Announcing the Vintage Computer Festival Marketplace

Ok, I guess it's time to begin the launch of the Vintage Computer Festival Marketplace. This has been in the works between Patrick Rigney and I for several weeks now, and it's just about ready for prime time. However, there is still some tweaking and debugging, and we'll want to enlist the help of 5-10 alpha/beta testers. But first, let me explain some of the features of the VCF Marketplace that, we believe, makes it a preferred venue to buy/sell/trade vintage computers. The site is based on the premise that we are all one community, and that we generally all want to trade old computers for hobby or business purposes. Some of us may want to make money. Others may just be interested in trading some of their good stuff for someone else's good stuff. Some may just want to give stuff away. Whatever the motive, our service caters to everyone. The basic services offered include: - Buy (search for what you want and buy/bid) - Sell (list your items) - Trade (ads can be posted as "for trade" or even "for sale or trade") - Request ("I'm looking for <?>") We also feature: - Discussion boards - A more sensible feedback/rating system We will in the future feature: - Inventory management (keep your own personal collection inventory complete with descriptions, serial numbers, photos, etc., and use the pre-entered data to sell/trade off items as you like) - Store fronts (use the inventory manager to input all your items for sale, then have people "enter" your store and shop around) The most important feature (from a buyer perspective) is searching. Our service has a search capability well beyond what eBay offers. I think everyone pretty much knows that putting a search term in eBay does not always guarantee you'll get what you want. In a lot of cases you have to wade through dozens, sometimes hundreds or even thousands of (irrelevant) results. We solve this in two ways. First, our service is targeted to the vintage computer enthusiast, so only items that are or are related to vintage computers will be listed. Second, we allow you to search by type, make, model and keyword. There are other search criteria that can be added to further refine your search (e.g. condition, keywords, etc.) The results will always be relevant to what you are looking for. And in case you're wondering, yes, there is a free-form entry in case the make or model is not in our database. When anything free-form is entered, we'll research it and add it to our permanent database. We also offer convenient and useful features such as the ability to save a search and e-mail notification. You can save a search and reference it whenever you want (so you don't have to keep entering in search terms over and over). You can also have the service notify you when something new comes up in your search criteria. You can even be notified the instant a new item gets listed that meets your criteria (but it costs...more on this later). Our navigation system is also laid out in a format that we feel is more organized and logical than other auction sites. The information is presented in a much more orderly and readable fashion. You will not experience the gawdiness of some eBay auctions. Clean, uniform listings is what you'll get. Listing an item is easy and more structured. If you're selling, you first decide how you want to sell it. Is it a sale or an auction? If it's a sale, you can put in the amount you want, or solicit a best offer by a certain date, or you can use the Max Eskin method (1.x * cost of shipping where x = some factor) if you're really just interested in giving it away. You can also specify a trade value, i.e. if you're listing a Sol-20, you can specify a dollar amount or "Trade for IMSAI 8080". If it's an auction, you decide what type of auction. You can have the (by now) traditional timed-auction (highest bid by a fixed time/date), timed-auction plus automatic extensions (to thwart sniping), sealed bid (basically the same thing as the best-offer-by-date sale), etc. For describing the item, we have a more powerful entry form. You have the choice of either listing an item in the traditional fashion (i.e. one description of a complete system), or you can list each item individually in a collective lot. So for instance, for a complete computer system, you first start with the general lot description, then you can individually enter the computer (you select its make and model, then enter pertinent information such as it's physical and operating condition) and then the display or terminal (same information) and then perhaps a peripheral of some sort (same info), and you can attach a photo to each. This helps you organize your listing and makes it easier for others to find your items. Of course, if you don't want to take the time to list the item in that manner (it really doesn't take much more time than a general overall description) you can, but it will be harder for people to find your items. Anyway, for buyers, you can browse the items that are listed in the database for sale/auction/trade/whatever by transaction type, or item type, or some combination thereof. For instance, say you want to peruse all S-100 adaptor boards. You can select "Adaptor Boards", "S-100" (or "ISA" or "PCI" or "Apple ][", etc.). You can then further specify you want to only see boards manufactured by "MITS", or "IMSAI", or "IMSAI" and "MITS", or any combination. Hit the submit button and you now have exactly what you are looking for. The listing shows all the items of the type you specified and at a glance shows you what type of listing it is (sale, trade, auction, freebie, etc.) Here's the best part: the site will be free to use for most people. As a buyer/browser, you of course pay nothing (unless you want to utilize the advance search features, discussed below). As a seller, once you establish an account, you can list up to 5 items every month free of charge. Once you go over the 5 item limit, you pay a flat fee of $20 for the month to list up to 15 more items. After that, you pay a flat fee of $50 a month to list an unlimited number of items. Also, you don't pay a sales commission. You just pay the flat listing fee. For buyers, you have access to all the advance search features. However, if you want the privelege of instant notification (you want to know the very moment someone lists an Altair for free) you'll have to pay a flat fee per month for that (a small fee per notification; yes you'll have to set-up an account to do this, and yes you'll have to, in effect, buy credits). Our service will be international in scope. We recognize the world-wide nature of computer collecting. In a next phase, we will implement multiple currencies and multiple languages. To start, however, everything will be in English and the Almighty Dollar. As mentioned, we are ready to begin some testing. We want to list the aid of 5-10 volunteer testers. You will be rewarded with free use of the paid features of the site for your help. If you're interested, please contact me directly at &lt;sellam(a)vintage.org&gt;rg>. If all goes well, we hope to open the site up in a beta mode in about 2-4 weeks. We'll then go into full live mode. We will be actively advertising the site to raise its profile among the community and make sure that it always has an abundance of listings so that it doesn't just become an also-ran. -- Sellam Ismail Vintage Computer Festival ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ International Man of Intrigue and Danger http://www.vintage.org * Old computing resources for business and academia at www.VintageTech.com *