2011 Charity Auction: Items Arriving! Leave Feedback!

[Lokkenjawnz]

The items look great guys! Great work again!

I do have a complaint though, maybe I'm just out of the loop here, but this whole proxy bidding thing is incredibly annoying, and in my opinion, ruins the auction. The whole point of this auction is to raise money for a good cause, and then when I get to bid on an item that's still only at $1, it turns out it's actually at a much higher amount, that simply doesn't show because of this whole proxy thing. I really don't understand why this is being used for this auction, all it means is that people will pay the absolute minimum that they can, and frankly it discourages me from bidding, because I have no idea if I can even afford an item, all I can do is jack the price up for someone else. Again, I'm not hugely familiar with proper auction sites, maybe this is the norm, but to me this really kills the spirit of the RB Charity auction, and unfortunately it pretty much makes me unable to contribute what meager funds I have, to the charity that I actually voted for.

Would it be at all possible to disable the proxy voting on these items? I have no idea if others here are enjoying using though, so if it's not a problem for others don't worry about it, but I feel like I can't be the only one bothered by this. I do appreciate the effort made by everyone to get it running though, and the help of GameGavel I'm sure helps to ease a lot of the stress on Dsh, which he deserves. Well regardless of if I can bid, I hope it turns out well!

[dsheinem]

The items look great guys! Great work again!

I do have a complaint though, maybe I'm just out of the loop here, but this whole proxy bidding thing is incredibly annoying, and in my opinion, ruins the auction. The whole point of this auction is to raise money for a good cause, and then when I get to bid on an item that's still only at $1, it turns out it's actually at a much higher amount, that simply doesn't show because of this whole proxy thing. I really don't understand why this is being used for this auction, all it means is that people will pay the absolute minimum that they can, and frankly it discourages me from bidding, because I have no idea if I can even afford an item, all I can do is jack the price up for someone else. Again, I'm not hugely familiar with proper auction sites, maybe this is the norm, but to me this really kills the spirit of the RB Charity auction, and unfortunately it pretty much makes me unable to contribute what meager funds I have, to the charity that I actually voted for.

Would it be at all possible to disable the proxy voting on these items? I have no idea if others here are enjoying using though, so if it's not a problem for others don't worry about it, but I feel like I can't be the only one bothered by this. I do appreciate the effort made by everyone to get it running though, and the help of GameGavel I'm sure helps to ease a lot of the stress on Dsh, which he deserves. Well regardless of if I can bid, I hope it turns out well!

Had I known we were only going to have a little over 100 auctions, I probably would have just managed it in a thread. Last year we had over 300, and it was unruly even with help.

I don't understand why you wouldn't bid for fear of paying more than you want to. If you bid $3 on something that's currently listed at $2, and it turns out that the bid was insufficient to become the high bidder (the item moves to $3.50 with the previous high bidder still in the lead), you aren't out any money. Just bid the maximum amount you want for each item, and keep your own tabs on how much you've bid in total. Yes, some items might go a little cheaper than they should, but opening the auction up to a broader public means that there's a good chance they won't.

In any case, I appreciate your constructive feedback and I'll certainly talk to Mike about whether there's another option for non-proxy bidding next year if we go the same route.

[dsheinem]

Incidentally, we are up to about $600 so far in the bidding. We raised about $1100 with 168 items in 2009 and (if we disregard the Valve item from last year) about $3200 with 315 items last year. What would be a realistic target for this year? $1500? $1000? I want to put one of those thermometers in the OP...

[Ziggy]

^ Between year one and two, that's an average of about $8.35 per item. So if there's about 100 items in this year's auction, then you'd expect $835. So maybe shoot for $1,000? Just let me know and I'll make a thermometer. edit: Oh, the bidding is up to $600 already, that seems like a lot! Maybe $1500 then?

edit: BTW, I noticed that the banner is just a crop of the site, and looks a little blurry due it it being slightly enlarged. I took the liberty to make a new one real fast (no real effort at all). It's the same dimension top to bottom, but I shortened the length a little. Not sure if you would wanna change it, but I think it would look nicer.









edit: Wasn't really going for the gold, but just a concept. A thermometer with USD on one side and the Euro conversion on the other for some of our European friends.

[MrHealthy]

If its only day 2 of the auction and we are already at 600 dollars then 1000 is far too low. I'd say 2000 is closer to what we can hope to get this year. There are 14 days left in which we can promote our items (including today), I don't see why we couldn't do this.

[dsheinem]

^ Between year one and two, that's an average of about $8.35 per item. So if there's about 100 items in this year's auction, then you'd expect $835. So maybe shoot for $1,000? Just let me know and I'll make a thermometer. edit: Oh, the bidding is up to $600 already, that seems like a lot! Maybe $1500 then?

edit: BTW, I noticed that the banner is just a crop of the site, and looks a little blurry due it it being slightly enlarged. I took the liberty to make a new one real fast (no real effort at all). It's the same dimension top to bottom, but I shortened the length a little. Not sure if you would wanna change it, but I think it would look nicer.









edit: Wasn't really going for the gold, but just a concept. A thermometer with USD on one side and the Euro conversion on the other for some of our European friends.

Thanks, Ziggy. I'll use the banner - and I'll probably go with thermometer when we agree on a goal.

I personally think $2000 is a bit high, as many of the higher priced items are already bid high. Maybe $1500?

[Ziggy]

OK, cool. I'll make a new one with a goal of $1500 in a bit.

[dsheinem]

OK, cool. I'll make a new one with a goal of $1500 in a bit.

can you just send me the link for the generator you are using?

[MrHealthy]

Hey Dave, if you havent started already I wouldn't mind organizing and linking all the items for the OP. Just say the word and I'll have it done in a jiffy.

[MrPopo]

The items look great guys! Great work again!

I do have a complaint though, maybe I'm just out of the loop here, but this whole proxy bidding thing is incredibly annoying, and in my opinion, ruins the auction. The whole point of this auction is to raise money for a good cause, and then when I get to bid on an item that's still only at $1, it turns out it's actually at a much higher amount, that simply doesn't show because of this whole proxy thing. I really don't understand why this is being used for this auction, all it means is that people will pay the absolute minimum that they can, and frankly it discourages me from bidding, because I have no idea if I can even afford an item, all I can do is jack the price up for someone else. Again, I'm not hugely familiar with proper auction sites, maybe this is the norm, but to me this really kills the spirit of the RB Charity auction, and unfortunately it pretty much makes me unable to contribute what meager funds I have, to the charity that I actually voted for.

Would it be at all possible to disable the proxy voting on these items? I have no idea if others here are enjoying using though, so if it's not a problem for others don't worry about it, but I feel like I can't be the only one bothered by this. I do appreciate the effort made by everyone to get it running though, and the help of GameGavel I'm sure helps to ease a lot of the stress on Dsh, which he deserves. Well regardless of if I can bid, I hope it turns out well!

This proxy bidding is exactly how it works on major sites such as eBay, and as you might remember eBay was used for the Play For Japan auctions earlier this year. The concern about not being able to pay for something is groundless, though. Imagine instead of proxy bidding that instead everyone just watched their auctions like a hawk. You still don't know if the item will go for higher than you can afford, as you know you're willing to go up to $X, but the back and forth bidding between you and two other people could still go higher than that. Really the only thing the proxy bidding does is that some items will go for cheaper than they might otherwise, as items without much interest that someone bids more than the minimum on would go for a lower price. But anything with any kind of contention will be pretty much unaffected.