# Sniping on Ebay



## rwtomkins (Jul 14, 2003)

Sorry if this is a bit off-topic but someone recently mentioned here a website offering a free sniping service for Ebay and I can't find it using Search. Can anyone recommend a good (free) sniping service? Might be useful for those planning to acquire more TiVos!


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## benallenuk (Aug 1, 2005)

yes go to www.auctionsniper.com they give you three free snipes. could you enter my ebay id as your referee so i also get three free snipes.

ive pm you my username. cheers


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## Pugwash (May 23, 2003)

There's also HammerSnipe. They give you 3 free a week.


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## rwtomkins (Jul 14, 2003)

Ah, HammerSnipe, that was it. Thanks very much Pugwash. Thanks too for the other suggestion, Benallenuk, but three snipes a week sounds a better offer than just three introductory ones.


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## frogster (Jan 4, 2006)

"99.93% Bidding Accuracy"

I wonder what happens the other .03% of the time? I suppose it buys you a broken VCR for £500.


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## cwaring (Feb 12, 2002)

Bloody hate snipers


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## Jebberwocky! (Apr 16, 2005)

cwaring said:


> Bloody hate snipers


I detest sniper complainers


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## Pete77 (Aug 1, 2006)

cwaring said:


> Bloody hate snipers


But that's how dumb ass Ebay make their auction site work. All this could be avoided if the auction continued on after the stated closing time until nobody had made a bid for 5 minutes with the highest bid then winning.

In that way the person winning the auction would be the one genuinely prepared to pay the most (as per normal auctions) rather than the one who is cleverest with a sniping bid that knocks out the bidder who would have been prepared to pay the most in a live auction room situation.

But as the Ebay auctioning method lends itself to sniping then if you can't beat them join them is what I say. The main concern is handing over your user name and password for your Ebay acount to one of these sites though. My advice would be to do a few searches with Google for complaints about these sites and to only pick one that seems to have been in business for quite a while.


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## blindlemon (May 12, 2002)

Or use a separate eBay ID for sniping

FWIW I have had no problems with www.auctionsniper.com


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## tefster (Mar 15, 2004)

>All this could be avoided if the auction continued on after the stated closing time until 
>nobody had made a bid for 5 minutes with the highest bid then winning.

That's just how Yahoo Auctions works - if there is a bid in the last x minutes of an auction then it auto-extends by x minutes and so sniping is nowhere near as feasible.

Years ago when the eBay UK pre-launch planning sessions were taking place I pushed for the idea of implementing this, but it never happened.

The thing is, if at the time you bid you just make a really firm decision as to your maximum bid then overall it won't make any difference if someone snipes or not, the highest bidder still gets it. But yeah it is annoying as heck when you've been high bidder on something for a week and that changes in the last 2 seconds...


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## blindlemon (May 12, 2002)

Yahoo gives you the choice between exact amount bids or auto-bidding, whereas eBay always auto-bids up to your maximum bid. 

Both schemes have their benefits and disadvantages, and the eBay one is probably easier for novice bidders in general, but I agree that it is also easier to snipe


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## rwtomkins (Jul 14, 2003)

What baffles me is why people persistently bid for items days in advance of the closing date (unless of course they won't have access to an internet connection on the day). It's completely pointless when the "real" auction only takes place in the last few minutes, just as in conventional auctions.


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## Pete77 (Aug 1, 2006)

tefster said:


> The thing is, if at the time you bid you just make a really firm decision as to your maximum bid then overall it won't make any difference if someone snipes or not, the highest bidder still gets it.


But as you know real auction room psychology isn't like that. People often make a higher bid than they intended to purely because they know otherwise a different bidder will win the auction. On Ebay you often see the final bid and think if only I had been prepared to bid £5 more than that.

As to the Yahoo auction site I have to say I didn't know it existed. Does much actually get sold on there?


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## Pete77 (Aug 1, 2006)

rwtomkins said:


> What baffles me is why people persistently bid for items days in advance of the closing date (unless of course they won't have access to an internet connection on the day). It's completely pointless when the "real" auction only takes place in the last few minutes, just as in conventional auctions.


Often they are novices unaware of how ebay really works or they want to test out the territory up to which other people have placed auto bids. Often they have no intention of actually wanting to win that auction themselves.

Due to the way the Ebay auto bidding system works and the increments change at certain price levels its quite easy to force those who have placed high maximum bids a day or two before the auction closes up to their maximum without any risk of winning the auction yourself. You just have to bid one minimum increment at a time and then suddenly you find your opponent doesn't place a bid at the next increment above you but at the same level as you but is still the highest bidder because they placed their bid first. It is at this point that you stop bidding.


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## wonderboy (May 27, 2003)

If you have a computer that's on all the time, then use the Firefox plugin "Biet-o-zilla" - it's a free sniper program, has got me many an item on EBAY.

http://mozware.free.fr/bietozilla/

You won't regret it!


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## Tony Hoyle (Apr 1, 2002)

tefster said:


> The thing is, if at the time you bid you just make a really firm decision as to your maximum bid then overall it won't make any difference if someone snipes or not, the highest bidder still gets it. But yeah it is annoying as heck when you've been high bidder on something for a week and that changes in the last 2 seconds...


Or you bid a nice high bid so you'll definately get it and in the last 10 minutes some sniper goes and doubles the price.. you still win but it's hardly worth it in the end.


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## ndunlavey (Jun 4, 2002)

In which case you shouldn't have bid that price for it. The problem on eBay is not the snipers, but the people who are willing to pay more than a reasonable price for something, just so they don't "lose" the auction. Snipers are the intelligent bidder's way of avoiding the problems those people cause.


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## Pete77 (Aug 1, 2006)

ndunlavey said:


> The problem on eBay is not the snipers, but the people who are willing to pay more than a reasonable price for something, just so they don't "lose" the auction. Snipers are the intelligent bidder's way of avoiding the problems those people cause.


Precisely but it would still be better if auctions worked the Yahoo way and went on until nobody else had been prepared to bid any more for the last 5 minutes.

On Ebay people often risk high bids thinking they are sure to be outbid by someone else at the last moment who they can't see. In a wait till there has been no bid for 5 minutes situation people know they actually risk winning the item by making another bid as the auction is about to close.


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## Tony Hoyle (Apr 1, 2002)

Unfortunately Yahoo auctions is no more 

http://uk.docs.yahoo.com/auctions/notice/

So it's bot infested Ebay or nothing now..

edit: just found out they actually closed 4 years ago... http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/2004188.stm


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## Pete77 (Aug 1, 2006)

Tony Hoyle said:


> Unfortunately Yahoo auctions is no more
> 
> http://uk.docs.yahoo.com/auctions/notice/
> 
> ...


Seems to me Ebay ought to give the seller the option of how they want the auction to close. That is either cut off at a definite time regardless of how many last minute bids there are or carrying on beyond the set closing time until there has been no further bid for 5 or 10 minutes or whatever is thought to be reasonable to show that no one else is actually interested in bidding further.


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## tefster (Mar 15, 2004)

>Unfortunately Yahoo auctions is no more
>edit: just found out they actually closed 4 years ago...

The European ones yes, but not all. Yahoo Auctions still runs in a couple of the asian countries where it has market dominance.


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## Pete77 (Aug 1, 2006)

tefster said:


> The European ones yes, but not all. Yahoo Auctions still runs in a couple of the asian countries where it has market dominance.


Does Ebay have no serious competition of any kind in Europe and the USA and wouldn't the EU Commission or US Anti Trust law be likely to have something to say about that in due course?


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## rwtomkins (Jul 14, 2003)

There are some others:

http://www.auctionlotwatch.co.uk/auction.html

I suppose the question for regulators would be whether Ebay had created barriers to entry. It appears it hasn't.


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## Pete77 (Aug 1, 2006)

rwtomkins said:


> There are some others:
> 
> http://www.auctionlotwatch.co.uk/auction.html
> 
> I suppose the question for regulators would be whether Ebay had created barriers to entry. It appears it hasn't.


There are probably some issues about it trying to corner the market in every single on line auction sector though. Surely the barrier to entry is that Ebay has so many links with banners on other websites etc that no new entrant can hope to compete with it or become established.


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## ColinYounger (Aug 9, 2006)

Pete77 said:


> its quite easy to force those who have placed high maximum bids a day or two before the auction closes up to their maximum without any risk of winning the auction yourself. [...] It is at this point that you stop bidding.


Maybe I'm dim, but what's the point of doing that? Other than malicious intent?


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## Pete77 (Aug 1, 2006)

CoinYounger said:


> Maybe I'm dim, but what's the point of doing that? Other than malicious intent?


You might be interested in an item and want to know the most the current high bidder is willing to pay to see if its worth you making the special effort to put a note in your diary to come back just as the auction closes. If the high bidder has put in a much higher bid they are going to end up paying around that anyway unless no one else is interested in the item. And if you want the item you will have to outbid their highest hidden bid.

For this reason it is very foolish to put in a highest bid for an item that is more than it is actually worth to you. On no account should you enter a win the item at all costs bid because you may well end up paying that amount.

Ebay auctions are a bizarre combination of a normal auction (the first few days with emailed notification you have been outbid) and a sealed bids auction where you place your own one bid blind not knowing what else others are willing to pay (the aitomated sniping bid as the auction closes via Hammersnipe etc approach).


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## rwtomkins (Jul 14, 2003)

I can see why sniping is irritating to non-snipers. If a lot of people are prepared to pay a high price for something it enhances its desirability and in all probability makes you value it more than if there were very little demand. But sniping conceals from the non-snipers what the snipers think the item is really worth and therefore misleads them as to its desirability. In effect, sniping conceals the item's true market value.


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## Pete77 (Aug 1, 2006)

rwtomkins said:


> In effect, sniping conceals the item's true market value.


No sniping conceals what you actually need to pay to win that auction which may or may not be its "market value" depending what you consider that to be.

But sniping isn't your only problem. You are also up against the current highest bidder having entered a much higher maximum bid unknown to you.

The auction continuing after the stated closing time till there had been no further bid for 10 minutes would help overcome most of this.


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## TCM2007 (Dec 25, 2006)

Pete77 said:


> You might be interested in an item and want to know the most the current high bidder is willing to pay to see if its worth you making the special effort to put a note in your diary to come back just as the auction closes.


If you just bid the maxiumum you are prepared to pay, then the system works fine, there is no need for these devices to work out what others are prepared to pay, or to make any notes in your diary. You'll either win the aution at or below what your prepared to pay, or you won't because it will go for more than you're prepared to pay. Knowing what someone elses max bid is makes no difference.



> For this reason it is very foolish to put in a highest bid for an item that is more than it is actually worth to you.


NSS! Whay would you even consider bidding more than it's worth to you?????


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## Pete77 (Aug 1, 2006)

TCM2007 said:


> NSS! Whay would you even consider bidding more than it's worth to you?????


If you follow auctions you don't win its quite clear that some people just become obsessed with winning at any cost.

You don't seem to acknowledge that not all bidders on ebay are entirely rational in their actions.


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## TCM2007 (Dec 25, 2006)

To bid more than something is worth to you is beyond irrational!


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## Pete77 (Aug 1, 2006)

TCM2007 said:


> To bid more than something is worth to you is beyond irrational!


The fact that calling a scam 09 tv quiz line show like The Mint or worse alternatives on Five late at night to be rooked of 75p per recorded announcement call (saying sorry we are busy call again) is a totally irrational thing to do doesn't seem to stop tens of thousands of people from doing it though does it.


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## blindlemon (May 12, 2002)

Oh, are those calls a just waste of money then? Darn!


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## Pete77 (Aug 1, 2006)

blindlemon said:


> Oh, are those calls a just waste of money then? Darn!


Ofcom have just ruled against ITV Play and Quizmania in their latest broadcast bulletin for claiming that a balaclava and rawl plugs were two of 13 items that viewers had to name that a woman might generally keep in her handbag.

http://uk.news.yahoo.com/15012007/344/tv-phone-quiz-rapped-answers.html

And as for some of those maths puzzles on the Great Big British Quiz on Ch5 the callers give every possible rational way to add them up and multiply them but are always told their answer is wrong.

Most people just get through to a recorded announcement telling them to call again (so I hear because I have never called one of these scam lines). One MP said a woman spent several thousand pounds ringing these lines.

Now obviously these people are addicts just as you and I are addicted to this forum  But I personally could not become addicted to something that was costing me a lot of money for absolutely nothing in return.


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## rwtomkins (Jul 14, 2003)

Pete77 said:


> If you follow auctions you don't win its quite clear that some people just become obsessed with winning at any cost.
> 
> You don't seem to acknowledge that not all bidders on ebay are entirely rational in their actions.


No, this is my whole point, it's not as irrational as it looks. They start off with an idea of what something is worth to them, but then discover that it is worth a great deal more in the open market. At that point the desirability and value of the object is enhanced and bidders find they are prepared to pay more for it than they previously thought they were. They tell themselves that this is not irrational because they will be able to recoup their extra investment if and when they come to sell the object again.

Once again, the value of something to you is greatly affected by its value to other people. There are very few things we genuinely need in life and the value of nearly all consumer goods is dictated by the aura of desirability that surrounds them. It's the basis of fashion, advertising and the entire consumer society.

But I completely agree with your remedy, that the model should be more like Yahoo's.


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