Getting a link from www.bluesnews.com is similar to being slashdotted. In today's "Links of the day" section, your ebay auction for the 8-balls is linked. Cool!

Cool! That was my first auction for these things. Let me see... Ah... I think I know who... Cool!

Crap, Paul! A 938 eBay rating?! You junkie.

Hahahahaha. In my case, I act as an aggregator for the entire family. My account (and I have to coordinate it... ugh...) but others in my house use it as well. Cheating...

Also, I have been on for a while...

They were intended as gifts, but I find I have a few left over from the minimum run. So, I am selling the extras off.


A little bit of dissembling, there, Paul? That's a good way to market them -- sell them three at a time and the people will think that's all there are left, so better bid now. Pretty clever.

I had a hard time finding the auction, though -- I eventually found it by searching by seller name pgrzelak. Perhaps if you included the words "Magic 8 Ball" in the auction description more people would see it.

For anyone interested, the auction is here.

tanstaafl.

Hee hee! but I'm suprised that PIBKAC isn't on there.

Hehe, the one thing I dislike about Ebay is that it has the history of everything you bought recently. Like what the hell are you doing with all those old calculators, and how was the Britney Spears concert?

Hehe, the one thing I dislike about Ebay is that it has the history of everything you bought recently.

Register an account in Germany.... bidding history is hidden for those users...

Gareth

Greetings!

Let's see...

A little bit of dissembling, there, Paul?

Well, that is true. Just that the minimum order was 1000. I do intend (either myself or through a partnership) open up a webfront somewhere. I just hadn't gotten around to it. This was just a trial to see what the reaction would be.

I had a hard time finding the auction, though...

I know. That is part of the problem - it is very easy to lose. That was part of the experiment on ebay - trying to find the best place to put it. I still have not found a good spot. All of the activity is really due to it being Blue'd. A friend of a friend submitted it to Blue and it got published. I went from 19 views to 4000+ and climbing.

I am trying to be careful of those key words. I might hide them / scatter them in the body of the text, and if I do use them in sequence I want to hide them in a comment or something. I am trying very carefully not to step on any trademarks or get any notice from large companies with lawyers. Perhaps some kind of disclaimer at the bottom - use it there and let it draw the hits.

But this ebay experiment has shown me three things:

a) the gallery photo is useless for animated GIFs.
b) I need to include the magic words in the body somehow
c) selling them individually or in small batches can be highly profitable

Not a bad thing because I got hit with two additional bills from the project (increased shipping cost from the vendor - the first was just an estimate, and packing charges - boxes boxes boxes).

PEBKAC, and its variations, was a good one, but I was trying to keep it a bit more generic and avoid most acronyms. RTFM is the only one I use, and that is common enough that even mundanes can understand it (once explained). Sad to say I was also trying to "user-ify" (sorry, Bitt!), dumbing the responses down so users would be able to use it to. I knew I was on the right track when the salesperson taking my order stole the printing company's sample for her own use.

...old calculators...

Those are mine. I am slightly nixie obsessed at the moment. These huge beasts do wonderful things like adding, subtracting, multiplying and even dividing. Wow!!! Unfortunately, of the three calculators received so far (awaiting a fourth), only one survived shipping in fully working condition. The others, well, I will need to try and repair someday...

...Britney Spears...

NOT MINE!!! As I said earlier, I often get stuff for other family members. All concert tickets were purchased for one of my brothers who wanted to keep the purchases a surprise for his wife. It was his daughter that went to that concert. When the tickets came, I used a set of needle-nosed pliars to handle them, inspecting them carefully before sealing them in a ziplok back...

...I often get stuff for other family members. All concert tickets were purchased for one of my brothers who wanted to keep the purchases a surprise for his wife. It was his daughter that went to that concert. When the tickets came...

You doth protest too much...

Normally I would not protest. But Brittany?!?!? No. I protest that this was not a purchase for my own personal use.