Is snipe bidding killing the hobby?

[Lordstan]

Originally Posted by ooo-ribay

Some people would say I don't deal in "high quality stuff" to begin with since I concentrate on a team that has only been around for 57 years. Whatever you call the stuff I collect, I can't even find rare or unusual stuff very often on ebay anymore. 99% of what I see is either less than 10 years old or extremely common. I do my 50+ searches once every six days and I more often than not find nothing I want to bid on. I'll watch items I already have but usually only find maybe two items a month to bid on.

Rob,
You are absolutely correct. "high quality Stuff" is a relative term. A rare SF pin may be a holy grail to you, but not to me. I meant no disrespect to anything anyone collects.
My point is that sniping isn't the reason stuff doesn't seem to be as commonly found on ebay. I think your situation is a little different than my example. Your SF collection is so advanced that the things you needs are going to be really really rare. Even if they aren't super expensive, the likely hood of you finding these things is small regardless. 20yrs ago, when ebay first started, I would be willing to bet,you had a much larger want list then than now. It stands to reason the more advance a collector or collection the slower it can be added to.