I posted this in another thread but I think my low post count and unfamiliarity with the pre-war guys has caused this to be overlooked. It may also be old news but it has not been discussed here that I am aware. In my mind, it's a pretty important eBay development....
This past Sunday night, I had two snipes set for ebay. Both were within a hour of the other. In both cases, "no bid was placed." This is very, very, very unusual for the snipe service I use. I talked to a buddy who uses a
different snipe service and he said he has also had "maybe a dozen" snipe failures in the last two weeks. The reason seems to be this (from my snipe service tech support):
"Ebay has evolved their security protocol after their security breach in May and has started the use of random CAPTCHAs. A CAPTCHA (an acronym for "Completely Automated Public Turing test to tell Computers and Humans Apart") is a type of challenge-response test used in computing to determine whether or not the user is human. When this occurs, you will see a no bid placed response and the eBay bidding log will note the request for an eBay authorization code. We will keep you updated on the use and frequency of eBay CAPTCHAs as we learn more. Thank you for your understanding." The CAPTCHAS I'm familiar with are the ones used by Ticketmaster, etc. - nonsense words written in hard to decipher fonts.
I asked tech support if this was just a huge coincidence (two missed snipes within an hour) or if ebay is using these CAPTCHAS so much that it's not surprising. This was their reply:
"The only pattern that we have been able to detect is an increased use of this security measure on Sunday evenings."
I don't know if this answer is legit or just a way of placating me, since my missed bids were on a Sunday evening.
At any rate, this use of CAPTCHAS will have consequences for buyes and sellers. Buyers, like me, will miss bids. Sellers will "leave money on the table." One of my bids not placed was for nearly four times what the item sold for. Even ebay is unwittingly losing fees (not that we care about them
). I can't believe I'm the only person on this board to rely on a sniping service. Besides allowing me to set my price and not become emotionally involved in the bidding, I also joke (kind of) that sniping saved my marriage....in that I'm not asking my wife "Hey hon, can you hold that thought (while I bid)?"