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Ebay Sniping

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Uh, no it's not stupid. If you put in 100 and somebody else pays more, then you don't win. If you were willing to pay more for it, then you should have put THAT number up in the first place.

The best way to win an Ebay auction for the least amount of money is to wait until the last minute to bid. If you're not going to be around when it's ending sniping is the best bet. Go and look up a semi popular item. Find an auction that has 0 bids, and find the same item on an auction that already has bids. 3 days remaining on both. Once a person bids on an item people come out of the wood work and want to turn it into a bidding war. a last minute max bid on an item with few bids will get it MUCH cheaper than you putting the same max bid on an item that has days remaining. There's zero reason to bid before the last 2 minutes of an action unless you like to throw money away.
 
****d US $74.00 Mar-4-10 14:07:24 PDT
****x US $73.00 Mar-4-10 14:07:24 PDT
****r US $70.00 Mar-4-10 14:07:06 PDT
****t US $66.66 Mar-3-10 07:10:17 PST
****e US $66.00 Mar-3-10 19:08:39 PST
Auction ended at 14:07:31

This item came in well under (more than $20) my max bid. Snipe = no bidding war.
My bid went in with 7 seconds left.

Your snipe is no guarantee of winning. Somebody always has a faster connection and other bidders can enjoy their auction fever.
 
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The day ebay puts a captcha will be the death of sniping. I don't get why they have not done it already.

Maybe not death.

CAPTCHAs
One attempt to defeat automated bid sniping software is requiring bidders to pass a CAPTCHA test prior to entering their bid. This ensures that all bids are entered manually. The counter for this is for the software to re-direct the CAPTCHAs to a CAPTCHAs reading service.

from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Auction_sniping#CAPTCHAs


My sense on why ebay is not using CAPTCHAs is about "if it is not broken, don't fix it."

CAPTCHAs can be a pain and they are making lots of money now with paypal and ebay. They have a monopoly in the US in some respects.
 
Username Mike... wow. That is retro as hell.

I might go back and read all your posts. I find you intriguing.

Edit: A busy 2010, 3 posts in 2011, 1 in 2012, 1 in 2013!!!
 
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