Silk Road forums
Discussion => Silk Road discussion => Topic started by: Dread Pirate Roberts on July 10, 2013, 07:50 am
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Hi everyone,
There has been quite a bit of discussion about the commission that is charged to vendors on Silk Road and I'd like to do my best to put some misunderstandings to rest. Many things were changed in a recent update to accommodate displaying and pegging prices to many currencies. One of those changes was the way the commission is calculated. This change had virtually no effect on the vast majority of sales on Silk Road that occur in the less than $1000 range. The commission did rise on larger volume orders. I've always felt that the 2% or so that was being charged on high priced orders was kind of low and decided to make the minimum commission 4%. I intended to inform our vendors of this through a message, but for some reason the message did not go through. I don't know if this was human error, or a technical error of some kind, but despite what some of you might think I am a normal human being and capable of error. In any case, the warning of the commission change did not make it to the vendors, so when they realized the commission had been raised by about two percentage points on high priced orders without warning, they we're rightfully upset.
However, this soon spiraled out of control with people making unfounded claims that the commission had doubled or tripled across the board, causing further outrage. I attempted to respond within the thread where this was being discussed, but multiple threads have been started now and the misconception has even spread to other websites. Hopefully this post will put the matter to rest.
As I've said all along, the commission that is charged is subject to change at any time, but because it is such a hot topic I am more than happy to reveal the commission schedule as it stands at this very moment. Keep in mind, this is subject to change at any time, and vendors have been equipped to handle changes in the commission without being warned ahead of time.
The percent commission charged at this point can be found with the following formula:
6.7 x e^(-p/6) + 4
where p is the price of the listing in Bitcoins. So, for example, a 10 btc listing has a total commission of 5.27%, or 0.5265 btc.
To give a little more perspective, at the current exchange rate of $75 per btc, a $1000 item under the former schedule now costs $1007.26. A $2000 item now costs $2028.07. And as said before, lower priced items are virtually unchanged. I think we can all agree that the service being provided by Silk Road to bring together a multitude of buyers and sellers and provide a safe platform for multi-thousand dollar deals is more than worth an extra 28 bucks.
That being said, I take full responsibility for any and all misunderstandings up to this point. I didn't deliver the forewarning as I had intended and I am sure none of this would have been necessary had my message been delivered. I'm sorry for wasting everyone's time with all of this and I hope you can forgive me this slip up.
Yours always,
Dread Pirate Roberts
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Very well said my Friend :)
Eternal Hugs to You :)
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Thank you for elaborating. I feel informed, with actual data.
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I don't know if this was human error, or a technical error of some kind, but despite what some of you might think I am a normal human being and capable of error.
Now you are underestimating yourself. You are not a "normal" human, that's for sure.
It's just that, as Nietzsche said: "One is most dishonest towards one's God: he is not permitted to sin" ;)
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I'm sorry for wasting everyone's time with all of this and I hope you can forgive me this slip up.
It's so crazy to see you ask for forgiveness; people were out of line for jumping to insane conclusions before waiting for a complete response. Silkroad is maintained and managed so well, it's easy to forget that this is something extremely innovative and still growing. It's already to the point where drug dealers are being held to the standards of mainstream businesses. Buying and selling drugs can quickly seem like completely normal things.. there are so many people unconcerned about taunting / provoking law enforcement. Obviously none of this would've happened if that message had been successfully sent... Or if we all just remembered how remarkable / crazy this entire thing is. There've definitely been several times when I've had to remind myself.
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To give a little more perspective, at the current exchange rate of $75 per btc, a $1000 item under the former schedule now costs $1007.26. A $2000 item now costs $2028.07. And as said before, lower priced items are virtually unchanged.
And a $2,500 item costs $2,600.80. It more than doubled. That is exactly why I noticed this so soon. It's okay/ My customers will eat those extra fees because I sure wont. :)
Thank you for giving us the formula and letting us know how the fees currently work.
I really don't have time to be correcting everyone's arithmetic, but I feel the need to nip this in the bud and point out how bad math and bad comparisons can lead people astray. I provided 2 data points, which you quoted, demonstrating the effect of the change in commission. Then you added a 3rd data point showing the total commission instead of the change, which is misleading, and then said "it" more than doubled, which is ambiguous. If "it" is referring to the commission, then this is not just misleading, but incorrect.
A $2500 item before the change is now $2539.80.
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Can't say I'm happy about increased fees but I appreciate the formula to avoid any ambiguity.
Also it would be really nice if we could see some basic feature upgrades on SR such as the ability to search by price. Please DPR, make it so.
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6.7 x e^(-p/6) + 4
What is "e"? The only e I am familiar with is the number e in math, but that couldn't be it.
Could you elaborate, DPR?
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Anything above $300 is going to have an increase in price of $20 and up... Kind of back handed to say "Lower priced items will remain virtually unchanged" when everything is changing in price to a degree proportionate to its price.
Lower priced items are not unchanged. Everything is changed.
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What is "e"? The only e I am familiar with is the number e in math, but that couldn't be it.
It is e, approximately 2.71828182845904 according to OpenOffice help.
I ran this through just to see what it comes back with:
Price in BTC Commission
1 9.67%
2 8.80%
3 8.06%
4 7.44%
5 6.91%
6 6.46%
7 6.09%
8 5.77%
9 5.49%
10 5.27%
11 5.07%
12 4.91%
13 4.77%
14 4.65%
15 4.55%
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It was never, ever just a 1.5% fee.
What is was before was $38.5 + 1.5% for amount over $1000. So for a $2500 order before, the commission was:
$38.5(for 1st $1000) + (1.5% of $1,500=22.5) for a total of $61 dollars or 2.44% of total order.
The new system takes into account price in BTC instead of USD in order for it to be universal given the new currency display additions. But that formula can be reconfigured for USD(or any currency), though one's calculation might be off a few cents when doing it that way. But it's a good enough, very close ballpark.
Maybe I'll post up a formula for USD.
But the new system actually lowers commission for orders under $350, on par to slight increase for orders $350 to $500, then goes up incrementally over $600 to $1000 by about $1 to $8. It's the over $1000 orders where it pops up a bit. But in real currency terms, the increase is mostly minor, relatively speaking. Nothing someone who is buying bulk would cry over and consider a deal breaker.
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What is "e"? The only e I am familiar with is the number e in math, but that couldn't be it.
It is e, approximately 2.71828182845904 according to OpenOffice help.
Wow, I never dreamed they'd use e. All I remember about it is that it is the base of a logarithmic table. "To the base e"... From my high school days. Then there's to the base 10 and to the base 2. I suppose any number can be used as the base of a logarithm.
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Just to clear up confusion about how the old fee system worked (which was a cumulative tier system):
Here is the old Fee table:
10% of first $50 (max $5) [meaning 10% for any order up to $50]
8.5% of $50 - 150 ($5 + max addl $8.5) [Meaning, 10% of 1st 50 + 8.5% of value >$50 to $150, not simply 8.5% of value of entire order that's between $50 and $150. Otherwise, a seller could just set order to $51 and save 1.5% in commission. Whereas the vendor listing for $49 would be paying more in commission. How would that be fair?]
6% of $150 - 300 ($13.5 + max addl $9)
3% of $300 - 500 ($22.5 + max addl $6)
2% of $500 - 1000 ($28.5+ max addl $10)
1.5% for everything over $1000 ($38.5 + 1.5% amt >$1000)
So for a $550 order, the fee was $28.5 + (2% of amt over $500 = (50 * .02 = $1) for a total of $29.5
Why would SR charge a vendor selling something at $1001 less commission in dollar terms than the Vendor who sells something for $550? What sense of fairness is that? That's why commission schedules are cumulative.
Perhaps some of the old time vendors can chime in to confirm how the old system was calculated.
See this old thread about it. Look at the last few posts: http://dkn255hz262ypmii.onion/index.php?topic=18636.msg209740#msg209740
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6.7 x e^(-p/6) + 4
where p is the price of the listing in Bitcoins.
The interesting consequence of this is that the commission rate will be a floating amount for items pegged to a fiat currency, and it will actually go up as the price of a bitcoin goes up. Here's a graph of the commission at the current exchange rate of about $77 vs if it was $200.
http://32yehzkk7jflf6r2.onion/comm.png
The reason is because as the price of a bitcoin goes up, a dollar becomes a smaller fraction of 1 BTC. In the simplest example, an item costing $1 would make the p term 1/77 at $77, and 1/200 at $200. Compare e^(-3/6) to e^(-1/6) to see how it goes up if the p term decreases.
Also, the light gray dotted line is the (cumulative) old rate.
So the rate is pretty much the same for items costing $50 to $300 at the current exchange rate, otherwise it's higher.
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Hat off to you DPR!
Thanks for posting and making right.
All is good - and I'm comfortable with the new commission structure.
BG
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6.7 x e^(-p/6) + 4
where p is the price of the listing in Bitcoins.
The interesting consequence of this is that the commission rate will be a floating amount for items pegged to a fiat currency, and it will actually go up as the price of a bitcoin goes up. Here's a graph of the commission at the current exchange rate of about $77 vs if it was $200.
http://32yehzkk7jflf6r2.onion/comm.png
The reason is because as the price of a bitcoin goes up, a dollar becomes a smaller fraction of 1 BTC. In the simplest example, an item costing $1 would make the p term 1/77 at $77, and 1/200 at $200. Compare e^(-3/6) to e^(-1/6) to see how it goes up if the p term decreases.
Also, the light gray dotted line is the (cumulative) old rate.
So the rate is pretty much the same for items costing $50 to $300 at the current exchange rate, otherwise it's higher.
Brilliant discovery. I was having a hell of a time trying to adapt the formula to USD for listings pegged to USD. Now I see why.
One thing, Listings pegged to USD from time of purchase to time of finalization would move commensurately with BTC value. So while the fee would also move with BTC valuation, so would the amount received in BTC at time of finalization (for unhedged orders).
I just wish I could figure out some static percentage points along this new sliding commission schedule that can be relied upon. Any ideas how?
Looking at your pic, not only does the percent change at certain points along the sliding scale relative to BTC, but the delta (rate of change) accelerates or decelerates with change in BTC. Am I seeing that right?
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Anything above $300 is going to have an increase in price of $20 and up... Kind of back handed to say "Lower priced items will remain virtually unchanged" when everything is changing in price to a degree proportionate to its price.
Lower priced items are not unchanged. Everything is changed.
Hey doomsday, never seen you before, nice to meet you. I would appreciate you not calling me a liar. Every word of my post is true. If you are going to call someone out for lying on this forum I would appreciate you do your due diligence and confirm that indeed they have lied. I guess we need yet another data point before some of you will start believing me.
A $300 listing before the update now costs $300.19. I think we can all agree that an extra 19 cents constitutes "virtually unchanged". One more data point and then I'm done. A $150 listing before the update now costs $149.70. That's right, the commission went DOWN in some places! Most transactions on SR are in the $100 - $200 range anyway.
I'm not sure at what point I went from being trusted implicitly to not only being mistrusted, but having lies spread about me and my actions. Silk Road has been a bastion for integrity in the black market since it began and you can be sure that so long as I am at its helm it will remain that way. I don't expect you to trust me blindly, but given the track record I do think I deserve the benefit of the doubt at this point.
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My most expensive listing changed from a whopping 415 dollars to a........ $416 dollars.
I for one, am appreciative of the recent updates. I am glad that SR is being updated as we move forward as a community.
Remember the attacks a few months ago? Things have been running extremely well. 2 years and counting SR! I think we all owe a thank you to DPR.
Fuck the tiny commission raises. What really concerned me, was the lack of communication to the vendors that commissions were being raised. DPR, however, came out to quickly explain this, which I thought was respectable, which he always has been.
-TH
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To give a little more perspective, at the current exchange rate of $75 per btc, a $1000 item under the former schedule now costs $1007.26. A $2000 item now costs $2028.07. And as said before, lower priced items are virtually unchanged.
And a $2,500 item costs $2,600.80. It more than doubled. That is exactly why I noticed this so soon. It's okay. My customers will eat those extra fees because I sure wont. :)
Thank you for giving us the formula and letting us know how the fees currently work.
I really don't have time to be correcting everyone's arithmetic, but I feel the need to nip this in the bud and point out how bad math and bad comparisons can lead people astray. I provided 2 data points, which you quoted, demonstrating the effect of the change in commission. Then you added a 3rd data point showing the total commission instead of the change, which is misleading, and then said "it" more than doubled, which is ambiguous. If "it" is referring to the commission, then this is not just misleading, but incorrect.
A $2500 item before the change is now $2539.80.
My math is spot on DPR. You're just wording this bad. When you say a $2500 item, you are clearly working the previous fees into the price and I was not. ;) I was clearly talking about a $2,500 item BEFORE any fees. You were talking about a $2,500 item after previous fees which is really a $2,4XX item. A $2500 item (before any fees) now costs $2600.80 after fees. Last week a $2,500 item (before fees) would cost $255X after fees. So fees did double for $2,500 items. I'm okay with that though. As I said, it's not coming out of my pocket, but I don't appreciate you saying that I am wrong about it.
It's all gravy Robbie. Just keep this ship sailing smoothly.
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One thing, Listings pegged to USD from time of purchase to time of finalization would move commensurately with BTC value. So while the fee would also move with BTC valuation, so would the amount received in BTC at time of finalization (for unhedged orders).
Unhedged items would have a consistent commission, because the vendor gets whatever BTC was put in escrow. Not sure how hedged items work. They could base commission on the BTC at the time the buyer submits the order or the BTC the vendor gets when the buyer finalizes.
I just wish I could figure out some static percentage points along this new sliding commission schedule that can be relied upon. Any ideas how?
List all your items in BTC. :)
Looking at your pic, not only does the percent change at certain points along the sliding scale relative to BTC, but the delta (rate of change) accelerates or decelerates with change in BTC. Am I seeing that right?
Yeah, but it's somewhat deceptive. You want to look at the difference between the blue and black line vs the difference between the black line and the bottom of the graph (which is below zero because I was lazy). That's the percentage difference between the two exchange rates.
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Fees went up, and in some places close to doubled. Who cares DPR is the boss suck it up or kick rocks.
We are provided the most ideal platform for virtual dealing free of charge.
The fee is one that can be passed on to buyers for a totally fee-free sale minus the hedge fee.
You guys are wayyyy too comfortable to be talking shit to DPR like that.
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To give a little more perspective, at the current exchange rate of $75 per btc, a $1000 item under the former schedule now costs $1007.26. A $2000 item now costs $2028.07. And as said before, lower priced items are virtually unchanged.
And a $2,500 item costs $2,600.80. It more than doubled. That is exactly why I noticed this so soon. It's okay. My customers will eat those extra fees because I sure wont. :)
Thank you for giving us the formula and letting us know how the fees currently work.
I really don't have time to be correcting everyone's arithmetic, but I feel the need to nip this in the bud and point out how bad math and bad comparisons can lead people astray. I provided 2 data points, which you quoted, demonstrating the effect of the change in commission. Then you added a 3rd data point showing the total commission instead of the change, which is misleading, and then said "it" more than doubled, which is ambiguous. If "it" is referring to the commission, then this is not just misleading, but incorrect.
A $2500 item before the change is now $2539.80.
My math is spot on DPR. You're just wording this bad. When you say a $2500 item, you are clearly working the previous fees into the price and I was not. ;) I was clearly talking about a $2,500 item BEFORE any fees. You were talking about a $2,500 item after previous fees which is really a $2,4XX item. A $2500 item (before any fees) now costs $2600.80 after fees. Last week a $2,500 item (before fees) would cost $255X after fees. So fees did double for $2,500 items. I'm okay with that though. As I said, it's not coming out of my pocket, but I don't appreciate you saying that I am wrong about it.
It's all gravy Robbie. Just keep this ship sailing smoothly.
sorry jack, but you quoted my wording, so it was your responsibility to clarify if you were changing what was being stated. Also, before the update, the total commission on $2500 was $61, now it is $100. That is not more than double as you said. It's not all gravy. I'm tired of this. I'm more than open to criticism and correction, but I won't ignore you when you tell people I am wrong when I'm not. It's not cool to spread lies and rumors. Amazingly, people base their opinion on random bs they read online. I shouldn't have to defend myself from the very people I'm serving. As you say, I should be keeping the ship sailing smoothly, but apparently defending my integrity can be added to the ever growing list of responsibilities I have.
Hey Cimicon-Rep, thanks for correcting people here and there as well.
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To give a little more perspective, at the current exchange rate of $75 per btc, a $1000 item under the former schedule now costs $1007.26. A $2000 item now costs $2028.07. And as said before, lower priced items are virtually unchanged.
And a $2,500 item costs $2,600.80. It more than doubled. That is exactly why I noticed this so soon. It's okay/ My customers will eat those extra fees because I sure wont. :)
Thank you for giving us the formula and letting us know how the fees currently work.
I really don't have time to be correcting everyone's arithmetic, but I feel the need to nip this in the bud and point out how bad math and bad comparisons can lead people astray. I provided 2 data points, which you quoted, demonstrating the effect of the change in commission. Then you added a 3rd data point showing the total commission instead of the change, which is misleading, and then said "it" more than doubled, which is ambiguous. If "it" is referring to the commission, then this is not just misleading, but incorrect.
A $2500 item before the change is now $2539.80.
Another example of math by JACKY... :)
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I'm not sure at what point I went from being trusted implicitly to not only being mistrusted, but having lies spread about me and my actions. I don't expect you to trust me blindly, but given the track record I do think I deserve the benefit of the doubt at this point.
I can only speak for myself at this point but here is why i have a uncomfortable feeling about sr lately.
When i came here sr was presented to me as paradise on earth. With DPR as a reliable captain. He always made everything right, specially in hiring the right persons for the right positions.+
Now Scout is gone, the mod who always presented himself (at least to me) as a very reliable one. Never made any actions the community could suspect some kind of corruption. When he closed a thread he had very good reasons for it which he stated right away and always.
He lead the forum community that nice that most people took over his nice behavior and acted as part time moderators when somebody got out of line.
Now scout is gone, for whatever reason. I miss him a lot. I never had anything to do with him (other than he declining rising my post to 50 so i dont have to spam :P) but i think he was very good for the forum community. In fact one of the best mods i have seen in my online career. Never use his status for personal reasons. Always gave a statement when it was needed. He made his job as good as inigo does.
Now all of the sudden a new mod pops up, named libertas. The only thing he seems to do right is pasting wiki links around and suggests people, who have probably read that article more times than him, to look into them. The community highly dislikes that guy which everyone can see at the karma points given.
Now exactly this guy, who is very bad for the community (in my opinion) all of the sudden becomes sr support and takes care for the customers!
Now if u want to look into the case of hazebusta who threatened me (this story will go public very soon, libertas agreed to it too), u will see what a character this guy has. its the worst character ive seen in the sr team yet. By far.
Now all of the sudden its all downhill. The best mod gets exchanged with the worst. Like its not enough he now even takes care of real customers problems, money involved, maybe even humans death involved, in the very wrong way. This guy, in my opinion, is a very bad vibe seed and im sure if he continues his behavior it will be (actually already is) very bad for sr.
Thats just how it is from my view. To give u an idea on why some people may have some concerns about sr.
I think u shouldnt see it as a bad thing if your community takes a closer look if they suspect something. It can only be good. Better than ignoring everything and might have u in jail already and LE taking over...
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Dread Pirate Roberts,
It's all good cap'n. You really have no need to defend yourself. You explained the situation adequately. You didn't do anything wrong or underhanded. For wrong or underhanded, see Atlantis's fee schedule which masks as NOT being a cumulative schedule while being just that. That makes their fees seem to be much cheaper than on SR on initial inspection. They are cheaper though. But so what.
Also, it's just that some of us are mathematically challenged and aren't quite at your level of mathematical genius. I mean, you used "e" in your new formula. I had to wiki that to be sure of what it was and how to use it on a calculator or spreadsheet. Yep, I'm that math rusty.
But so far I figured out a fair amount of data points along the new sliding commission scale. So I have a pretty good handle on what to expect fee wise within about $.025-$0.50 accuracy. For unhedged, USD pegged listings.
Simple suggestion for all vendors to figure out new fee for any listing:
1. Make a dummy listing. Name it "Comm Test" or something. Stealth it. Set shipping to 0.
2. Set a price. The one you are trying to figure commission for. Put in some nonsense in the description. Set quantity to 1
3. On the account page, Click settings and change your listing to pre or post commission pricing (opposite of what you normally have).
4. Refresh your listing page. Note the difference in price for your dummy listing after you changed how its displayed (pre or post comms).
That's your fee. :)
Easy peasy.
Eventually someone will come up with a formula we can plug into Excel so we can do it one the fly. The formula DPR gave can be plugged into excel also but it works best when one bases everything on BTC. Making one for any particular fiat currency will be a challenge if the rate of change (delta) along the commission's sliding scale curve accelerates or decelerates relative to BTC value. In simple terms, unlike the old fee schedule which had thresholds, this new one doesn't, It just keeps sliding down incrementally from ~<10% to below 4%. Except instead of thresholds, the rate of change of the percentage along the scale's curve decelerates the higher the price a listing is.
Example:
From $1 to $500, the % charged ranges from ~<10% to ~6%. The rate of change is pretty fast
From $501 to $1000+ the % charged ranges from ~5.9% to <4%. The rate of change is much slower.
As Astor plotted out in post above, that's a parabolic like curve.
*did some of y'all just go cross-eyed?* LOL.
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this does NOT sound like the DPR that serves the community of the road. i dont recall DPR sounding rude, snippy or otherwise unkind. there are other posts from DPR as well that dont fit the personality we came to know and trust. DPR has always answered all concerns and questions with patience and sincerity. jut not feeling this imo...nothing personal
As the responsibilities change to be ever more the increasingly time consuming and difficult so too does the personalities of the ones being held responsible. Whether it be, in your eyes, for the better or the worse it is just a change, and people do change. Love the DPR
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Saving this for when it becomes relevant to me lol :)
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Nice to know. It's really quite an honest system. Small time vendors get small fees so they can still make it by, and larger vendors making bank on SR pay a little more to keep SR and DPR going. All sounds good to me, I don't mind paying a little extra.
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cha ching...
so whats that $10,000 a day ? ok ??? tax free?
can I please have my $500 back and I will fuck off ;D ;D seriously.
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Putting all this "how much did the rates go up/down" bickering aside, I do have to say that a commission rate that fluctuates depending on the price of bitcoins seems very strange to me. Like it or not, Bitcoins as a currency are way too volatile to post your listing based on BTC value. The vast majority of vendors peg it to USD, for good reason.
As I understand it, with this new system if BTC swings wildly, so does the USD-based commission rate. That's not good design.
I'm open to correction if my interpretation of this formula is incorrect.
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Putting all this "how much did the rates go up/down" bickering aside, I do have to say that a commission rate that fluctuates depending on the price of bitcoins seems very strange to me. Like it or not, Bitcoins as a currency are way too volatile to post your listing based on BTC value. The vast majority of vendors peg it to USD, for good reason.
As I understand it, with this new system if BTC swings wildly, so does the USD-based commission rate. That's not good design.
I'm open to correction if my interpretation of this formula is incorrect.
You are correct that, were that formula to remain exactly as it is, the commission on a USD scale would change with the exchange rate. That's why it will be updated from time to time to adjust for any major swings in the exchange rate. It is a great design on the backend making the code much simpler and reducing load on the system.
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Some of you are kinda being shitheads. Really dpr is being nice, and shouldn't even have to post these replies. damn show a little bit of respect in your questioning. too many of you are fucked up on bathsalts.
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Just wanted to say a few words....First thing, nothing last forever. Which I'm pointing out on the change of mods of recent. Can't expect for someone to do one thing forever, as time goes by people have the need to advance and move on to bigger things or just feel exhausted of doing the same thing over and over again...I can only imagine the stress the cats go through who run this place...I can safely say that handling some customers is like handling a 6yr old kid.
I think it's safe to say that DPR is just feeling a bit stressed with everything's that has been going on which is a natural reaction with any change that happens. And probably feeling a little irritated on some of the posts even though it probably wasn't intention make him look like someone he had no intention of being when posting this notice. It's a natural reaction and if any of us were in his shoes would react the same way to clear things up..
The hike in commission in my opinion was bound to happen. As the market grows, and especially with the all the media that's been going around (There's always been but it's more than what it was a few months ago, and Atlantis isn't making it any better with it's thirst for members) I can only imagine that new members are finding it's way over to SR..And as that happens it's going to take more time and money to make sure this market that we love run in a way to please everyone. I don't know about you guys but I've noticed for a month or so now that the site is actually running faster than it was 3 months ago.
In conclusion, we all hate change especially when it comes to money but it is what it is, deal with it. :P The price hike will sting a little for the first few orders but, hey! It's the price we have to pay to enjoy this luxury we got going on here. And maybe some don't see it but what DPR got here is a business, sort of like a swap market/flea market and he's the landlord who rents out space and like in the real world we have to pay taxes..
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Some of you are kinda being shitheads. Really dpr is being nice, and shouldn't even have to post these replies. damn show a little bit of respect in your questioning. too many of you are fucked up on bathsalts.
YEP!
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DPR is more then a god for us.
Show some respect your fucking fucks.
the commission increased just in high priced items ( which is 0,1% of the traffic here) and people start loosing their minds. It's fucking pathetic.
and to the guy criticizing Libertas, i respect your opinion, but Libertas is always helping people and is doing his job very well, as did scout. But scout left, deal with it. Libertas is great and i don't see anyone that should be in his position besides him.
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Dread Pirate Roberts,
It's all good cap'n. You really have no need to defend yourself. You explained the situation adequately. You didn't do anything wrong or underhanded. For wrong or underhanded, see Atlantis's fee schedule which masks as NOT being a cumulative schedule while being just that. That makes their fees seem to be much cheaper than on SR on initial inspection. They are cheaper though. But so what.
Also, it's just that some of us are mathematically challenged and aren't quite at your level of mathematical genius. I mean, you used "e" in your new formula. I had to wiki that to be sure of what it was and how to use it on a calculator or spreadsheet. Yep, I'm that math rusty.
But so far I figured out a fair amount of data points along the new sliding commission scale. So I have a pretty good handle on what to expect fee wise within about $.025-$0.50 accuracy. For unhedged, USD pegged listings.
Simple suggestion for all vendors to figure out new fee for any listing:
1. Make a dummy listing. Name it "Comm Test" or something. Stealth it. Set shipping to 0.
2. Set a price. The one you are trying to figure commission for. Put in some nonsense in the description. Set quantity to 1
3. On the account page, Click settings and change your listing to pre or post commission pricing (opposite of what you normally have).
4. Refresh your listing page. Note the difference in price for your dummy listing after you changed how its displayed (pre or post comms).
That's your fee. :)
Easy peasy.
Eventually someone will come up with a formula we can plug into Excel so we can do it one the fly. The formula DPR gave can be plugged into excel also but it works best when one bases everything on BTC. Making one for any particular fiat currency will be a challenge if the rate of change (delta) along the commission's sliding scale curve accelerates or decelerates relative to BTC value. In simple terms, unlike the old fee schedule which had thresholds, this new one doesn't, It just keeps sliding down incrementally from ~<10% to below 4%. Except instead of thresholds, the rate of change of the percentage along the scale's curve decelerates the higher the price a listing is.
Example:
From $1 to $500, the % charged ranges from ~<10% to ~6%. The rate of change is pretty fast
From $501 to $1000+ the % charged ranges from ~5.9% to <4%. The rate of change is much slower.
As Astor plotted out in post above, that's a parabolic like curve.
*did some of y'all just go cross-eyed?* LOL.
Best post in the thread. Helps out tremendously.
+ Karma.
Rather than trying to figure out how to adapt a formula for USD pegged listings, which will be quite the task, simply set your listings to pre-commission pricing.
Since BTC is the intermediary, you won't be able to devise a proper formula to accurately calculate the commission rate unless you write a script that automatically obtains the current BTC/USD rate in which to plug in the formula.
Simply, a crude estimate of what would represent the current rate in USD of the commission which can be deduced by the "brute force, plug in and see" method you prescribed above is all that is required to factor in your pricing pre-commission. As BTC value rises and falls relative to the buyer's fiat currency, your listings as from the point of view of the buyer will reflect the minor change in commission as influenced by the BTC fluctuation.
One less calculation you have to make. Using pre-commission pricing now, you only need concern yourself with those things which affect your profit margin. Most of which are fixed costs.
And to DPR. Kudos for coming up with a fair system that is not USD centric but BTC centric. BTC being the common denominator of all activities on here.
Best Regards,
From all of us at Pharmington Rex
●ஜ۩۞۩ஜ▬▬▬▬ஜ۩۞۩ஜ▬▬▬ஜ۩۞۩ஜ●
The Gentleman Lords of Pharmaceuticals.
Serving US Patrons from within the US.
●ஜ۩۞۩ஜ▬▬▬▬ஜ۩۞۩ஜ▬▬▬ஜ۩۞۩ஜ●
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And to DPR. Kudos for coming up with a fair system that is not USD centric but BTC centric. BTC being the common denominator of all activities on here.
Every BTC deposit and BTC in escrow is a liability that SR must pay to users at some point. SR is less concerned with the dollar value of the BTC than the nominal number of BTC that SR is liable to pay. Now that the system is BTC-centric SR can adjust commissions on the fly to ensure that SR has the ability to pay withdrawals.
Short story: the vendors and buyers are bailing out SR.
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I am still confused as to why the big listings increased to 4%, wether you like it or not from 2% then to jump to 4%, at a 40+ increase is pretty hefty to me. Unsure why the big listings are getting pegged so hard, when you have thousands of little listings that can be increased by a dollar or two and that would balance it out totally...
Also, to keep up with current competition, Atlantis's fees of that price are 1%, these are 4%. That is HUGE. Big bulk buyers are just going to tell their vendor to do all their bulk buys on Atlantis and use SR for there small listings....Not trying to be rude, just seeing light on this situation DPR
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YOU GUYS ARE TRIPPIN!
do u forget what this guy has done for us? he has us ordering drugs online.. safely and when hes attacked by hackers he fixes it
when hes talked down to he gets mad like anyone of us would..
this guy has made everyones life better for him to want a little extra for fees is really NOT a big deal to me.. shit ill just charge my clients an extra couple bucks and boom.. made my money back..
i love DPR and would never talk down to him or say anything bad about him or SR... this place has changed my life forever..
anyone got something bad to say to DPR should get stoned
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went over to atlantis' site to compare rates. heres what they have listed on their forums:
USD Value Commission as a percentage
Value less than or equal to $50 6%
Value less than or equal to $150 5.5%
Value less than or equal to $300 5%
Value less than or equal to $500 2%
Value less than or equal to $1000 1.5%
Value greater than $1000 1%
wow....
No one is going over to Atlantis, regardless of money or how many incentives you guys try to come up with. No matter what you say, nothing will change that the fact that 95% of people who think about buying drugs online only know about Silkroad. Those commission rates will only sway dumb people who can't figure out that they mean nothing if there are no customers.
And this tactic of trying to convince people that DPR is not DPR is creative... A lot of people (including top-level vendors) will never consider moving from Silkroad because of his history of keeping the site active and pure loyalty. But how many people do you think will believe something so ridiculous? And whatever that number is, only the dumb people will switch to a market that has no customers. You Atlantis people can do whatever the fuck you want, but attracting vendors should be the least of your worries.
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I am still confused as to why the big listings increased to 4%, wether you like it or not from 2% then to jump to 4%, at a 40+ increase is pretty hefty to me. Unsure why the big listings are getting pegged so hard, when you have thousands of little listings that can be increased by a dollar or two and that would balance it out totally...
Also, to keep up with current competition, Atlantis's fees of that price are 1%, these are 4%. That is HUGE. Big bulk buyers are just going to tell their vendor to do all their bulk buys on Atlantis and use SR for there small listings....Not trying to be rude, just seeing light on this situation DPR
Dollar terms brother. Dollar terms.
Fixating on percents misses the real deal.
On a $2000 order, under the new policy, the fee jumps up about $25 give or take depending where BTC is. Do you really think vendors or buyers are going to jump ship and run to Atlantis over $25 increase which may be adsorbed in part or entirely by the vendor?
Seriously?
Atlantis has been around for a few months with the same lower fees. Their client base only bumped up when SR was under massive attack in the spring and when SR was back up and running, so went their bump in client base.
The nominal fee on bulk orders is being increased because guess what? Bulk vendors/buyers can afford it and aren't going to be phased over a net 1%-2% increase in price. They've seen higher price increases by vendors who raise prices due to demand and still were unphased.
Remember also that most bulk buyers aren't buying for personal consumption. So the minor dollar increase in cost will be amortized in their costs per gram or per pill. Which in many cases would only add a few pennies or nickles to their wholesale costs.
Example: (simplified on purpose to illustrate a point about amortization)
Buying 1000 pills of something @ $2000. Cost per pill is $2 - Sell pills local @ $5 - profit $3.5 - markup 150%
Buying 1000 pills of something @ $2025. Cost per pill is $2.03 - Sell pills local @ $5 - profit $3.47 - markup 146%
Don't think anyone will be hurtin' over it.
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Quick question everyone,
Can someone please explain how to work that equation a little more in depth. Like can someone please just show a few simple examples showing the equation with 10, 500, 1000, 2000 dollar listings. I need to know what e is supposed to stand for and how to finish the equation. I am sorry to be asking this, but, I am not an accountant and am slightly rusty with my math. Thanks in advanced!
Also, if what I read is correct. If I create my listings when the account is set to pre-commission pricing and place what I want to receive for the item. Then I change the account settings to post commission. After that a $20 listing shows a price of $22.10. That 2.10 is the SR commission fee?
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Quick question everyone,
Can someone please explain how to work that equation a little more in depth. Like can someone please just show a few simple examples showing the equation with 10, 500, 1000, 2000 dollar listings. I need to know what e is supposed to stand for and how to finish the equation. I am sorry to be asking this, but, I am not an accountant and am slightly rusty with my math. Thanks in advanced!
Also, if what I read is correct. If I create my listings when the account is set to pre-commission pricing and place what I want to receive for the item. Then I change the account settings to post commission. After that a $20 listing shows a price of $22.10. That 2.10 is the SR commission fee?
Someone posted that e is the number e = 2.71. That's close enough for all practical purposes. In the equation you elevate e to the power (-p/6) and you multiply that by 6.7. Then to that you add 4. I don't know how thay came up with this so complicated thing.
If you have precommission pricing, all you do is visit the listing url and the price shown is the price people pay ("your" price plus commission).
goblin
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went over to atlantis' site to compare rates. heres what they have listed on their forums:
USD Value Commission as a percentage
Value less than or equal to $50 6%
Value less than or equal to $150 5.5%
Value less than or equal to $300 5%
Value less than or equal to $500 2%
Value less than or equal to $1000 1.5%
Value greater than $1000 1%
wow....
No one is going over to Atlantis, regardless of money or how many incentives you guys try to come up with. No matter what you say, nothing will change that the fact that 95% of people who think about buying drugs online only know about Silkroad. Those commission rates will only sway dumb people who can't figure out that they mean nothing if there are no customers.
And this tactic of trying to convince people that DPR is not DPR is creative... A lot of people (including top-level vendors) will never consider moving from Silkroad because of his history of keeping the site active and pure loyalty. But how many people do you think will believe something so ridiculous? And whatever that number is, only the dumb people will switch to a market that has no customers. You Atlantis people can do whatever the fuck you want, but attracting vendors should be the least of your worries.
I think you could be wrong.
There is no stress for SR vendors to set up a Vendor account on Atlantis for 25$ and set up his listings on both sites.
Due to the lower fees the Atlantis offers would be cheaper.
I don't really care, I think I'll still do my online shopping at SR^^
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Quick question everyone,
Can someone please explain how to work that equation a little more in depth. Like can someone please just show a few simple examples showing the equation with 10, 500, 1000, 2000 dollar listings. I need to know what e is supposed to stand for and how to finish the equation. I am sorry to be asking this, but, I am not an accountant and am slightly rusty with my math. Thanks in advanced!
Also, if what I read is correct. If I create my listings when the account is set to pre-commission pricing and place what I want to receive for the item. Then I change the account settings to post commission. After that a $20 listing shows a price of $22.10. That 2.10 is the SR commission fee?
Someone posted that e is the number e = 2.71. That's close enough for all practical purposes. In the equation you elevate e to the power (-p/6) and you multiply that by 6.7. Then to that you add 4. I don't know how thay came up with this so complicated thing.
If you have precommission pricing, all you do is visit the listing url and the price shown is the price people pay ("your" price plus commission).
goblin
Thank you very much
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I only list expensive stuff (compared to average SR buys) and to be quite honest, it hasn't made too much of a difference to things. As I provide information through consultations I have very little outlay other than my time so I have simply taken the small rise in commission as a loss to myself and my customers have seen no rise. For the vendors making tens of thousands a month (Yes, my experience says this is normal for 1-5% vendors), just take it on the chin and get on with doing your daily deeds, business is business and if you're up for keeping it successful, you've got to adapt.
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the prices seem to be jumping all over the place from page to page i just clicked on frank mathews 1 gram listing and it says its 119 dollars a g
but on his profile page its reading 116 dollars
so two different prices for the same listing
im confused lol
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Looks like a picked a good week to pay my SR deposit and get into the coke game on here..... Especially since cocaine is soo expensive this is really going to fuck with what I though I was getting myself into.
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There has been a lot of arguing about what you pay in commission since the formula was changed, so for clarity transparency here is what you're paying in commission including a comparison. Before you say this is wrong, please verify your calculations. These number have been independently calculated by another user.
Commission calculations
Atlantis Old Silk Road New Silk Road
6% of the first $50 10% of the first $50 4%+6.7*exp(-p/6)
5.5% of $50 - 150 8.5% of $50 - 150
5% of $150 - 300 6% of $150 - 300
2% of $300 - 500 3% of $300 - 500
1.5% of $500 - 1000 2% of $500 - 1000
1% for everything over $1000 1.5% for everything over $1000
Pre-Commission Atlantis Old SR New SR Old SR % increase New SR % comm.
List Price Commission Commission Commission over Atlantis Price over Atlantis price
$5 $0.30 $0.50 $3.11 40% 937%
$10 $0.60 $1.00 $1.67 40% 178%
$20 $1.20 $2.00 $1.04 40% -13%
$50 $3.00 $5.00 $2.00 40% -33%
$100 $5.75 $9.25 $4.00 38% -30%
$200 $11.00 $16.50 $8.00 33% -27%
$500 $20.00 $28.50 $20.00 30% 0%
$1,000 $27.50 $38.50 $40.00 29% 45%
$2,000 $37.50 $53.50 $80.00 30% 113%
$5,000 $67.50 $98.50 $200.00 31% 196%
$10,000 $117.50 $173.50 $400.00 32% 240%
$20,000 $217.50 $323.50 $800.00 33% 268%
$50,000 $517.50 $773.50 $2,000.00 33% 286%
This is inaccurate. The commission on a $5 listing is most definitely not $3.11, it's more like $0.53 and I'm pretty sure several of those other #s are way off as well. Stop posting things you haven't verified and understood yourself, and stop believing things you haven't verified or understood.
Gold, we should talk. People selling btc for fiat are charged 0% because they cannot use the escrow. and people doing the opposite should be treated as exchangers as well. I agree that the margins on money exchanges are much too tight to be treated the same way. I'll send you a message.
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That was a lot of work yet every number for the new commission is wrong because you applied it to the USD price, not the BTC price.
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Yes, we both did that. He realized it and send me a note after I posted it. I have deleted the posting. My apologies
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Lots of speculation about DPR here. ???
I am all for open discussion about changes and how they will effect us, but that is a far cry from some of the shit being talked here.
First off who are you to say what DPR should charge for his service? If you don't like it then use a different site. I don't mean this to be rude, but that is the way the free market works. DPR should raise the fees until he doesn't feel it is worth it anymore. When the SR began there were no fees to buy/sell here. Things change. It is his property and by complaining about the commissions you sound like someone who thinks they deserve the work of another man for less then he is willing to agree to.
Personally, I like the straightforward way DPR put it over a year and a half ago: "Whether you like it or not, I am the captain of this ship. You are here voluntarily and if you don't like the rules of the game, or you don't trust your captain, you can get off the boat. For those that stay, we at Silk Road will continue to do everything in our power to keep this market running smoothly and safely, and thank you again for your support!"
I believe he is acting the same as he always has. I posted the following in another thread but is sounds like some of you didn't see it. This is some of the history on the topic which I found on the forums. He has always taken it personal when people call him out for being greedy or question his right to set the commission as he sees fit.
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"Silkroad Fees" from July 2011: http://dkn255hz262ypmii.onion/index.php?topic=986.0
DPR made the following posts in that thread.
added to the seller's guide:
"...when pricing your items, be sure to include shipping and handling in the price. Whatever you set your price at will be your total compensation. However, your listings will display a price that is higher than the one you set because we add a commission to each listing. The commission is subject to change, but at the time of this writing it is 6.23%."
Sorry for the opacity. I'd like to share with you how I view money, so you can get a better idea of what to expect in regards to the management of Silk Road going forward.
Money is a tool, a means to an end. Our end here at Silk Road is not the accumulation of money, or the comfort and security it brings (not that there's anything wrong with that). Our end is freedom from tyranny, and secured basic human rights for the people of the world. As awesome as it is, Silk Road is just the beginning in what will likely be a long journey. You can count on us to use the wealth created by it responsibly to produce ever more infrastructure and resources toward achieving these goals. In the end, it won't be about the money, it'll be about what we've all achieved by thinking and acting for ourselves and refusing to compromise.
Would this mean then that as the volume grows exponentially that there is a good chance that the fees will slide downward; both because of volume and the fact that there will be somewhat less to do in the way of major updates of the board because it will become both highly efficient and more bulletproof over time with each new iteration? Based on your philosophy of money (the tool part is the same as my own, however I do *love* the creature comforts that come from having it) I would be very interested to hear your answer, even if it is just in a philosophical bent rather than any estimation or indication of future fee structures. thanks!
Not necessarily. Basically what I'm saying is, MUCH more is possible than just being able to buy drugs freely. With the revenues from Silk Road (the more the better), we can invest in even more ambitious and revolutionary projects. Money is a tool, but so is Silk Road. Our aim is to one day live in a world where we won't need Silk Road, because we won't need to hide anymore.
September 2011: What do you think about the new SR SELLER COMMISSION that's coming up? http://dkn255hz262ypmii.onion/index.php?topic=3415.0
"This is an automated message to all Silk Road sellers:
Some of you are just joining us as sellers, others have been here since the beginning. Wherever you came into this game, I hope you are having fun :) For those just coming in, I want to give you a little history.
Starting out, there were no commissions on sales. Sellers got 100% of what the buyer paid and there wasn't even a fee to become a seller! This might sound great for sellers, but paradoxically, I think things got much better when we started charging for accounts and adding a commission. Why? Because buyers had more reason to trust you and do business with you, and Silk Road finally had a revenue stream to invest in advanced server security and feature development.
When we started charging a commission, I just picked a number, something like 5.25%. This was added on to every sale, so that sellers got what they listed the item for and buyers only saw one price. I was hoping this would give me the flexibility to change the commission rate at will without too much fuss from the community, but I soon found that many cared very much about this number, especially when I raised it by 1% to 6.25%.
From my perspective, I would like this number to be as high as possible without causing sales to drop for you, but I have no idea where that point is. It could be 5%, 10% or even 20%, I just don't know. I'm not saying we're amazon.com, but they charge a 15% commission on every item plus a flat $1.25 and I think ebay charges something like 13% if you take into account all of their fees.
So, my proposal is to run an experiment. We've been tracking sales data very closely for months and we're showing fairly steady linear growth. What I'd like to do is double the commission rate to 12.5% for 1 month and see how sales respond to this. If our rate of growth slows, or even shrinks, then at least we'll know that it is too much and can scale it back, but if it doesn't affect sales, then we'll have doubled our revenue without any major consequence and can start investing in some of our "back-burner" projects such as internationalizing the site, developing an api, possibly starting an insurance pool, and getting normal updates and features online faster.
This change will begin in 3 days unless I hear an overwhelming number of you respond negatively against it. Thanks for your time and for making Silk Road great :)
Best regards,
Silk Road staff"
Jan 2012: State of the Road Address http://dkn255hz262ypmii.onion/index.php?topic=8397.msg76738#msg76738
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Hash: SHA1
- From it's humble beginnings, the Silk Road market was quickly populated with what has become a vibrant community full of interesting characters. From our superstar vendors and ever helpful mods to all of the active folks on the forum, the people here are truly awesome. Silk Road would not be what it is or possibly even exist without everyone who has stepped up along the way to point out security flaws, contribute their ideas, and take this experiment on as their own and stand with us.
It didn't take long before word got out. Our little hidden market got the attention of the media and soon the politicians and law enforcement. But Silk Road was never meant to be private and exclusive. It is meant to grow into a force to be reckoned with that can challenge the powers that be and at last give people the option to choose freedom over tyranny. We fundamentally believe that people can thrive and prosper under these conditions and so far tens of thousands have done so in the Silk Road market. A revolution has been born. So ideally, more participants means more prosperity. What we've found in practice is that if there is an opportunity to cheat, steal or lie for personal short-term gain, someone, somewhere will exploit it.
So, we've had two major challenges to face as Silk Road grows and evolves. One is making our systems tough enough and flexible enough to withstand and win a cyber-war with the most powerful organizations in the world, should they choose to start that war. This is always and ever a top priority. The other is making the market a place where people can quickly and easily buy and sell just about anything without worrying about being attacked by gun toting men in uniforms and thrown in a cage or worry about being ripped off by their trading partner.
I am proud to say we have been successful in achieving these goals up to this point. The site remains up and functioning (despite a few screw ups on our part, like not having a full capacity backup server ready to go when a live server went down, and a poorly executed url switch, just to name a few). And, over 99% of all transactions conducted within the escrow system are completed to the satisfaction of both both buyer and seller, or a mutually agreed upon resolution is found.
This success has in no way made us complacent however. New members are still being lured into trading outside of escrow by scammers and getting ripped off, and “finalizing early”, effectively cutting out the escrow process, is common practice. Still, I believe we can mitigate these risks and take our market to the next level in security, reliability, performance, and convenience for everyone involved.
First we must deal with trading out of escrow. Up to this point we have charged a flat 6.23% commission on all trades. This is much too high for transactions in the $300 and over range, making trading out of escrow for large transactions much more attractive than staying within the system. Now, instead of charging a flat commission, we will charge a higher amount for low priced items and a lower amount for high priced items, similar to how eBay does it.
We've worked hard to come up with a commission schedule that should work for everyone and will give scammers no excuse to make people send money outside of escrow. For some perspective, eBay and amazon charge the following rates:
eBay - $0.50 to list, 11% of the first $50, 6% of $50.01-1000, 2% of $1000.01+
amazon - $1.35 + 15% (for almost all items)
We also went to the Silk Road independent sellers to see what they thought an appropriate commission schedule would look like. The average response looked like this:
15% of the first $10
11% of $10 - $50
8.14% of $50 - $250
5.6% of $250 - $1000
3.7% of $1000 - $5000
We looked at past sales data and our current and future revenue needs and were able to bring these numbers down even further:
10% of the first $50
8.5% of $50 - 150
6% of $150 - 300
3% of $300 - 500
2% of $500 - 1000
1.5% for everything over $1000
With this change, there are no phoney excuses whatsoever for vendors to ask for out of escrow payment. Any request should be interpreted as a scam attempt and reported to the Silk Road support team via the “contact us” link on the main site. We are looking at several mechanisms for enforcing the ban on OOE transactions, from self-policing to bounties on offenders.
Together, we can beat the scammers and make the Silk Road market a place where you can buy with confidence and peace of mind. If we stay true to our principles of integrity, virtue, mutual respect and camaraderie that have guided us to this point, I believe our future is bright and this revolutionary experiment will be a success!
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CLARIFICATION: The new policy regarding out of escrow transactions stated in this address does not affect a vendor's ability to ask their customers to finalize their orders and release payment before shipment. We still strongly recommend that buyers avoid doing this at all costs because we will be unable to protect you in case of fraud.
CLARIFICATION: This new policy also does not affect vendors who use the market as a platform for Bitcoin exchange. They may continue to operate as usual, but again we strongly recommend that you purchase bitcoins through a non-anonymous vendor because the market is not set up to facilitate bitcoin exchange and your money can be stolen without recourse.
FURTHER COMMENTARY: http://dkn255hz262ypmii.onion/index.php?topic=8539.0
Thank you everyone for your comments and suggestions. One suggestion I especially like is the one about commission being affected by trade volume. To those of you that are either supportive of the change, or have faith in what I am doing regardless of whether you see the point or not, thank you for your support! I have done everything I can to earn that trust and I cherish it.
To those of you chalking my actions up to pure greed and ignoring the context for the changes, I say shame on you. When have I lied? When have I cheated or stolen from anyone here? When have I treated anyone unfairly? When have I lead you astray? Why do you turn on me now when I have poured my heart and soul into this community and project?
10% on $50 orders? We are talking about an extra $1.88! A $10 order? An extra 38 cents! Do you think this site built itself? Do you think it runs itself? Do you have any clue what goes on behind the scenes to keep this going? Do you have any idea the risk the people operating this site are taking? Do you have any clue what we've been through to get here today? Do you have any clue what it's going to take to get through the next year?
Whether you like it or not, I am the captain of this ship. You are here voluntarily and if you don't like the rules of the game, or you don't trust your captain, you can get off the boat. For those that stay, we at Silk Road will continue to do everything in our power to keep this market running smoothly and safely, and thank you again for your support!
To be honest, I am quite surprised by how negative the responses have been to the State of the Road Address and how little faith you put in me after I feel like I have done so much to deserve it. I chose the words I wrote in the Address very carefully. I reviewed it many times. Every one of them is true, and my sentiment is valid. Go through and re-read it along with the clarifications. Every one of your concerns is addressed if you would only do me the courtesy of believing me. This change IS about scam prevention. We ARE working on solutions to the finalizing early and bitcoin exchange scams. We DID do everything we could to keep the rates low while still addressing the present and future needs of the organization. Everyone WILL be treated fairly under the new rules just as you have been all along.
We also need to be WAY more flexible on this kind of stuff. It would be amazing if we could try out lots of different commission rates, some way too high, some way too low, to try to find out what works for everyone, but the minute we even mention changing rates everyone becomes an expert on the subject and puts up resistance to change. There is lots about this organization that just isn't going to be made public and you have to TRUST us that we are doing our absolute best and will always work toward our stated goals, which include giving people the opportunity to choose freedom over tyranny, and to trade in just about any good or service they wish, securely and privately. Our goals DO NOT include profiting personally at anyone else's expense, or the expense of our stated goals. If I am greedy, I am greedy for freedom. I am greedy for power. Not force over others, but for a world where POWER resides in me and each and every individual, where it belongs. If we can get to that world, I can die happy.
Silk Road is an ENTERPRISE that is just getting started. It could literally change the world as we know it. It is bigger than any one of us, and it is going to take the dedication and will of MANY talented people, a lot of luck, and RESOURCES to get from here to there. Do you want to see this thing go all the way and take the absolute piss out of the power mongers of this world? Do you want to give it every chance it needs to succeed? Why aren't you telling me to raise the commission even further then? I don't hear anyone refusing the commission break on high priced goods. I don't hear anyone saying “don't do that, you need it, you keep this whole thing going, we're happy to do our part.”
As a community, if we are going to survive, we need to adopt a LONG TERM vision. Getting the most out of this thing before it gets taken down is NOT going to bring us success. In that world, Silk Road will be a shooting star that burns out quickly and dies as little more than a dream, swallowed by the nightmare reality of an ever-expanding, all-powerful global oligarchy. Planning ahead and doing everything we can NOW to prepare for the war to come is the only way we are going to have a shot at this. We are still mostly ignored by our true enemies, but this incubation WILL NOT last forever.
I don't like writing this kind of stuff publicly because it taunts our enemies and might spur them into action, but I risk it because the context for what we are doing is too often lost in the day to day stuff that happens here and it needs to be put in from time to time. Silk Road NEEDS our support. It needs everything we have. The return on what we put into it will be immeasurable if we can get through the months and years ahead and gain a real foothold on the global stage. HELP ME GET US THERE!!! Do it for me, do it for yourself, do it for your families and friends, and do it for mankind.
P.S.
Here's another thing that doesn't get said enough: I love you. This is the most fun I've ever had and I feel closer to the people I have met here than the vast majority of people I have to hide all of this from in real life. Stay light, have fun, and please please please take this on as more than a way to score drugs. Stand by me as we stand up for ourselves.
- Silk Road admin
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And in case you didn't read the whole thing make sure you take note of the last bit. I hope DPR still feels this way and I hope you as a community member still feel it.
P.S.
Here's another thing that doesn't get said enough: I love you. This is the most fun I've ever had and I feel closer to the people I have met here than the vast majority of people I have to hide all of this from in real life. Stay light, have fun, and please please please take this on as more than a way to score drugs. Stand by me as we stand up for ourselves.
- Silk Road admin
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HE LOVES ME..
HE REALLY LOVES ME!!
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-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1
Hi everyone,
There has been quite a bit of discussion about the commission that is charged to vendors on Silk Road and I'd like to do my best to put some misunderstandings to rest. Many things were changed in a recent update to accommodate displaying and pegging prices to many currencies. One of those changes was the way the commission is calculated. This change had virtually no effect on the vast majority of sales on Silk Road that occur in the less than $1000 range. The commission did rise on larger volume orders. I've always felt that the 2% or so that was being charged on high priced orders was kind of low and decided to make the minimum commission 4%. I intended to inform our vendors of this through a message, but for some reason the message did not go through. I don't know if this was human error, or a technical error of some kind, but despite what some of you might think I am a normal human being and capable of error. In any case, the warning of the commission change did not make it to the vendors, so when they realized the commission had been raised by about two percentage points on high priced orders without warning, they we're rightfully upset.
However, this soon spiraled out of control with people making unfounded claims that the commission had doubled or tripled across the board, causing further outrage. I attempted to respond within the thread where this was being discussed, but multiple threads have been started now and the misconception has even spread to other websites. Hopefully this post will put the matter to rest.
As I've said all along, the commission that is charged is subject to change at any time, but because it is such a hot topic I am more than happy to reveal the commission schedule as it stands at this very moment. Keep in mind, this is subject to change at any time, and vendors have been equipped to handle changes in the commission without being warned ahead of time.
The percent commission charged at this point can be found with the following formula:
6.7 x e^(-p/6) + 4
where p is the price of the listing in Bitcoins. So, for example, a 10 btc listing has a total commission of 5.27%, or 0.5265 btc.
To give a little more perspective, at the current exchange rate of $75 per btc, a $1000 item under the former schedule now costs $1007.26. A $2000 item now costs $2028.07. And as said before, lower priced items are virtually unchanged. I think we can all agree that the service being provided by Silk Road to bring together a multitude of buyers and sellers and provide a safe platform for multi-thousand dollar deals is more than worth an extra 28 bucks.
That being said, I take full responsibility for any and all misunderstandings up to this point. I didn't deliver the forewarning as I had intended and I am sure none of this would have been necessary had my message been delivered. I'm sorry for wasting everyone's time with all of this and I hope you can forgive me this slip up.
Yours always,
Dread Pirate Roberts
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YOU'RE HUMAN!!!!!!!!!
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"Silkroad Fees" from July 2011: http://dkn255hz262ypmii.onion/index.php?topic=986.0
DPR made the following posts in that thread.
added to the seller's guide:
"...when pricing your items, be sure to include shipping and handling in the price. Whatever you set your price at will be your total compensation. However, your listings will display a price that is higher than the one you set because we add a commission to each listing. The commission is subject to change, but at the time of this writing it is 6.23%."
Sorry for the opacity. I'd like to share with you how I view money, so you can get a better idea of what to expect in regards to the management of Silk Road going forward.
Money is a tool, a means to an end. Our end here at Silk Road is not the accumulation of money, or the comfort and security it brings (not that there's anything wrong with that). Our end is freedom from tyranny, and secured basic human rights for the people of the world. As awesome as it is, Silk Road is just the beginning in what will likely be a long journey. You can count on us to use the wealth created by it responsibly to produce ever more infrastructure and resources toward achieving these goals. In the end, it won't be about the money, it'll be about what we've all achieved by thinking and acting for ourselves and refusing to compromise.
Not necessarily. Basically what I'm saying is, MUCH more is possible than just being able to buy drugs freely. With the revenues from Silk Road (the more the better), we can invest in even more ambitious and revolutionary projects. Money is a tool, but so is Silk Road. Our aim is to one day live in a world where we won't need Silk Road, because we won't need to hide anymore.
Wow, I can't believe DPR wrote that, not because it's out of character, but because if anyone made an insanely expensive proposal to locate DPR or bring SR down, all they'd have to do to get the operation approved is show these posts. In reality, Silkroad's success (and the success of all online free markets) is dependent on public confidence; so regardless of what people here may think, SR can be shut down. I guess if he's already prepared to truly put himself in the cross-hairs of people who have such power / motivation, then I shouldn't be worried. But it seems like creating a free market is already a giant step, and managing that free market as it grows and grows seems like it would be so time-consuming. In any case, the fees for more expensive items were a bit low, with that, and the fact that this new system makes more sense, there's really no one complaining.
From DPR's perspective, maybe what's upsetting is when people know what the money is going towards, and yet still complain when fees are changed. But it goes back to vendors falling into a routine that makes it seems like all of this is just normal.
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DPR I really think a change like this could of been done a lot better, Silkroad needs a intricate hybrid business model to create a competitive advantage. Right now SR only has their core business that consists of the man behind a curtain and core distributors. If you compare silkroad to any major software company's silkroads growth has been much different, a perfect example is shutting down the the secondary weapons site for being a non monetary revenue stream that has a monopoly on anonymous online sales in a market that is around 60 billion a year and just after you have sandy hook every news channel pushing gun bans and every one in the USA hoarding magazines and guns essentially every major news channel was advertising the deepweb with gun ban scares. Utilizing a 20 something year old stoner who lives in his moms basement and spends each day browsing 4chan and does freelance coding on the side you could of had abstract data produced showing that the media and governments worldwide are pro gun control.
A big investment in software is needed to do this for Silkroad but of course in greater depth a program that is capable of modeling even hierarchies, event abstraction, event pattern detection, abstracting event based processes and detecting relationships. This software is very effective at providing correlation to situations which would allow us to improve are key performance indicators.
So we changed the revenue model by increasing fees with the ultimate goal of increasing profit, with the new system silkroad earns a minimum of 4% from vendors who do around 25 million in business a year. The worldwide size of this market is around 300-350 billion and 1% of the world GDP. Even if the silkroad fee was 100% of the vendor sales they would be nothing in relation to the possible profits! Their are many internal opportunities to increase the revenue well maintaining minimum costs. Due to the nature of this business and bitcoins their can not be complete end to end control on the incoming revenue these loses can be quite significant, the high profit time when silkroad dominates the market will cum to an end just like the internet porn industry, alternative more advanced means of tracking revenue must be implemented to remain profitable.
To increase the number of users their are a few things that need to be changed I would say the most important to be their directors of silkroad that are paid in bitcoin to improve Silkroad DPR could privately contact people who have the ability to apprehend the interrelationships of presented facts in a way to guide action to the desired goal. Anarchism is based on the fact one person can not do everything to perfection otherwise we would all be in favor of dictatorships. One way of greatly increase the numbers of users is a p2p silkroad based currency that pays dividends this would fulfill the human desire for long term trusting relationships which is part of human nature and has been displayed in many attachment theory tests. Media attention will eventually stop and to maintain growth new and innovative ideas will have to be implemented.
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DPR I really think a change like this could of been done a lot better, Silkroad needs a intricate hybrid business model to create a competitive advantage. Right now SR only has their core business that consists of the man behind a curtain and core distributors. If you compare silkroad to any major software company's silkroads growth has been much different, a perfect example is shutting down the the secondary weapons site for being a non monetary revenue stream that has a monopoly on anonymous online sales in a market that is around 60 billion a year and just after you have sandy hook every news channel pushing gun bans and every one in the USA hoarding magazines and guns essentially every major news channel was advertising the deepweb with gun ban scares. Utilizing a 20 something year old stoner who lives in his moms basement and spends each day browsing 4chan and does freelance coding on the side you could of had abstract data produced showing that the media and governments worldwide are pro gun control.
A big investment in software is needed to do this for Silkroad but of course in greater depth a program that is capable of modeling even hierarchies, event abstraction, event pattern detection, abstracting event based processes and detecting relationships. This software is very effective at providing correlation to situations which would allow us to improve are key performance indicators.
So we changed the revenue model by increasing fees with the ultimate goal of increasing profit, with the new system silkroad earns a minimum of 4% from vendors who do around 25 million in business a year. The worldwide size of this market is around 300-350 billion and 1% of the world GDP. Even if the silkroad fee was 100% of the vendor sales they would be nothing in relation to the possible profits! Their are many internal opportunities to increase the revenue well maintaining minimum costs. Due to the nature of this business and bitcoins their can not be complete end to end control on the incoming revenue these loses can be quite significant, the high profit time when silkroad dominates the market will cum to an end just like the internet porn industry, alternative more advanced means of tracking revenue must be implemented to remain profitable.
To increase the number of users their are a few things that need to be changed I would say the most important to be their directors of silkroad that are paid in bitcoin to improve Silkroad DPR could privately contact people who have the ability to apprehend the interrelationships of presented facts in a way to guide action to the desired goal. Anarchism is based on the fact one person can not do everything to perfection otherwise we would all be in favor of dictatorships. One way of greatly increase the numbers of users is a p2p silkroad based currency that pays dividends this would fulfill the human desire for long term trusting relationships which is part of human nature and has been displayed in many attachment theory tests. Media attention will eventually stop and to maintain growth new and innovative ideas will have to be implemented.
What's the 300-350 billion? The retail value of all drugs sold worldwide? I disagree that new and innovative ideas are necessary for growth. The only thing necessary for growth is: informing people about this website and how to use it. Simply designing a detailed 'get started' guide for new users would increase growth, and that's not much of an innovative idea. The Atlantis website has been desperately trying to gain a foothold in this market, if anyone has been motivated to think up new / innovative ideas it's them... And so far they've gone nowhere.
I personally don't think the armory should be re-opened for reasons that have to do with selling a gun without looking someone in the eyes, but putting that aside; any illegal firearms would be extremely expensive, it would take time for vendors to setup accounts, and any issues with scams would immediately turn off new buyers. The gun-control scare did alarm quite a few Americans, but we're talking about normal Americans. With this economy, the majority of them would not be willing to break the law to buy something so expensive. Increasing growth isn't about innovative ideas; especially since SR has no competition. Simply keeping this website open will increase the amount of news coverage (that's not going away). With the younger generations becoming more & more tech savvy, growth is guaranteed.
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DPR I really think a change like this could of been done a lot better, Silkroad needs a intricate hybrid business model to create a competitive advantage. Right now SR only has their core business that consists of the man behind a curtain and core distributors. If you compare silkroad to any major software company's silkroads growth has been much different, a perfect example is shutting down the the secondary weapons site for being a non monetary revenue stream that has a monopoly on anonymous online sales in a market that is around 60 billion a year and just after you have sandy hook every news channel pushing gun bans and every one in the USA hoarding magazines and guns essentially every major news channel was advertising the deepweb with gun ban scares. Utilizing a 20 something year old stoner who lives in his moms basement and spends each day browsing 4chan and does freelance coding on the side you could of had abstract data produced showing that the media and governments worldwide are pro gun control.
A big investment in software is needed to do this for Silkroad but of course in greater depth a program that is capable of modeling even hierarchies, event abstraction, event pattern detection, abstracting event based processes and detecting relationships. This software is very effective at providing correlation to situations which would allow us to improve are key performance indicators.
So we changed the revenue model by increasing fees with the ultimate goal of increasing profit, with the new system silkroad earns a minimum of 4% from vendors who do around 25 million in business a year. The worldwide size of this market is around 300-350 billion and 1% of the world GDP. Even if the silkroad fee was 100% of the vendor sales they would be nothing in relation to the possible profits! Their are many internal opportunities to increase the revenue well maintaining minimum costs. Due to the nature of this business and bitcoins their can not be complete end to end control on the incoming revenue these loses can be quite significant, the high profit time when silkroad dominates the market will cum to an end just like the internet porn industry, alternative more advanced means of tracking revenue must be implemented to remain profitable.
To increase the number of users their are a few things that need to be changed I would say the most important to be their directors of silkroad that are paid in bitcoin to improve Silkroad DPR could privately contact people who have the ability to apprehend the interrelationships of presented facts in a way to guide action to the desired goal. Anarchism is based on the fact one person can not do everything to perfection otherwise we would all be in favor of dictatorships. One way of greatly increase the numbers of users is a p2p silkroad based currency that pays dividends this would fulfill the human desire for long term trusting relationships which is part of human nature and has been displayed in many attachment theory tests. Media attention will eventually stop and to maintain growth new and innovative ideas will have to be implemented.
What's the 300-350 billion? The retail value of all drugs sold worldwide? I disagree that new and innovative ideas are necessary for growth. The only thing necessary for growth is: informing people about this website and how to use it. Simply designing a detailed 'get started' guide for new users would increase growth, and that's not much of an innovative idea. The Atlantis website has been desperately trying to gain a foothold in this market, if anyone has been motivated to think up new / innovative ideas it's them... And so far they've gone nowhere.
Those numbers are from the UNODC and I believe its the final retail price, its been a long time since I have seen the actual publications their still out their of course and are quite detailed if you want to check. People have been selling drugs online for over 20 years yet its never really blown up, until their are cartels with websites I would say its smaller scale. Its getting more attention now then it ever has but still is not really catching on. Educating people about something is extremely expensive and not very effective, no large business ever wastes money on advertising through education for example if you live in Canada you constantly see the TD bank comparing their banking to a comfortable chair, If posting fliers saying hey were TD bank and if you would like to join us just come drop on by worked they would do that and save millions the AAF would not exist and their would not be doctorate programs for advertising. It is a complex art which demands knowledge of human nature and creativity. Detailed guides on how TOR functions have been available for years any one who has a computer can access it and if you put buy drugs online into any search engine only about the first 1000 news articles are about silkroad. Silkroad is big because its creation was innovative it was a new solution to a demand, their is a huge market left untapped though and its going to take a new solution to get them onto the deepweb. You will find their is a strong correlation to success and innovation IE a homeless person making a crack pipe from tinfoil is a low level of innovation and is uncreative and required basic primate knowledge to find the solution to his problem when compared to a superbowl add which is the biggest you can really go you see high levels of innovation, these are the people who set trends and work for recognizable brands, they pay about 1 million for 10 seconds of TV time for the super bowl and honestly I think I walk away from them dumber than before I watched them but it works. Silkroad is no longer unique and could easily become a thing of the past look at what happened to myspace. You also completely contradict yourself saying innovation is not needed then saying a website is not successful because of its lack of innovation, its literally the exact same layout as silkroad. You have agreed with me but just said it backwards. it failed because it was not innovative vs it was not innovated so it failed. They both have the same meaning bud.
I personally don't think the armory should be re-opened for reasons that have to do with selling a gun without looking someone in the eyes, but putting that aside; any illegal firearms would be extremely expensive, it would take time for vendors to setup accounts, and any issues with scams would immediately turn off new buyers. The gun-control scare did alarm quite a few Americans, but we're talking about normal Americans. With this economy, the majority of them would not be willing to break the law to buy something so expensive. Increasing growth isn't about innovative ideas; especially since SR has no competition. Simply keeping this website open will increase the amount of news coverage (that's not going away). With the younger generations becoming more & more tech savvy, growth is guaranteed.
If it was linked to silkroad like it should of been I could set up shop the day of since i'm already a vendor. Guns are relatively cheap they start under $500 for a reliable one ak-47s usually sell for around $400 at gun shows and are considered one of the best rifles ever produced by many even people on minimum wage could buy one heck even a coke addicts one day budget could get you a few. They can also be quite expensive which is good for business as it adds variety, theirs also is a large market for guns I personally have always kept an assault weapon in the house ever since my late teens and currently own a Military issue HK416 with a compm4 scope and a bc100mag I have spent a bit over $7000 on it which is nothing to be able to know the day some biker gang decides to break down my door I will be able to take them all out with little to no resistance, you cant put a price on the emotion freedom and security gives you. Theirs also scams on silkroad but we do not shut that down drug addicts are often compulsive liars its been proven many times the use of certain drugs causes impulsive behavior just ask any one who has sold heroin on silkroad. Your accept the risk when you decide to join the whole point of the website is to give people the freedom to choose and theirs no reason for their to be an increase in scams as long as its treated the same as silkroad. Also according to the FBI their are over 200 million privately owned firearms in the USA its known as the most gun loving nation around it also has more people in jail than any other country and I personally know many people who purchase illegitimate weapons all the time it would be perfect for the large crowd of people who are looking for specialized equipment. It failed before because it was so dissociated from the mainsite and silkroad was prioritized over it, theirs nothing inherently dishonest about selling self defense tools. Most of the people I know who sell guns or own many guns are good people who would never scam any one. Its actually the people who do not have the guns that where doing all the scamming which is a bit ironic. A simple requirement like providing a picture with your vendor name would stop most of the scams.
Also the business model you proposed is crazy if you worked in any corporate office you would be fired on the spot for saying something like that and it has yet to work once in recorded history,in knowledge economy which is considered the latest stage of development in the global economic economy things which are innovative are inherently valuable. Knowledge is not a limited resource for example right click on silkroad view the page save it in word and upload to the host of your choice good job on making your very own silkroad! Theirs absolutely nothing proprietary about it and you already said their where websites doing the same thing once again contradicting yourself. Also the becoming tech savy thing was a thing in your parents generation every one can use a computer that lives in a first world country they have been in school systems for more than 20 years. I remember 15 years ago people used IRC to sell drugs that was always small time budmail a website you can access on the clearnet sells weed and is also quite small. Everything you say is opinion based and often contradicts things you said just before. If your going to argue based on opinion you should at least do some type fact check and argue strong points. Also nothing stays in the news for long IE Clinton who received probably 1000x more news coverage than silkroad has and has not been mentioned in ages I could go on and on about how quickly the media dumps information when its no longer new. I think you are getting confused because the only news you choose to pay attention to is related to silkroad so you think its the only news. Did you know that one of the main forces behind a market economy is the media that did reports on silkroad these are all interlocking forces.
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You actually made one point I think might be correct under certain circumstances, Innovation has no relation to profit in a communist society as their is no profit motive or benefits of being intelligent im sure you would love it especially their easy to understand media.
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| 1BTC=$100 | 1BTC=$70 | 1BTC=$130 | 1BTC=$250 | 1BTC=$250 | 1BTC=$1000
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|USD | BTC | Com% | BTC | Com% | BTC | Com% | fee+* | BTC | Com% | fee+** | BTC | Com% | fee+** | BTC | Com% | fee+**
|50 | 0.6 | 10.06 | 0.71 | 9.95 | 0.38 | 10.28 | 3.38% | 0.2 | 10.48 | 1.91% | 0.1 | 10.59 | 2.97% | 0.05 | 10.64 | 3.50%
|100 | 1 | 9.67 | 1.43 | 9.28 | 0.77 | 9.89 | 6.61% | 0.4 | 10.27 | 3.78% | 0.2 | 10.48 | 5.93% | 0.1 | 10.59 | 7.03%
|200 | 2 | 8.80 | 2.86 | 8.16 | 1.54 | 9.18 | 12.53% | 0.8 | 9.86 | 7.39% | 0.4 | 10.27 | 11.79% | 0.2 | 10.48 | 14.11%
|300 | 3 | 8.06 | 4.29 | 7.28 | 2.31 | 8.56 | 17.59% | 1.2 | 9.49 | 10.80% | 0.6 | 10.06 | 17.54% | 0.3 | 10.37 | 21.17%
|400 | 4 | 7.44 | 5.71 | 6.59 | 3.08 | 8.01 | 21.67% | 1.6 | 9.13 | 13.98% | 0.8 | 9.86 | 23.11% | 0.4 | 10.27 | 28.16%
|500 | 5 | 6.91 | 7.14 | 6.04 | 3.85 | 7.53 | 24.71% | 2 | 8.80 | 16.89% | 1 | 9.67 | 28.45% | 0.5 | 10.16 | 35.00%
|600 | 6 | 6.46 | 8.57 | 5.61 | 4.62 | 7.10 | 26.74% | 2.4 | 8.49 | 19.52% | 1.2 | 9.49 | 33.51% | 0.6 | 10.06 | 41.63%
|700 | 7 | 6.09 | 10.00 | 5.27 | 5.38 | 6.73 | 27.83% | 2.8 | 8.20 | 21.85% | 1.4 | 9.31 | 38.25% | 0.7 | 9.96 | 48.00%
|800 | 8 | 5.77 | 11.43 | 5.00 | 6.15 | 6.40 | 28.12% | 3.2 | 7.93 | 23.87% | 1.6 | 9.13 | 42.63% | 0.8 | 9.86 | 54.06%
|900 | 9 | 5.49 | 12.86 | 4.79 | 6.92 | 6.11 | 27.73% | 3.6 | 7.68 | 25.58% | 1.8 | 8.96 | 46.62% | 0.9 | 9.77 | 59.76%
|1000 | 10 | 5.27 | 14.29 | 4.62 | 7.69 | 5.86 | 26.83% | 4 | 7.44 | 26.98% | 2 | 8.80 | 50.21% | 1 | 9.67 | 65.07%
|1500 | 15 | 4.55 | 21.43 | 4.19 | 11.54 | 4.98 | 18.88% | 6 | 6.46 | 29.83% | 3 | 8.06 | 61.95% | 1.5 | 9.22 | 85.13%
|2000 | 20 | 4.24 | 28.57 | 4.06 | 15.38 | 4.52 | 11.30% | 8 | 5.77 | 27.69% | 4 | 7.44 | 64.75% | 2 | 8.80 | 94.89%
|3000 | 30 | 4.05 | 42.86 | 4.01 | 23.08 | 4.14 | 3.44% | 12 | 4.91 | 18.43% | 6 | 6.46 | 56.04% | 3 | 8.06 | 94.63%
|4000 | 40 | 4.01 | 57.14 | 4.00 | 30.77 | 4.04 | 0.98% | 16 | 4.47 | 10.54% | 8 | 5.77 | 42.74% | 4 | 7.44 | 84.17%
|5000 | 50 | 4.00 | 71.43 | 4.00 | 38.46 | 4.01 | 0.27% | 20 | 4.24 | 5.68% | 10 | 5.27 | 31.28% | 5 | 6.91 | 72.32%
*percentage of fee increase from 70 to 130
**percentage of fee increase from 130 to n
As you can see, a fee structure based on BTC doesn't make sense and won't scale. From the time DPR said 1btc to today ($130), all vendors unknowingly suffered over a 20% fee increase for those items between $400 and $1000. This probably covers most of the items currently sold on the market for roughly a 25% increase in immediate revenue for site admin.
As far as my monetary net worth is concerned, the future value of Silk Road as an organization dwarfs its and my liquid assets. … I wouldn’t sell out for less than 10 figures, maybe 11
Suppose the average US vendor buys a product on the street, lists it on SR for $350, and make 4 sales. Then he cashes out via vendor gold for the $1000 listing for $1,253.40. He get charged ~8.5% sale fee, another ~25% cashout fee (of which 5.86% goes again to SR).
4*350=$1400
-$119 for SR fees
-$180 for Gold (high due to high exchange rate on SR)
-$73 for Gold's SR fees
So after all that work, the vendor received $1000 in cash + $28 in his SR balance. The effective tax rate is 26% of revenue (while corporate taxation is based on profit). For comparison the US Federal Government charges an income tax at 26% for the highest earning bracket.
The barrier to entry at this point for a vendor to do legitimate business here is already sufficiently high. As a self proclaimed libertarian and someone who's in for the long hall (according to Forbes interview), DPR should know better than to tax like this.
DRP, you really need to think about the long term and macroeconomic implications of your fee structure. Not only will it be forced to change in the next btc bubble, it won't allow SR to reach the 11 figure evaluation you were hoping for.
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| 1BTC=$100 | 1BTC=$70 | 1BTC=$140 | 1BTC=$250 | 1BTC=$250 | 1BTC=$1000
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|USD | BTC | Com% | BTC | Com% | BTC | Com% | fee+* | BTC | Com% | fee+** | BTC | Com% | fee+** | BTC | Com% | fee+**
|50 | 0.6 | 10.06 | 0.71 | 9.95 | 0.38 | 10.28 | 3.38% | 0.2 | 10.48 | 1.91% | 0.1 | 10.59 | 2.97% | 0.05 | 10.64 | 3.50%
|100 | 1 | 9.67 | 1.43 | 9.28 | 0.77 | 9.89 | 6.61% | 0.4 | 10.27 | 3.78% | 0.2 | 10.48 | 5.93% | 0.1 | 10.59 | 7.03%
|200 | 2 | 8.80 | 2.86 | 8.16 | 1.54 | 9.18 | 12.53% | 0.8 | 9.86 | 7.39% | 0.4 | 10.27 | 11.79% | 0.2 | 10.48 | 14.11%
|300 | 3 | 8.06 | 4.29 | 7.28 | 2.31 | 8.56 | 17.59% | 1.2 | 9.49 | 10.80% | 0.6 | 10.06 | 17.54% | 0.3 | 10.37 | 21.17%
|400 | 4 | 7.44 | 5.71 | 6.59 | 3.08 | 8.01 | 21.67% | 1.6 | 9.13 | 13.98% | 0.8 | 9.86 | 23.11% | 0.4 | 10.27 | 28.16%
|500 | 5 | 6.91 | 7.14 | 6.04 | 3.85 | 7.53 | 24.71% | 2 | 8.80 | 16.89% | 1 | 9.67 | 28.45% | 0.5 | 10.16 | 35.00%
|600 | 6 | 6.46 | 8.57 | 5.61 | 4.62 | 7.10 | 26.74% | 2.4 | 8.49 | 19.52% | 1.2 | 9.49 | 33.51% | 0.6 | 10.06 | 41.63%
|700 | 7 | 6.09 | 10.00 | 5.27 | 5.38 | 6.73 | 27.83% | 2.8 | 8.20 | 21.85% | 1.4 | 9.31 | 38.25% | 0.7 | 9.96 | 48.00%
|800 | 8 | 5.77 | 11.43 | 5.00 | 6.15 | 6.40 | 28.12% | 3.2 | 7.93 | 23.87% | 1.6 | 9.13 | 42.63% | 0.8 | 9.86 | 54.06%
|900 | 9 | 5.49 | 12.86 | 4.79 | 6.92 | 6.11 | 27.73% | 3.6 | 7.68 | 25.58% | 1.8 | 8.96 | 46.62% | 0.9 | 9.77 | 59.76%
|1000 | 10 | 5.27 | 14.29 | 4.62 | 7.69 | 5.86 | 26.83% | 4 | 7.44 | 26.98% | 2 | 8.80 | 50.21% | 1 | 9.67 | 65.07%
|1500 | 15 | 4.55 | 21.43 | 4.19 | 11.54 | 4.98 | 18.88% | 6 | 6.46 | 29.83% | 3 | 8.06 | 61.95% | 1.5 | 9.22 | 85.13%
|2000 | 20 | 4.24 | 28.57 | 4.06 | 15.38 | 4.52 | 11.30% | 8 | 5.77 | 27.69% | 4 | 7.44 | 64.75% | 2 | 8.80 | 94.89%
|3000 | 30 | 4.05 | 42.86 | 4.01 | 23.08 | 4.14 | 3.44% | 12 | 4.91 | 18.43% | 6 | 6.46 | 56.04% | 3 | 8.06 | 94.63%
|4000 | 40 | 4.01 | 57.14 | 4.00 | 30.77 | 4.04 | 0.98% | 16 | 4.47 | 10.54% | 8 | 5.77 | 42.74% | 4 | 7.44 | 84.17%
|5000 | 50 | 4.00 | 71.43 | 4.00 | 38.46 | 4.01 | 0.27% | 20 | 4.24 | 5.68% | 10 | 5.27 | 31.28% | 5 | 6.91 | 72.32%
*percentage of fee increase from 70 to 130
**percentage of fee increase from 130 to n
As you can see, a fee structure based on BTC doesn't make sense and won't scale. From the time DPR said 1btc to today ($130), all vendors unknowingly suffered over a 20% fee increase for those items between $400 and $1000.
The barrier to entry at this point for a vendor to do legitimate business here is already sufficiently high. As a self proclaimed libertarian and someone who's in for the long hall (according to Forbes interview), DPR should know better than to tax like this.
Raver! my home boy ricky said you got some bad ass methylone! hit me up.
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Not only will it be forced to change in the next btc bubble...
+1
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Lots of smoke and mirrors but this # does not lye.
AS OF TODAY I HAVE A LISTING OF $32,760 WITH SR FEES TOTAL TO $35,004. THAT IS 6.8% SR FEE .
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I'd really like DPR to directly address my above post, privately if he so needs.
You don't even know what the thing is yet. How big it can get, how far it can go. This is no time to take your chips down. A million dollars isn't cool, you know what's cool? ... A billion dollars.
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So you up the commission, change the BTC engine so you gain more Bitcoins that can be sold for a higher price than what they're actually listed as (I had no problem selling $2000+ at Mt. Gox) , what are you going to do next? You already have enough money to last your lifetime, and probably 20 others since you don't have to pay taxes. Why in the hell do you need more?
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Nice work RaverLove
+1.
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You're a fucking stupid hippy? What's cool? Who gives a fuck what's cool, what are you going to do with a billion dollars? Sit there and look at it, that's pretty much all you can do with it. Unless you want to kill yourself doing so much drugs and become a stupid beverly hills ignorant bitch until you die.
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A simple question, surely answered somewhere, but I cannot find it. Are shipping charges also subject to commission? Or just tacked onto the vendor's payout after commission is charged on the item's price? I'm assuming shipping is subject to commission, or else we would see listings for $1 items with $999 shipping, but if someone could confirm my assumption, I should feel quick gratitude, to borrow a phrase from Emily Dickinson.
Mr. Winky Doodle: Do you need a hug? Or what is your issue exactly?
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A simple question, surely answered somewhere, but I cannot find it. Are shipping charges also subject to commission? Or just tacked onto the vendor's payout after commission is charged on the item's price? I'm assuming shipping is subject to commission, or else we would see listings for $1 items with $999 shipping, but if someone could confirm my assumption, I should feel quick gratitude, to borrow a phrase from Emily Dickinson.
Mr. Winky Doodle: Do you need a hug? Or what is your issue exactly?
Shipping charges are commission free,
Don't be tempted to up the shipping to save on fees though as accounts have been banned for that in the past