Snipe S/W? - test-drb@ccmp.vtda.org

21 Dec 2000

On December 21, Eric J. Korpela wrote:
...
               . 
I'd pay several hundred bucks for a pdp11/34a in a
 heartbeat on eBay.  Why?  Because I've been looking for one for a LONG
 time [...]  
 I don't think this invalidates the point Aaron made.  In fact it validates
 it.  Enter several hundred bucks for your maximum and you won't have to
 snipe.  If it goes above that, well, it was more than you were willing to
 pay.  What's the problem?  If you are disappointed you didn't get it, then
 you apparently didn't have your maximum set high enough. 
  You do have a point there, I must admit.

...
  That's usually not the goal of sniping.  The goal
of sniping is to get the
 item for less that you think others would be willing to pay.  Then again
 if they really had entered their maximum, the technique wouldn't work.  The
 problem is that most people really don't think through what their maximum is
 and are willing to change their "maximum" several times over the course of
 the week. 
  This is a VERY good point.  If one is doing it for business, say,
buying and selling Ciscos, it's easy to attach a dollar figure to an
item.  But when I do a search for "pdp* -plasma", it's sometimes
difficult to figure out how much money something is worth to me.
Often it even varies with my mood!

...
  I usually bid my maximum right away.  I'm never
disappointed because someone
 else was willing to pay more, because I am unwilling to pay more.  Sniping
 really doesn't buy you anything but the satisfaction of knowing you've paid
 more than you were originally willing to. 
  I assume you mean "less"?

        -Dave McGuire