Anyone used it?

Never been stupid enough to try.

I've only been to the site a few times, but I've never actually seen a high dollar item auction end.

Isn't that the site that had those commercials with the blonde girl, saying there was a guy who bought a Dodge Charger for like $500?

Yeah, I completely believe that's legit!

Is that a micro bidding site? I fully believe someone may have paid that low for an item.

The issue is they may have paid several thousand BIDDING on it.

They're not scams per se, just a massivley stupid idea for anyone to use

i think skoreit.com is what mike and mike are always pushing on their show. seems like an idea to hook stupid, gullible people.

You might or might not call it a scam. It's a neat concept (for the seller).

Read http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dollar_auction for an example of how it works and how they make money at it.

Items start bidding at a penny, each bid is only a penny, and the seller gets every bid that is made.. So, for an item that sells for $1, the seller gets that one dollar bid, plus the $.99, and the $.98 bid ... and basically makes $50 in the deal.

i've had friends win stuff from quibid

its just a matter of gambling at the end of the day.

Not a scam, just risky.

Never used it myself. A friend of mine used a site like that though...

The website set the bid amount (like 1 cent or 2 cents) so each new bid only increased the total by that increment.

You had to buy bids (mostly at ~60 cents each or something like that).

Then if you won you had to pay whatever the bid total at the end of the auction was plus shipping.

So really you had to buy bids + the item if you won + shipping.

The guy who got him into the site bought "won" golf balls... he spent about 20 bids ($12) plus $12.## to buy the item he "won" plus ~$10 shipping.

I would say most of the time it's not a good deal... but that just what I know via word of mouth about those sites in general.

I'm so mad that I didnt think of this. People get cheap stuff and the seller makes ridiculous profits. Genius!

Yep -

The site gets way more than most items are worth.
The winner gets the product for way less than it is worth.

The loser is all of the bidders that don't win (which alot of times means the winner is also paying alot more than you think).

There's a story of a Harvard professor that uses a similar technique to auction off a $20 to his business students every year. The catch is that both of the 2 highest bidders must pay their final bid. And only the highest gets the $20 bill.

http://michaeljamesmoney.blogspot.com/2009/10/tricky-auction.html

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There's a story of a Harvard professor that uses a similar technique to auction off a $20 to his business students every year. The catch is that both of the 2 highest bidders must pay their final bid. And only the highest gets the $20 bill.

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We did the dollar auction in a game theory class at A&M. I forget the prof's name, but I don't think he's there any longer.

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but I don't think he's there any longer.

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prolly cause he made a ton of money off the auctions and is retired in the bahamas now

Looks to me like a fad for clueless Home Shopping Network types.

Seems like one of those things were it would only be useful to go bidding at the end and only select a couple items to bid on.

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Seems like one of those things were it would only be useful to go bidding at the end and only select a couple items to bid on.

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Which means waiting until the end to bid and watching closely.

If one's time has little value, then that might be okay. But it doesn't take long at an auction trying to save a few bucks to eat up more in time than the savings.

I agree.

The new phrase being thrown around describing these sites is "entertainment shopping." Kind of like "entertainment online poker" and "entertainment gas station slot machines."

i'm guessing if they're ever about to lose money on an "auction" a shill comes in to bid again.

so I say scam.

Google search on "beezid scam"
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&client=opera&rls=en&q=beezid+scam&btnG=Search&aq=f&aqi=&aql=&oq=

From http://askville.amazon.com/BEEZID-SCAM/AnswerViewer.do?requestId=64691602:

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Think about it, do they really care if the product sells to an actual "REAL" buyer? NO THEY DON"T!! because they are making their money off the prepurchased "BIDS". Once you use a bid your money is gone. If they Buy their own product then they just keep relisting it. All the while making money off the BIDS even if you don't win it.

The timers they use are very erratic they pause, skip numbers, and just when you try to bid with even 2 secs left the system won't register your bid and you lose the product.

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From the comments:

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After patiently staring at my computer screen for endless hours and for most of the night while watching the countdown on two items until finally just at the right time, I hit the bid button AND WON BOTH ITEMS. I was originally so happy and thrilled that I had finally won these items. As I found just the right moment to hit bid on both of these items, the screen displayed, “ENDED” and displayed my user name on the bottom as the winner for both Auction ID:2329 AND Auction ID:2258. Then to my complete surprise and outrage your countdown suddenly restarted for both items! (These two items were up for bid on the same day yet separate times). At first I thought perhaps you were having a computer glitch even though I thought it was EXTREMELY unfair to me, but when it happened a second time I had enough! Eventually both of these items were awarded to other people…..if they are even real people at all. How could this happen???? And Why?

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And this guy from http://www.antiscam.net/forum/viewtopic.php?f=23&t=1292 makes some really good points:

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I have talked with one of your managers (Axxxxx) about a commonly occurring “software anomaly” within your site where if multiple bids (I have seen up to 5) are placed at the same time for the same bid figure Beezid raises the bid (without authorization!) of the bidders that came in just behind the first but perhaps in front of an autobeezid. These changed bids were never placed and is very incriminating proof of unethical business practices. In reality Beezid is capturing multiple payments for what the value of what a single bid does on its own when avoiding the “trap”. Unfortunately you never know when the unlawful adjustment and value capture will happen. This is the softest way I can interpreted what is happening here but believe me when say the way I exposed it to Angelo will be the hard line most others would pursue.

When I click on a fixed bid figure I am not giving Beezid permission to line me up at a higher bid figure although that is exactly what you do. As long as Beezid is changing my bid then charging me for it without my permission, even if by pennies the auction can’t be looked at as legitimate (to put it lightly). If I were to tell people about this money stealing feature within your software you will not need to worry about staying in business. This kind of thing has got to stop. Changing peoples bid to increase bid value recovery is NOT OK! I hope Beezid gets on this because I could not sit idly by while people are getting screwed every minute your site is running.

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Remember, when I click on “Bid” the figure that I authorized is the only bid Beezid is authorized recover. You folks owe a lot of people a lot of money for what you have taken from them. Perhaps you don’t see it like that but any court will.

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When the value in the "bid" box says $10 and one of Beezid’s clients clicks on it before the clock even displays #1, yes before the #2 second display period ends (I make mention of this because the #1 second display period is reserved only for “Snipers”. “Regular” bids are not accepted during that period), their bid is commonly stolen by Beezid, changed and place up to 6 (I have screen shots that PROVE this know) bids down the road at a value they did not authorize, screwing up any strategy they were following and spending money on while Beezid exponentially recovers bid value.

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When you place a bid on a penny auction site it is NEVER the auction houses prerogative to take control of it, change its value and place it at a different bid amount in a place you did not authorize! The first bid for any displayed value is the only one Beezid or other penny auction site has the right to recover. The bids that came in after the first but before the #1 second display period starts (where snipers are forced into recovery but regular bids are excluded) are NOT THE PROPERTY OF THE HOUSE!!! Beezid has no right to change OUR bids in order to force bid recovery and fraudulently increase the sale price!

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Perhaps the government should concentrate on penny auction gambling (is certainly looks to be more like a gamble than an auction) and forget about the poker sites.