Am I getting this right???

[Fandango 1,440]

I've been unable to sleep in the past few days, so pls bear with me, lol.

I'm surfing the net, and I come across this news video, of how someone won something really expensive for cheap from this particular auction site where bidding only goes up in increments of a penny. BUT you have to pay for each bid you make. So, I'm bored, I go look at this site.

It's not like a timed auction like ebay, it's one where you need 10 secs or so of no bids to win the item.

Btw, I'm not stupid enough to bid on anything, or buy these bid points or whatever. ($.60 per bid)

Currently, what is intriguing me is that they have a $100 gift card. Auction should have ended an hour or so ago, but everyone's going nuts. It's gone up from $3 to around $15 now. So I get curious. 100 bids in a dollar x 15 dollars = 1500 bids x .6 per bid

The site just made $900 for auctioning off a $100 gift card???

Are people really this stupid????

Edited September 4, 2010 by Happy Bunny

[Nagishkaw 510]

[Rebecca Jo 1,962]

It would be stupid if one person paid the $900.

[Fandango 1,440]

It would be stupid if one person paid the $900.

True, but it means all the losing bidders spent $882 (in this instance) vying for a $100 gift card and wound up with bubkus. And how does anyone know that some of these 'other bidders' are not bots?

[Rebecca Jo 1,962]

True, but it means all the losing bidders spent $882 (in this instance) vying for a $100 gift card and wound up with bubkus. And how does anyone know that some of these 'other bidders' are not bots?

If this is the site I'm thinking of, the bidders themselves can actually use a bot.

[Danno 1,228]

Does your state run a lottery system?

[Penguin_ie 5,997]

The site makes money, true- it is a business. But if individual bidders are clever, they can get very good deals, especially if you are online at times others are not. My current laptop comes from such a site, I paid about 85 dollars for it (60 dollars plus bids I bought), and it sells for 900+ dollars retail.

[Ban Hammer 13,641]

"a fool and his money are soon parted."

[웃 910]

There are quite a few of those sites around.

Just don't ever go to http://swoopo.com

They have a system where there is automatic bidding. So you spend 50 bids and you can leave your computer and it will automatically bid on your behalf. But when you click the button to auto bid the auction goes from 10 seconds remaining to 5 minutes remaining. So during the life of a 5 or 6 hour auction the time left of the auction will jump from a few seconds to 5 minutes many many times. So everybody then has to wait 5 minutes until making their last second bid. Then when you think you are getting close to winning it again jumps to 5 minutes remaining. And you don't know if the bidders are present or if it's the auto bidding. And one time I came back hours later and the same names were bidding. I think they had robot-bidders to make sure they get more money. It is all a big scam! I donated a couple hundred one night when I was really bored.

Edited September 4, 2010 by Lord Infamous

[Hilarious Clinton 452]

I've been unable to sleep in the past few days, so pls bear with me, lol.

I'm surfing the net, and I come across this news video, of how someone won something really expensive for cheap from this particular auction site where bidding only goes up in increments of a penny. BUT you have to pay for each bid you make. So, I'm bored, I go look at this site.

It's not like a timed auction like ebay, it's one where you need 10 secs or so of no bids to win the item.

Btw, I'm not stupid enough to bid on anything, or buy these bid points or whatever. ($.60 per bid)

Currently, what is intriguing me is that they have a $100 gift card. Auction should have ended an hour or so ago, but everyone's going nuts. It's gone up from $3 to around $15 now. So I get curious. 100 bids in a dollar x 15 dollars = 1500 bids x .6 per bid

The site just made $900 for auctioning off a $100 gift card???

Are people really this stupid????

yes

[Fandango 1,440]

I want to buy stock in that company! lol

[mawilson 2,133]

I want to buy stock in that company! lol

It's no worse than the lottery... just sayin'.

[Fandango 1,440]

It's no worse than the lottery... just sayin'.

I suppose if you were going to buy the item anyways, and are willing to pay full price, then it's cool to 'take a chance'....otherwise, to me, it sounds a bit dodgy cos I can't help but think there'd be shills.