder has 2 bid retractions- both for $5 over my max- within about 3 minutes of each other. So- that combined with fishing out my max is wrong. The bidder worked the system with bidding/retracting in such a way that their bids stuck even though they obviously had no intention of paying.
I've been trying to keep good contact with the seller- apparently I know him from another forum- but whatever the other bidder did could have potentially skewed those auction results badly for him
I've bid on some eBay auctions where I bid my maximum amount and someone else came within a few dollars of it. Talk about losing such an auction by just a dollar more bidded from another eBayer. Sometimes you win some, others, you lose. ^_~
What's interesting are those "reserved" auctions on eBay that go unsold because the intial asking price is too high from the seller. Why go that particular route anyways?
That's very interesting, I bid on something on Ebay once too. The other guy bid more than me on such an auction and ended up winning. Talk about losing an auction by not bidding as much as the other people in such an auction.
Lordstar wrote:i just sit on a auction wait till the last five seconds and then put in my max bid. that way i dont spend over what i intend to pay.
*hi-five*
Battlesmurf wrote:Not necessarily the way the bidder bid- but how he retracted. The same bidder has 2 bid retractions- both for $5 over my max- within about 3 minutes of each other. So- that combined with fishing out my max is wrong. The bidder worked the system with bidding/retracting in such a way that their bids stuck even though they obviously had no intention of paying.
Wow, that's mega dirty. I've never even thought of that (not that I'd ever do that now that I'm aware of it ). You should talk to eBay about this bid retraction exploit (I mean in general, not just for your sake).
It seems like ebay could "rewind" bids back to the pre-shilling point when someone retracts their top shill.
-ud
Dave_K. wrote:Yeah, you can never tell with these "hidden bidder" auctions, not sure I even understand WHY people list things with hidden bidder.
In my case, I had a listing where the bidders started harassing each other over the outcome, so all of my auction-format listings from that point became hidden bidder to keep it simple Not sure there's a comfortable way to manage it, otherwise.
"This is not an alien life form! He is an experimental government aircraft!"
Wait...so if you place then retract a bid the other bidders still have to pay that price?
That's just fucked.
Also, many Ebay users are friggin idiots. I've been "sniped" on a few occasions, and I just have to laugh. I place a max bid, then leave it be. If I only want to pay X amount, I'll enter X. I don't understand the people that need to place a low bid then keep raising it.
No, what they did was bid until they had the highest to find his max, then retracted and bid right under that. So the bid was retracted, but then another bid was placed to keep the price high.
Either that or it only retracted the final bid and left the one that was slightly less than his in tact. I'm not sure how retractions work when you've already made multiple bids.
The end result is that there's still a bid in place, it's just a bid that was calculated to drive the price up as far as possible without winning.
In all honesty, it could also be another ebayer who was mad that you went above his max and did it out of spite.
Battlesmurf wrote: Not necessarily the way the bidder bid- but how he retracted. The same bidder has 2 bid retractions- both for $5 over my max- within about 3 minutes of each other. So- that combined with fishing out my max is wrong. The bidder worked the system with bidding/retracting in such a way that their bids stuck even though they obviously had no intention of paying.
Wha? You can retract bids? Damn, I didn't even know you could do that. Now that I see the retractions at the bottom of that bid page, I agree this looks pretty dirty. But to CStarFlare's point, it could have been a disgruntled bidder. Either way, I agree you should split the difference in price to when the shilling started.
Battlesmurf wrote: Not necessarily the way the bidder bid- but how he retracted. The same bidder has 2 bid retractions- both for $5 over my max- within about 3 minutes of each other. So- that combined with fishing out my max is wrong. The bidder worked the system with bidding/retracting in such a way that their bids stuck even though they obviously had no intention of paying.
Wha? You can retract bids? Damn, I didn't even know you could do that. Now that I see the retractions at the bottom of that bid page, I agree this looks pretty dirty. But to CStarFlare's point, it could have been a disgruntled bidder. Either way, I agree you should split the difference in price to when the shilling started.
yeah- the bid retractions are supposed to be in place for if you accidentally put 4500 instead of 450 or other serious measures. Clearly- 405 is not a type o- not when it's done twice in a row like that.
Dave- I owe you a PM tonight Re: leo- been slipping my mind
Suspect indeed. For the price, though, I'd definitely snag it up. Great game, superb price. Seeing such a cab brings back memories... and makes me wonder how many credits I fed into this game as a teenager. Where did I take that kind of money?
Muchos años después, frente al pelotón de fusilamiento...
Definite shill bidding made way too obvious due to greediness. Avoiding this sort of crap is yet another reason why sniping is the way to go when bidding.
Damocles wrote:Also, many Ebay users are friggin idiots. I've been "sniped" on a few occasions, and I just have to laugh. I place a max bid, then leave it be. If I only want to pay X amount, I'll enter X. I don't understand the people that need to place a low bid then keep raising it.
Not to get too far OT here, but If you ask me, sniping = smart bidding.
I use your same theory. I enter my max bid into JBidWatcher and walk away.
The only difference is that I am unaffected by shill bidding, and I significantly decrease my risk of losing out to a bidder obsessed with "winning."
I'm an inexperienced ebay buyer and I'm sure stuff like this has happened to me as well.
I'd find in a couple of my auctions that most of the prices has risen up to very close to my max bid. So from then on I rarely made bids and use buy it now.
It's funny because sometimes buy it now prices are usually a lot cheaper than the auction prices my items usually end at. I'd check past auctions and sometimes people battle it out for days to have the item rise above other buy it now prices. I'd save my self the wait and hassle of battling it out for first place.
Killer instinct series has always been fun, great choice
Battlesmurf wrote: Not necessarily the way the bidder bid- but how he retracted. The same bidder has 2 bid retractions- both for $5 over my max- within about 3 minutes of each other. So- that combined with fishing out my max is wrong. The bidder worked the system with bidding/retracting in such a way that their bids stuck even though they obviously had no intention of paying.
Wha? You can retract bids? Damn, I didn't even know you could do that. Now that I see the retractions at the bottom of that bid page, I agree this looks pretty dirty. But to CStarFlare's point, it could have been a disgruntled bidder. Either way, I agree you should split the difference in price to when the shilling started.
Sure, you can retract a bid if an error in entering the bidding price was made. It says so in fine print on the eBay site. But when used for shill bidding purposes, that's crossing the line. Who knows what the other bidder's ulterior motives are when shill bidding on a particular auction. And did you notice that bidder has a feedback rating of just plain number one? Sounds like he or she has played this type of shill bidding crap before and is very familair with it.
There was one case of an eBay seller creating a bunch of fake eBay seller accounts and bidding on his own auction just to jack up the price. WTF?!
the more I hear people's responses- I get about 60% telling me "that's shill bidding, f that transaction" and 40% saying "that's shill bidding, buy it anyways as it's clean and it great shape". I've been stewing long and hard over what I should do- eBay still has not contacted me yet in regards to 'their official findings'.
). I already reported the activity to eBay- and I'm being told it's 50/50 whether they'll help or not. I've talked with the person who listed it (left them a peaceful message explaining that I have a bad taste in my mouth due to the tampering- but also that I don't necessarily blame him). Most likely I'm not going to pay. 
). You should talk to eBay about this bid retraction exploit (I mean in general, not just for your sake).
