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Please note you are only bidding on a picture of a PS3, and not an actual system

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When the PS3's were first listed eBay made show a picture of the thing to prove they had it. So some people DID in fact advertise that they had a picture.

What first sentence OR heading says its a picture? Not until the fine print at the bottom of the listing can you actually make out that it's a picture.

I can only assume that by avoiding answering the question about a family member being scammed this way, that you don't want to admit that you would be upset.
 
jivetrky said:
man I cannot believe you guys are almost condoning these actions. I'll definitely have to keep that in mind when I browse and sell here in the classifieds.
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Keep it in mind. If I write "You are getting an empty cardboard box" and you get a cardboard box filled with styrofoam, I'd say you got the better deal.

People rely waaayyy too much on others nowadays to cover their own stupidity.

I say we sue the seller for selling it, Ebay for letting it happen, and Paypal for allowing theft!!
 
Well last night they removed all of the active auctions (at least the deceptive ones. There's a couple that make it crystal clear that you are buying a picture.

They removed them a couple hours after I sent them a strongly worded email. I'm sure it was just a coincidence, but I like to think I had something to do with it ;)
 
Well, I have to fall somewhere between jiketrky and Tom on this one.

First off, Tom has a good point in that there is a standard in commerce of “let the buyer beware”. Basically, as a buyer, you should have some reasonable obligation to make sure that you understand what you are doing before you bid on the auction. If you do not trouble yourself to read the whole thing, then you may end up getting screwed.

As an example, I once sniped an auction for about 20% of what the item (Roland 72 key midi controller that cost me about $100) was worth at retail. Part of the deal was that the auction had in huge red letters:

Buyer pays $0.00 shipping and handling

Now the seller had apparently not taken the time to familiarize himself with the way that Ebay works so he was not prepared to release the item to me. Tough cookies for him. He has the same obligation to learn the system and he got caught out. So when he emailed me, he decided to say that he accidentally forgot to include shipping in the price and would I mind if he put an extra $50 on my credit card? (he already had my card # as I make it a habit to check out right after a good snipe).

So I got an opinion form SSS on what I should do before getting back to him and told him that my understanding was that he had to send my keyboard at the agreed upon price. Following which, I got email from him that he had felt that he had to ask his manager before going further and the manager had agreed with me (the seller was a professional music store somewhere).

However, I still like what jivetrky is doing. People who play stupid games with ebay should be controlled so that the ebay thing does not get ruined for everyone else. Go ahead and report people who seem to be abusing the service. The fact is that they only get away with that because some people are gripped with a bad case of e-retardation and they do not deserve to be preyed on.

jivetrky said:
http://cgi.ebay.com/Sony-Playstatio...ryZ62054QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

^^Now this one I like :)
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Yes and no. Notice that he is charging $35 shipping and he only ships to the United States? While the auctions is clearly humorous, he really ought not to be playing that game. What if someone from England wants it? The picture could be emailed easily enough.

That much being said, I would really prefer it if the rule was that the photograph was done so as to make it visually obvious what was going on. In this case, let's see the picture with the frame wrapped around it. Or like when the X-box came out and a bunch of people were auctioning off the box (you are bidding on an x-box box...) if the box had been shown next to the system with the words “system not included photochopped into the picture.
 
Malpine Walis said:
Well, I have to fall somewhere between jiketrky and Tom on this one.

First off, Tom has a good point in that there is a standard in commerce of “let the buyer beware”. Basically, as a buyer, you should have some reasonable obligation to make sure that you understand what you are doing before you bid on the auction. If you do not trouble yourself to read the whole thing, then you may end up getting screwed.

As an example, I once sniped an auction for about 20% of what the item (Roland 72 key midi controller that cost me about $100) was worth at retail. Part of the deal was that the auction had in huge red letters:

Buyer pays $0.00 shipping and handling

Now the seller had apparently not taken the time to familiarize himself with the way that Ebay works so he was not prepared to release the item to me. Tough cookies for him. He has the same obligation to learn the system and he got caught out. So when he emailed me, he decided to say that he accidentally forgot to include shipping in the price and would I mind if he put an extra $50 on my credit card? (he already had my card # as I make it a habit to check out right after a good snipe).

So I got an opinion form SSS on what I should do before getting back to him and told him that my understanding was that he had to send my keyboard at the agreed upon price. Following which, I got email from him that he had felt that he had to ask his manager before going further and the manager had agreed with me (the seller was a professional music store somewhere).

However, I still like what jivetrky is doing. People who play stupid games with ebay should be controlled so that the ebay thing does not get ruined for everyone else. Go ahead and report people who seem to be abusing the service. The fact is that they only get away with that because some people are gripped with a bad case of e-retardation and they do not deserve to be preyed on.



Yes and no. Notice that he is charging $35 shipping and he only ships to the United States? While the auctions is clearly humorous, he really ought not to be playing that game. What if someone from England wants it? The picture could be emailed easily enough.

That much being said, I would really prefer it if the rule was that the photograph was done so as to make it visually obvious what was going on. In this case, let's see the picture with the frame wrapped around it. Or like when the X-box came out and a bunch of people were auctioning off the box (you are bidding on an x-box box...) if the box had been shown next to the system with the words “system not included photochopped into the picture.
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Yeah, I absolutely agree with that! If it's a photo, it should be a picture of the photo. (But I guess these people that are trying to sell a digital copy of the photo, to deliver by email, wouldn't be able to do that.)



And I also agree that the buyers need to be more careful and thoroughly read the auction. But that doesn't mean we should allow these people to prey on others. (or almost cheer on these people as some might.)

If this was the case, imagine what our classifieds would be like if SSS and the other mods let people get away with trying to trick people into buying crap. If they suspect even a slight lack of morals in a person, they suspend them or ban them from the classifieds. (I've seen it) In the case I'm thinking of, the member wasn't even involved in a classifieds transaction. But they showed a severe lack of morals, so SSS removed their classified access to protect the rest of us. And I was glad to see it happen, as it made me realize the level of decency OCF demands of it's members.
 
SolidxSnake said:
Seeing as how it said "Brand new in box PS3 PICTURE!" kinda tipped it away for me. You wouldn't be listing an actual PS3 with "PICTURE!" in the title, wouldya?

My remaining grandma wouldn't even be able to read the auction... Language barrier ftw... The Altzheimers wouldn't help either

^- That one, first sentence (as well as heading) says it's only a photo. Sure it's misleading, but really, it's the buyers fault in the end. I'm not really saying I condone them, but I don't look down on 'em either. Let 'em do what they want, not my problem.
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Its still such BS.
"Brand new in box PS3 PICTURE!"
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Now if you interpret it in this way, it has a completely different meaning

"Brand new in box PS3, PICTURE!"
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People can be so easily deceived because of crappy internet grammar alone.
 
WaTTz said:
Its still such BS.


Now if you interpret it in this way, it has a completely different meaning




People can be so easily deceived because of crappy internet grammar alone.
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People can also be so easily deceived by their own ignorance.
 
This happen with the xbox360 release too. Remember the auctions for the XBOX 360 BOX, just the box... People bid on those all day, while I don't support scammers I say if people are dumb enough to bid on or buy something without researching it or at the very least reading about it they deserve to lose their money.
 
Well I agree that these people are dumb for not reading better. But I still beleive we need to stand up against these theives. That is why I've been checking and reporting these auctions every day. (PS3, Xbox360, and Wii (Athough noone seems to be doing it with Wii's))
 
jivetrky said:
Well I agree that these people are dumb for not reading better. But I still beleive we need to stand up against these theives. That is why I've been checking and reporting these auctions every day. (PS3, Xbox360, and Wii (Athough noone seems to be doing it with Wii's))
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Thieves? If someone's careless enough to drop quite a large sum of money without reading any details, then it's their fault. They're not thieves if the ignorant buyer bids (and thus willingly gives the seller money).
 
SolidxSnake said:
Thieves? If someone's careless enough to drop quite a large sum of money without reading any details, then it's their fault. They're not thieves if the ignorant buyer bids (and thus willingly gives the seller money).
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It's theft. If you paid $600 for a PS3 @ BestBuy Online and they shipped you just the box, would you not say the "stole" your money? Same deal. It's tricking people into thinking they are bidding on a PS3. Only they won't even get a box!
 
DvBoard said:
It's theft. If you paid $600 for a PS3 @ BestBuy Online and they shipped you just the box, would you not say the "stole" your money? Same deal. It's tricking people into thinking they are bidding on a PS3. Only they won't even get a box!
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How is it theft if it CLEARLY STATES that you're bidding on a pic or box of the item? Sure it's not ethical, but I still fail to see how it's fraud.
 
Because most of them do not CLEARLY STATE it is a picture. They try to hide it. Are you just playing devil's advocate here or is this really how you feel? I just find it hard to believe this is actually how you feel about these things.

Do you think this auction was CLEAR?
http://cgi.ebay.com/NEW-PS3-60GB-PR...ryZ21198QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem
I keep coming back to the "grandma" idea....but if my grandmother was bidding on this to try and win me one for Christmas, I'd guarantee she would miss the tiny disclaimer at the bottom.


How about this one:

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dl...E:L:RTQ:US:1&viewitem=&item=250057798742&rd=1
I sent a message asking him about it, because I wasn't 100% sure if it was legit or not:
me - "I'm confused, is this auction for an XBox360 gaming system, or a picture of the system? Please make that clear...."
him - "it's for a picture, if you aren't interested, please don't bid. Thank you! I'm not going to lie to you."

Needless to say I reported it immediately after.

That tiny font comment of "1 Picture for each auction!" could be thought of meaning that he is using the same picture for the three consoles he speaks of, and is just letting you know this.


I'm happy to note that at least one seller has been banned
Clip1.jpg
I've been reporting every one of his auctions (even though worthless eBay did not cancel all of them) I really wish they had a better way to report such sellers.
And BTW, this is also after he potentially made off with literally THOUSANDS of dollars of peoples money. (depending on if the people completed the transactions believing it was a legitimate auction, and I'm sure some/most did.

Unfortunately there are still some others still doing it. I'll keep on trucking until eBay removes my "report listing" button or they actually remove the users. And even then I'll probably still do it for a while.
 
Guys lets not throw terms around that does not apply, It is not theft. Immoral is the word that would apply. I agree that what the seller is doing is wrong and ebay should make them put up more of a warning about it, if you are willing to spend $900 without reading a page and a half of material maybe you are just too careless with your money. Impulse buying shouldent be done online because its foolish, the scams that can happen online are numerous.

Note, I am not saying that the seller is doing the "right" thing, it is morally wrong in just about any way I can look at it. It is however legal, he has stated that he is selling a picture of a playstation and someone else decided not to read an items description before entering into a legal contract.
 
SolidxSnake said:
Those are deceiving, especially the X360 one. However, other ones clearly state "YOU ARE BIDDING ONLY ON A PICTURE".
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Yes, but the ones that clearly state that aren't the ones that are the problem. It's the ones that are trying to hide it that everyone is talking about here. Like the ones I posted, and the original link in the OP. (Although the latter do a much better job of trying to deceive)


And like I was saying, with the whole grandma thing, these auctions aren't designed to prey on people like us....it's the MAJORITY of people that use eBay. The ones that either wouldn't know to look, or wouldn't know what to look for.
 
jivetrky said:
Yes, but the ones that clearly state that aren't the ones that are the problem. It's the ones that are trying to hide it that everyone is talking about here. Like the ones I posted, and the original link in the OP. (Although the latter do a much better job of trying to deceive)


And like I was saying, with the whole grandma thing, these auctions aren't designed to prey on people like us....it's the MAJORITY of people that use eBay. The ones that either wouldn't know to look, or wouldn't know what to look for.
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Grandma or not, if you're using eBay, and dropping quite a large sum of cash, you should know how to read and not impulse buy.
 
I think people should read and understand the listing. I don't blame the seller one bit for doing this. He is totally right out in the open saying he's selling a picture of a PS3. He's not trying to fool anyone into anything. If an impulsive buyer just so happens to stumble across his page and bids $900, then more power to him. He just sold a picture for $900 and didn't have to fool anyone to do it. I see absolutely nothing wrong with it whatsoever. If he was trying to fool people into thinking he's selling the actual PS3, then he deserves to get his face punched in, but otherwise he is doing no wrong and a judge would agree with him.
 
xilix said:
I think people should read and understand the listing. I don't blame the seller one bit for doing this. He is totally right out in the open saying he's selling a picture of a PS3. He's not trying to fool anyone into anything. If an impulsive buyer just so happens to stumble across his page and bids $900, then more power to him. He just sold a picture for $900 and didn't have to fool anyone to do it. I see absolutely nothing wrong with it whatsoever. If he was trying to fool people into thinking he's selling the actual PS3, then he deserves to get his face punched in, but otherwise he is doing no wrong and a judge would agree with him.
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If they didn't have to fool anyone the description would read:


THIS AUCTION IS FOR A PICTURE OF A PS3 SYSTEM


But they don't do that, they try to hide it and make the buyer think they are bidding on a system. If you can't see or admit that, there is something wrong.

Did you look at the links I posted in post #53? How are those sellers making that "totally right out in the open" ??
 
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