Now-a-days I rely on a few saved searches on ebay, and rarely I will look at someone's purchase history (only to marvel at the sheer number of things that have passed me by). I deliberately don't search intensely, because I'm trying to cut back. I pretty much "bottom feed" these days. If I see something cool I'll low-ball it. If I win, great. If not, great. Seems when I think I have it all, I find something that I A) don't have and B) is either very rare or unique. (Ok, I'm ranting, you get the idea.)
For the more obsessive who have custom search bots, perhaps they can add "social engineering" to their techniques, borrowing strategies from fellow collectors to augment their mighty arsenal of discovery tools :)
Anyway, these days, 2 searches, 5 minutes a day to pour over the lists. I'll add stuff to my watch list just to let it go by. I also rely on the generosity of others who toss URL's and drop names of people who have gems to sell. Other than that, zilch.
On Apr 26, 2004, at 11:20 AM, C.E. Forman wrote:
What I'd like to know is how people (the same people all the time) are finding the rare items. Granted, I'm aware of a few sellers putting a ton of stuff up, so people watch their auctions. Everyone searches on Infocom, Drash, etc. But I've also seen some really obscure stuff by an atypical seller go for a lot, stuff I didn't think anybody else would have found, especially since eBay has screwed around with the categories to the point where everything is essentially buried.
It's pretty much public knowledge that I wrote my own automated eBay search tool, but if a few of you don't mind sharing how you find your stuff, I'd be interested to hear it. Do you rely on eBay's saved searches and automatic notifies? Do you save the URLs for the results of a bunch of your own searches? Do you spy on other known collectors and see what they've come across? About how many searches do you do, and how often?
C'mon, don't be shy.
<x-tad-bigger>----- Original Message -----</x-tad-bigger>
<x-tad-bigger> </x-tad-bigger><x-tad-bigger>From:</x-tad-bigger><x-tad-bigger> </x-tad-bigger><x-tad-bigger>Stephane Racle</x-tad-bigger><x-tad-bigger> </x-tad-bigger>
<x-tad-bigger>To:</x-tad-bigger><x-tad-bigger> </x-tad-bigger><x-tad-bigger>[EMAIL PROTECTED]</x-tad-bigger><x-tad-bigger> </x-tad-bigger>
<x-tad-bigger>Sent:</x-tad-bigger><x-tad-bigger> Sunday, April 25, 2004 5:39 PM</x-tad-bigger>
<x-tad-bigger>Subject:</x-tad-bigger><x-tad-bigger> Re: [SWCollect] Retro PC game collecting officially became big business</x-tad-bigger>
I was actually thinking along the same lines, and I'm sure I wasn't the only other one. Some of the prices make it seem like $100 for a game is nothing... I don't know, but to me, $100 is a lot of cash! The other thing I've noticed too is that there's at least a couple of bidders who seem to be doing more than just collecting. I think Bryron, for one, would still be ready to pay big bucks for a game even if he already had ten copies of it - perhaps an investment? I believe C.E. made a similar statement not too long ago regarding Starcross saucers and Suspended masks.
I found this one particularly interesting since I got a copy off eBay only three or four months ago and I was the only bidder. Now all of a sudden, there's 10 bids:
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=4315&item=3091242158&rd=1&ssPageName=WDVW
I think the fact that knowing people are bidding high is driving more people to bid even higher.
While I'm glad my collection is worth more, I wouldn't be overly thrilled if this hobby became a business. I'm not exactly sure it would be a good thing if every game sold for $100+. On the other hand, I'm almost tempted to sell some of my stuff at these prices. :-)
Stephane
Hugh Falk wrote:
<x-tad-bigger>I was waiting for things to die down a bit before bringing this topic up, but the last few weeks have brought an extraordinary amount of activity on eBay…both in the number of good, old PC games for sale and the prices being paid. My watch list has never been so full. In fact, I’d say my watch list over the last few weeks was as long as the previous six months (maybe a year). At least 3 individual sellers had lots to offer:</x-tad-bigger>
<x-tad-bigger>Hopey</x-tad-bigger>
<x-tad-bigger>Rbgamehunter</x-tad-bigger>
<x-tad-bigger>Carol!yahoo</x-tad-bigger>
<x-tad-bigger>Combined with lots of one-off sellers.</x-tad-bigger>
<x-tad-bigger>But what really struck me was that even with all the supply, the ending prices were just so much higher than I’ve ever seen before. I would have expected prices to drop with so much stuff on the market, but it didn’t happen. Things I’ve seen go recently in the $10 - $30 range were going for over $100. Many of the usual suspects were bidding, but the most noticeable was Peter (sorry to call you out Peter), who by my rough calculations has dropped AT LEAST 10 grand in the last 2 months.</x-tad-bigger>
<x-tad-bigger>In some ways it is really great to see games appreciating in value so much. Maybe we’ll remember March and April 2004 as the months that Retro PC game collecting officially became big business.</x-tad-bigger>
<x-tad-bigger>Hugh</x-tad-bigger>
