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Joined:
December 2004
Posts: 1116
Location: Keller, TX | Ebay Balladeer
I have been watching this one. The description says there is a wood crack - somewhat visible in the photos. Maybe a finish crack instead.
Any comments? |
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Joined:
June 2003
Posts: 194
Location: Las Vegas | Originally posted by ttenn:
Ebay Balladeer
I have been watching this one. The description says there is a wood crack - somewhat visible in the photos. Maybe a finish crack instead.
Any comments?
Never bid against a (0) feedback "bidder" unless there are no other options; 99% of 'em are the seller. eBay's profit would decrease by 70% if they really did something about shill bidding sellers, so they don't.
Les |
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Joined:
July 2005
Posts: 176
| How do you know that?
99% of (0) bidders aren't shills. Come on now. Everybody has to bid the first time at least once.
You think this guy created an account in June to shill bid his guitar in November? |
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Joined:
April 2004
Posts: 13303
Location: Latitude 39.56819, Longitude -105.080066 | XBJ, I have to agree with Nick on this one.
I probably created my ebay account several months before I actually bought anything. While I am sure the scenerio exists more than we would like, I don't believe that most sellers with the intent to cheat are swift enough to plan things 1/2 year in advance. |
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Joined:
July 2002
Posts: 1900
| The bidder's account started in June 2005, the seller's account started in September 2005, 3 months later...so, the assumption is that the bidder is the same individual as the seller, correct? Could be, I guess, but when I originally opened my ebay account it was to bid not to sell. So, this guy definitely has to be pretty devious to open a seller's account, sell 3 items, then use his previous 'shill bidder' account to scam people into bidding on his seller account... How could ebay possibly research that kind of scenario? Ebay would have to receive an emormous amount of verifiable complaints...wouldn't they?
Steve |
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Joined:
December 2004
Posts: 1116
Location: Keller, TX | So, how about the guitar? Any ideas. Got an e-mail from the seller stating it was just a finish crack.
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Joined:
August 2003
Posts: 396
| It looks like he didn't sell 3 items, he bought 3 items. This looks like the first attempted sell for this guy, unless I'm reading something wrong. My simple ebay rule is that I do not buy from anyone with no history or small amount of feedback PERIOD. At 3 feedbacks, with all being from sellers, not from buyers, I would not bid on anything with this guy as seller. And yes, this could be a fake first bid. When it comes to money, I usually assume the worst from people and this has saved me many dimes over time. |
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Joined:
January 2005
Posts: 640
Location: boulder | looks like a finish crack. right on top of the seam though. could always just leave it and play it, or send it in to the mothership for crack fill,or whatever they call filling in the crack, just to make sure crack does not get any worse. ...You gets what you pays for, I suppose. |
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Joined:
December 2004
Posts: 1116
Location: Keller, TX | I may try to snipe this one if nobody else is interested. Although my high bid isn't gonna be very much. |
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Joined:
January 2004
Posts: 338
Location: SE Michigan | Also look at the items that the guy bought for his three feedbacks, some bears that combined dont amount to $25 bucks.
If your heart is set on it go ahead and bid, but there is enough here to make me nervous. |
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Joined:
June 2003
Posts: 194
Location: Las Vegas | eBay receives THOUSANDS of shill bidding complaints daily, to which they send out form e-mails in which they claim "We've investigated, and we can't prove it." Eventually people who complain give up. "Professional" crook eBay sellers are allowed absolutely unlimited number of accounts to bid on their own merchandise, and no cross checking on contact information is ever done. Sellers engage in it because they feel they must to compete because "everyone is doing it."
Unless a seller is so dumb as to admit they did it in e-mail (happened to me ONCE) eBay will do nothing. They also use this very convenient and highly profitable policy to pad their new user numbers and usage statistics, which looks very nice to shareholders.
If eBay wanted to kill shill bidding, they'd only allow one I.D. per person, instill a cross-checking contact database, and it would kill eBay-facilitated shill biding overnight. At least an unscrupulous seller would have to get another phone number and/or post office drop to engage in fraud. As it stands now, hundreds of thousands are doing it. And number of feedbacks is no indication; large volume sellers regularly dump their ID's and start over. As well as regularly setup new ID's to use on a weekly basis to shill bid later. Sometimes it's really ludicrous the ID's they come up with, and sometimes it's blatantly obvious (to everyone but eBay.)
I stand by my statement; 99% of (0) feedback bidders are the seller or his/her associates. The bidding patterns (bidding just up to someone else's maximum with many tiny bids) prove it; the items reappearing (sometimes up to 10 times!!!) after the (0) feedback "buyer(s)" "back out" prove it, and sometimes the denigrating ID's they pick (often exposing their attitude toward buyers with ID's like "dumbass", "dimwit", "uglyannie"; yeah, I'd like to go through eBay life with ID's like that) or the lazy ones with random number ID's that look like generated passwords.
I could care less whether anyone else believes it or not; I simply supply the information so my friends who are buyers here can benefit by sniping or service sniping (www.esnipe.com) which not only kills most shill bidding by sellers, it also kills getting into "jack up the price" bidding wars with the rare real eBay newbies.
What sniping cannot kill is the extremely popular "hidden reserve" where the (0) feedback shill bidding seller sets his real reserve with the shill bid hidden maximum bid, and starts the auction low to get some "action" going. While this is not as fraudulent as out and out shill bidding, most sellers who engage in one engage in the other as well, and it is beyond annoying.
By the way, this information is readily available in many books that puport to give sellers the "edge" on eBay.
And believe that the sellers definitely have the edge on eBay. Someday there will be a class action lawsuit, of that you can be sure.
Les |
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Joined:
July 2002
Posts: 1900
| Les, excellant information! I had heard as much from a friend who's has a legitimate seller account. He told me that ebay is so bad that he expects it to be taken over and government controlled in less than 2 years... |
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Joined:
December 2004
Posts: 1116
Location: Keller, TX | Alas, someone wanted it more than me. I was high bidder for 10 seconds! The guy that got it has bought a guitar before. Don't know if it was a shill or not.
If anyone has an old A-brace balladeer to donate to the cause, let me know. |
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Joined:
October 2005
Posts: 400
Location: North Texas | Not a bad looking guitar, although the crack seemed more serious than a minor finish blem. If it had a real case it might have brought more money. The final price seemed reasonable. One thing is for sure, there will always be another one coming up for bid. |
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How about this Balladeer