After the Snipe war with them in 1998 they started sending an email to me notifying me of impending changes on their site but in late 2002 they stopped doing that.
Some have interpreted the Germany law that Ebay Germany does not prohibit the sniping or the use a Snipe service or software on their own platform. The lawsuit prevented a German Business from operating the service and it had nothing to do with Ebay's position on sniping but rather a concern about German Privacy laws and the disclosure of passwords to a third party web service. I guess that depends if you want to listen to a spin machine or look at the track record beginning with day one, that advent of Cricket.
A Germany user told me the ban was applicable to all Snipe programs including Cricket but they were not doing anything about it. That has never been verified and nobody from Germany .gov has said anything to me about it. A quote from this law breaker, ...the use of software AND services is not allowed anymore, but they don't do anything against sniper ;-) November 29, 2002
When bidding in the past you never had to sign into Ebay but anywhere else on the site you had to sign in with your password and ID. The closer you got to your personal information on Ebay the more you had to sign in. I called it the sign-in of a hundred sign-ins. Early this year when chatting on the Ebay Chat boards it became a requirement that you sign in with SSL (Secure Sockets Layer) I understand that is because the chat boards are hosted on a non Ebay site. Bidding was the only thing left on Ebay other then browsing the site that did not require a full fledged Sign-In.
Ebay announced in November that they would be working on their sign in feature and it would affect bidding. Actually it didn't affect those that manually bid just Snipe software. The purpose of the changes were to align the sign in procedures. I believe that to be true however I also believe it goes much deeper then that.
In the late Summer of 2003 they actually started changing sign in procedures, not November when they announced it while doing something really strange and overt knowing a third party program would have a very difficult time overcoming the problem created for them. This particular sign in blocking method is only used or enforced on one place on their site to my knowledge however the actual Ebay sign in form contains the code that starts the blocking feature.
I can't talk about #9 that also happened in the late summer due to a non-disclosure agreement but it does not bode well with Sniping. I went to work on my new Snipe engine.
In late October 2003 Ebay sent a random survey inquiring as to whether the Ebay user would support Sniping if they provided it themselves or through a service and if the user would pay for this service or prefer it to be free. I was sent a copy of the survey and verified that Ebay is toying with Sniping and the survey seemed to be worded or seemed to be manipulated in a way to lead one to say what Ebay wanted to hear. Me thinks that Ebay would like for Snipe software users to be frustrated with them so that they'll plug into a new Ebay revenue generating machine they are toying with. Me thinks Ebay has decided it's time to collect money from the bidders too, not just their cut on the seller side.
Since the November Ebay sign in changes when you bid now, you finally are signed into Ebay. In other words, if you are not signed in when you place your bid after what I call the confirmation, you become signed in. If you are already signed in, you simply place your bid.
Ebay can stop a web snipe service with the flip of a switch because of their static IP addresses; they have chosen to not take that route although they have done so but only temporarily. They can stop most if not all Snipe software programs AND web snipe services on the market today with one or two lines of JavaScript code. They have not at this time chosen to do so but they do have those few lines of code in place somewhere on their site now and are using it and have been using it since August 14, 2003.
Recently Ebay started shutting down auctions that used seller services that advertised they had or provided Snipe services.
Although Germany could get the courts to legally ban Snipe software, Ebay knows the decision was made based solely on Ebay's claims according to the attorney. Ebay convinced the court that privacy and passwords were connected. I cannot imagine Ebay would be willing to extend the effort and money to do the same in the US if they even could. I understand the reason Ebay succeeded so easily was because as this Belgium attorney pointed out to me, As I said German fair competition rules are amongst the most detailed and archaic anywhere in Europe. He then told me he spent a could deal of his working life in Brussels Belgium, dealing with these laws.
The auction format is history. What I perceive you'll have is a closed bidding system. Nobody will know what is going on until the envelopes are opened.
Ebay and the sellers will make the most they possibly can and you'll pay the most possible. Anonymity is lost.
Can you cancel a bid once submitted? With software programs you can change your mind and click Abort anytime you want.
Nobody knows or can learn of your bid until those final seconds. Anybody with the key to the safe can see your bid before the auction ends and if you do not think that will or could happen wait until you hear about a similar program I am working on but in a different industry. It's going to cause a ruckus in this other industry and only because those with the keys do have friends and some with those keys are willing to sell info to the right buyer. Giving Ebay your bid up front provides a way for them to tally up their daily sales better then a crystal ball could. I've often been asked to write a software program that would disclose a bid on Ebay so the user knew to bid more. Uh.. that tells me there is a market for the service.
Because then everybody would need a bidding program, perhaps not a Sniping program to attend the end of the auction because people would quickly learn that bids are made at the last few minutes until the auction is no longer extended. You basically turn a 3-7-10 day auction into preview period and a real live auction when it was supposed to close.
Cricket would undergo a Snipe Bid logic adjustment and show up for you and bid incrementally like a live human for however long it took, even if in the middle of the night or a rain storm or while you were at work or... The only way to beat the extended auction format would be to bid early using Ebay's proxy bidding system so you didn't have to worry about... say, that sounds familiar.
In early November all the Snipe services and programs were affected by the sign in changes sporadically. Later in the month the changes were fully implemented site wide. I reported the fix was easy but I had been working on this engine for some time and I decided to install the engine. Oops.. it was not as ready as I thought.
I will admit it would have been better for my business and my customers had I simply made the fix and uploaded it. My decision was based on what I know and feel about the future of Sniping as we know it today.
The only problems I am having with the new Snipe engine are system specific and a lot of confusion on Ebay's part about what signed in really means! That means that it works perfectly 100% of the time on some computers but not on all computers all the time and on a few computers, nothing but problems :( Sometimes Ebay would say you were signed in but you were really not -- Ebay bugs in some cases, Cricket bugs in other cases....separating the two has been a real challenge. I have to determine what the system specific issues are and resolve them. In the last week or so Ebay has worked out it appears most of their sign in bugs. Registered users are welcome to try out the new Snipe engine, just email me.
Is last second bidding or "Sniping" all you need to know about winning more Ebay auctions?
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