Swoopo!!!!!! (.com)

[blueonblack]

Ok, this website has been mentioned on the forum once before, but not *nearly* in enough detail. I and my partner in crime here at my place of employment have been getting loads of entertainment from this site and I had to share.

Here are the basics. This is an auction site. All of the auctions are for brand new items, usually tech related. The auctions are usually short, like minutes long, though some are hours. On a standard auction the price starts at 15 cents. There is no reserve. That's right, a 73" television on auction for 15 cents with no reserve. Here's the fun part: it costs you to bid. You have to BUY bids beforehand, in increments of at least 30, for 75 cents each. Every time you bid, the price of the item goes up 15 cents. Sounds simple so far, but toward the end of the auction, say the last 20 seconds or so, every time someone bids it resets the clock to 20 seconds.

Let me lay out the economics here, for simplicity's sake. They also have what they call a "penny auction", which is the same as above, but the price starts at 1 cent and each bid raises the price 1 cent. In one auction they sold a Nikon D90 digital SLR camera with a 18-105mm lens kit. Runs $1150 at Newegg. The winner of the auction paid $158.96 for it. Wow! Sounds great. What you don't see at first is that to win that auction he put in 1096 bids. At 75 cents each, that cost him $822. Total he's out: $980. Still a fair deal for him, but when you see the cost that auction ended at, that means that there were 15,895 bids placed total. At 75 cents each. Total income to Swoopo? $11,921.25. Subtract the cost of the camera and they still cleared ten thousand dollars. They could give it away free to the winner and still clear ten grand.

It gets better. They also auction off "free bid vouchers". That's right, you can spend the bids you paid for to bid on more bids that you get for free. *IF* you're the winner. Again, great deal for the winner, even better deal for Swoopo. Bad for everyone else.

These guys are even selling money. I can't find it now, but I saw an auction for 80 dollars in cash. It works exactly like the others, so the winner ends up paying less than $80 for the $80, but Swoopo makes a huge profit and everyone else is just out. "Hey! I know a place where we can buy five hundred dollars for seventy-five cents! Follow me!"

I'm not complaining. I've read a lot of blogs and posts calling this deal a scam but it's not. They are up-front with everything they do. I don't see a lick of dishonesty at all. I say if they can get this many people to throw this much money at them, more power to them. As Larry Niven said, think of it as evolution in action.

Go to the site sometime and just watch the money roll in to these guys. It shows a bunch of the ongoing auctions live and every time a bid is made the price flashes red. That's another 75 cents into these guys' bank accounts. Just look the site over, watch it for a while and see what absolute pure distilled genius it is.

[Zephik]

Interesting...

I can't see anything wrong with this either. You are essentially paying for each bid, or in other words, each time you make a bid you are actually paying whatever your bid was. So, I guess I should rephrase that. There isn't anything illegal about this, and technically there is nothing wrong with it either so long as you know how it works from the beginning. But it must really suck to be one of the many losers. Like you said, its great for the winner, great for the company, but totally sucks for everyone else. But you know the stakes getting into it, so you can't complain really.

It actually is pretty genius. I'm not sure if I would ever participate though, seems pretty foolish if you ask me. I mean, you can't win EVERY time. You are almost guaranteed to lose quite often in my opinion. But you know what they say; Another fool, another dollar. ...actually, I don't know if that is even a saying, but it totally should be. lol

EDIT:

Oh wait I get it now. I was close to understanding how it works, but not quite. You don't pay whatever you bid, you pay a fee TO bid, which is 75 cents. I think I like that much more. lol

[blueonblack]

EDIT:

Oh wait I get it now. I was close to understanding how it works, but not quite. You don't pay whatever you bid, you pay a fee TO bid, which is 75 cents. I think I like that much more. lol

You pay the fee TO bid, and then if you're the winner you pay what the ending bid was also. All the losers don't get anything except the joy of paying for the bids they just threw away. (And they're paid for up front)

It is in fact pure genius. I mean, how can you distill genius down any further than selling money that's not even yours yet and making a profit at it? :D

[Zephik]

Its eBay in slot machine form. You have to put in money to make money. In this case, instead of a lever to pull, you push a button instead. Just like in gambling, not everyone is a winner. Although I think you have a better chance at the local casino than you do here, but then again the payout seems to be generally higher here as well, so it makes sense that the chance is greater as well.

Gambling and auctioning combined together as one. It should almost be illegal just for being so damn clever. lol

I mean, this is basically the same way Casinos make so much damn money.

[blueonblack]

Indeed it is. I'd say it meets the American Heritage Dictionary definition of gambling, but I think it's outside the legal one. Regardless, I just spent like two hours just watching this Perpetual Income Machine pull cash into these guys' pockets and loved every minute of it. I am truly humbled.

[BuzzKillington]

Ya, I posted this site a couple weeks ago curious about it's legitimacy... no way in hell I'd take part in a bid unless it was some completely off the wall item that no one wanted.

Like many have said... it is a great idea but the way they present it is even more genius. Just a look at the site makes you want to participate... almost without caring about the stakes. Honestly, if I would have thought up this idea, I would have forgot about because in my mind, it sounds ridiculous that people actually participate.

[nevermind1534]

I see ads for them all the time in gmail.
><Sponsored LinkNintendo Wii for $27.90 - www.Swoopo.com/Nintendo-Wii - The hammer fell at $27.90 this time Don't miss our bargain price!

[xmastree]

http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/archives/001196.html

[Omega]

http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/archives/001196.html

So what they are, according to this website, is essentially a website that gives people the items they got for "cheap" after they collect the money for it (and go buy it from a store).

So in essence, they're making stupid amounts of money because people like the idea of winning something for "cheap".

Clever. I bet they rake it in.

[BuzzKillington]

So what they are, according to this website, is essentially a website that gives people the items they got for "cheap" after they collect the money for it (and go buy it from a store).

So in essence, they're making stupid amounts of money because people like the idea of winning something for "cheap".

Clever. I bet they rake it in.

I still can't get over how stupid it is taking that big of gamble... taking a chance of literally throwing away 800 bucks so you can save maybe 300 or so off of a tv or something. Just spend the extra 300 for a 100% chance of winning.

[blueonblack]

I agree, but what keeps them coming in is the occasional HUGE savings, like the Nintendo Wii for $21.20 (including the bids they used to win it) or the 73-inch television for $367 (also including the bids and shipping). Swoopo still makes a killing on these, but the occasional huge savings keeps the money rolling in.

:bowdown:


(And yes, I realize that these results could very easily be fabricated or manipulated for appearance, but I question their motive. Why would they need to do that?)

[Zephik]

I still can't get over how stupid it is taking that big of gamble... taking a chance of literally throwing away 800 bucks so you can save maybe 300 or so off of a tv or something. Just spend the extra 300 for a 100% chance of winning.

Thats not really how it works is it? You pay 75 cents each time you bid (I think that is how it works). So if you bid say 200 times, you spend $150, which is still a lot of money, but not quite as much as say 800 bucks.

So the question is... would you spend $150 for a somewhat decent chance at a $1000+ item? (I mean really, I can't imagine TOO many people going up to $150 in bids, but maybe I guess.)

[BuzzKillington]

Thats not really how it works is it? You pay 75 cents each time you bid (I think that is how it works). So if you bid say 200 times, you spend $150, which is still a lot of money, but not quite as much as say 800 bucks.

I was throwing out numbers based on "What you don't see at first is that to win that auction he put in 1096 bids. At 75 cents each, that cost him $822. Total he's out: $980."


*just a thought*
Could you imagine if you were 1000 bids deep, battling some asshole and you ran out of bids? :shoed:
...or internet goes out...

[NightrainSrt4]

I dropped 20$ a while ago to play around on this site after a friend told me it was cool. Spent half my bids before I realized that you can't snipe at the last second. Lmfao, felt like a dumbass for not reading and going on what I was told, but ehh.

It really is gambling. That's how they get you. Once you throw that bid in and watch the timer count down to zero hoping you won, you've got that same feeling inside. Inevitably someone else bids and it goes away till you get that back.

The way to go is to wait it out, pick auctions that are going to almost the last second before a single person bids, then bid. Slow auctions like that. But there really is so many people you only win by blind luck. Another thing I don't like is that there is no one to police their company. They could have bots bidding so a real person never wins, only their company, and they rake in tons from every bid that was placed.

I watched one DSLR go up and up on the penny auctions and realized they made over 10K dollars, assuming most were bought bids with say a 1/4 won bids + the money they made on those. Insane income, and thats how they can deal with making a bit under on some items because they make huge profits off those penny auctions.

So ya, even once I realized how to play the game better, I never won anything, not that I really cared as it was interesting, yet they STILL send me junkmail lol. In the end, just pay the bit more and go to newegg, as the winner gets an okay deal, but the loosers get screwed, and by the time you win, your over the retail of just going to Best Buy, unless your insanely lucky. But I would play the lottery before playing there again lol.

[p0Pe]

well... this is a good excample

http://www.swoopo.com/auction/ds-nintendo-ds-lite-silver-/134741.html

this dude got ripped 242,70 for a thing that costs 129.90 on the market lol... now thats bering stupid

[Omega]

I still can't get over how stupid it is taking that big of gamble... taking a chance of literally throwing away 800 bucks so you can save maybe 300 or so off of a tv or something. Just spend the extra 300 for a 100% chance of winning.

well it's not too bad if you buy like 30 bids and don't bid a lot until prices are actually close to retail (which is where, I assume, people will start stopping their bidding to try and save money). You could save, say, $50-100 on something by just being smart with your money here. The problem is that it's set up to feel like you'll be getting it for cheap and so you throw tons of bids at it and end up paying considerably more than you thought you would.

I'm sure there's a decent strategy to pulling in something for decently cheaper without wasting bids like mad but the majority of people probably forget about the bids they bought and end up pissing their money away. It's American materialism and shopping fetishism at it's finest, most distilled form: Paying money to pay money for something. It seems almost as if people just enjoy spending money, even if they don't get anything out of it.

I pretty much make it a point to justify my purchases, or at least have something tangible to show for them.

[Zephik]

Free swag for the losers, or maybe just the losers that spent a certain amount in bids. They should incorporate that into their game plan. T-Shirts, Hats, Coffee Mugs, etc.. All of which doesn't really cost that much. Not that it would persuade ME, but I bet it would help persuade other people, people who are iffy and/or on the line of the decision on whether they want to play or not. When people want to do something but their brains get in the way, they'll usually use anything they can to justify ignoring their brains.

/.02

[blueonblack]

Zephik, that is brilliant. Are you in marketing? :)

[NightrainSrt4]

The issue here is the detachment between the user and his/her money. It's even worse than poker chips.

People don't realize, at some level, that each and every click is pissing away money. There isn't even a popup box that says, "are you sure you want to bid?". If you accidentally double click, boom there's two bids tossed away, with one for no reason.

It's genius, yet so idk, wrong. And not because I didn't win anything lol. I knew that going in but wanted to see for myself. There is just a huge detachment created between the users and their money.