Yeah, what he does is shill bids. Then, when there is a higher bid he removes them :/
He does it with every item he auctions, so does Jin.
Rank 1 - New or Inactive
Yeah, what he does is shill bids. Then, when there is a higher bid he removes them :/
He does it with every item he auctions, so does Jin.
Rank 1 - New or Inactive
ah that would explain why (is unfamiliar with how it works)Originally Posted by KillinSpoon
Rank 9 - Board Staff
What is the basis for this theory?
Rank 1 - New or Inactive
You watch one of his auctions the next time it goes up, the zero bidders come and go until the last day.
He's been doing it for ages now, along with advertising it as 'another member' (one time he left his trip on a post on /toy/ giving himself away).
It is more 4chan hate for him because of this crap he pulls all the time, Jin does the same thing (it is suspected that he makes multiple customs of the same thing like Jin does, shill bids to a massive price and then offer 'second chances' to the next 3-4 highest bidders).
It may just be business and what he does for a job but that doesn't mean that I approve of his tactics.
Rank 1 - New or Inactive
thats such a crappy thing to do. i guess commissions just dont pay enough :]
Rank 1 - New or Inactive
oh wtf? i noticed that his customs are always heavily overpriced.
now i know why.
sounds plausible to use zero bidders and then remove them later once someone genuinely beats the price.
cos right now there are no longer any zero bidders on his auction!
also sounds plausible to make multiples and offer them to the genuine bidders who missed out.
but hey, this is his full time job and if there are actually people out there who are willing to pay an exorbitant amount of cash for his work then who i am to judge?
Rank 1 - New or Inactive
yeah i just had a look and indeed the zero bidders are gone which makes no sense if they were legit bidders - so he just removed them to erase evidence.
and while i don't care how much people want to pay for his customs, to artificially raise the price is so unethical and a disgusting exploitation of the bidding system on ebay.
Rank 9 - Board Staff
I don't see how you all can be so sure it is him doing this.
Rank 8 - Deluxe Member
Exactly. Much of the work on the first version is design, and testing various combinations of additions, modifications, paintwork etc. Once it's all been nailed down, it'd be stupid not to make near-identical pieces (which could be assembled and prepped much more quickly) for people willing to pay significantly more than the reduced price.
Example: Someone paying $1500 for a piece which might easily have taken 40 hours of design and testing, and $500 in parts, spares, duplicates, and raw material to get the final effect. That's not a very high hourly profit rate (~$25/hr pre-tax). But if three other people are willing to pay $1000 each for copies which might be able to be assembled and detailed in 25 hours each using $200 of parts, that's $32/hr gross for those three. That raises the total hourly rate for a given design from $25 to just over $30 - a 20% pay rise just for adopting a different business strategy.
Of course, I have no idea if these numbers are anything at all like what professional kitbashers/sellers see day to day, but they illustrate the point.
Rank 9 - Board Staff
Sounds pretty inconclusive. Isn't it possible these could be from one or more seriously interested buyers using bullshit bids to see how high the current bidder is? Or even disgruntled folks looking to cause this impression?
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