Silk Road forums
Discussion => Silk Road discussion => Topic started by: Dread Pirate Roberts on June 26, 2011, 05:37 pm
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Hey gang,
As some of you noticed, we shut down new seller accounts briefly, but have now opened them up again. This time, we are limiting the supply of new seller accounts and auctioning them off to the highest bidders. Our hope is that by doing this, only the most professional and committed sellers will have access to seller accounts. For the time being, we will be releasing one new seller account every 48 hours, though this is subject to change. If you want to become a seller on Silk Road, click "become a seller" at the bottom of the homepage, read the seller contract and the Seller's Guide, click "I agree" at the bottom, and then you'll be taken to the bidding page. Here, you should enter the maximum bid you are willing to make for your account upgrade. The system will automatically outbid the next highest bidder up to this amount. If anything is unclear, just drop us a line. Good luck!
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Should be interesting!
:D
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I am so appreciative that you keep trying to find ways to make this safer, and to keep the scammers off here. Buyers are in the most vulnerable position, as we have to send out an address, no way around it...until nanotechnology is improved to where we can buy the dope code the same as bitcoins, we need protection. A good reputable seller will be alright with this...the scammers will get weeded out...
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I think this is a good step towards adding some disincentive towards scammers trying to advertise through SR. I think maybe we should go a step further and add some rules about sellers stating that they only accept payments outside the escrow system.
Question: will any of the bid amounts be released to the 'SR public'? Just out of curiosity.
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It would be nice if vendors with good feedback could refer other vendors into accounts.
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Awesome, this is something i mentioned on the old forum after the first outage and all new accounts were disabled... by limiting the new user seller accounts it will make everything alot safer! Bravo!
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Do old sellers get to keep their seller accounts then?
Or do we have to re-apply and bid?
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Do old sellers get to keep their seller accounts then?
Or do we have to re-apply and bid?
I certainly hope youall do...that's the way I understood it...
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It doesn't have much weight but being able to refer some vendors would be good. I've run into a few who are trying to do the right thing by buyers but are stymied by the lack of seller accounts.
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I would suggest seeing the demand of new seller accounts. If there is high demand for new seller accounts it may be good to allow more per period. This is after all a free market which probably would be bad to limit SR to those who can afford to be in the vendor club.
The problems I could see arising would be vendors who can't pay up to join, and will try to do deals outside of the system. It's not a good idea if you're a buyer, but if the vendor can provide a price point that is too good to pass up to the buyer, they could circumvent the system. Just my $.02.
I do believe it's good to limit the number of new vendors but you should definitely consider the demand for new seller accounts, and evaluate if changes need to be made.
Keep up the good work SR.
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This is a good step. L.E.'s main mechanism for getting involved will be on the seller side, since the buyer side is the weakest in terms of information. Also it will discourage scammers from getting into the game (although I'm sure it's already pretty hard to scam inside of the escrow structure - any transaction outside of escrow has nothing to do with SR and the responsibility lies solely on the participants).
It would also be interesting to see what the bidding is up to. If a seller is serious, he's not going to mind throwing down a few bitcoins to get into the game and you are more likely to get sellers who have good sources (or are their own source) providing services and products. This will increase the overall quality of goods on SR, which is of course to the benefit of the customers.
Bottom line - I like it!
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while it initially seems like a good system (certainly better than nothing/no new sellers), i dont really understand what this system is supposed to accomplish wrt LE, firstly what i don't get is
1.) what good would LE have to create fake buyer accounts? e.g. they'd be going after buyers, which seems like it would be more work than its worth (so you busted some kid for getting a personal supply). is this really the approach we think LE will take ? wouldn't it be more profitable to try to a.) take out the sellers firstly or if not, take the site offline
2.) what's to stop LE from bidding high enough to create seller accounts?
or am i misunderstanding the approach with respect to LE (or is this purely to make sure sellers trying to do business on SR are just legit and not scammers)
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The way I see it, You arent able to provide the best product if you don't even have the money to pay for an account.
Not having money leads to poor products, poor packaging, and less care. Someone who pays for an account has an added devotion to their sales. People who like making money wouldnt spend money unless they knew they were going to provide their everything to make more. Maybe they are trying to clean up from the people trying to nickel and dime in a field that should have only the most dedicated selling. Let's be honest with ourselves, would you rather buy from someone who is going out to buy from their person once an order is made, or from someone who is full on dedicated and ready to sell to you in hand.
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To be honest I will not spend my bitcoins on an auction just to become a seller here so I can be scammed further by having sent my product to fake addresses provided by fake buyers. Or buyers who claim they newer got my package and with the help of the escrow system get their money back while I lost my product and paid for the postage or else, I get a negative rep.
Sellers are the one who needs protection, not the buyers who are protected by the escrow system and the rep system, both favors the buyers not the sellers.
Sellers will try to find other ways outside SR if a pre-payment is needed.
IMO it'd be better to charge every transaction with a minimal amount of bitcoin this would take back on bogus buys.
Unused seller accounts that never listed anything could be deleted, these are already being sold here and elsewhere.
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@JackDan
The unfortunate truth of the matter is that the "brick and mortar" risk (artificial consequences imposed by moral legalists) lies entirely on the buyer. Unless you are flashing a driver's license when sending off your product, there is nothing to tie a seller to the outgoing package (other than city of origin, in which case you could make a bi-weekly trip to the nearest larger urban post office). The buyer assumes all of this risk, the risk to the seller is purely a financial one.
This is the reason prices are a bit higher than on the street. The seller needs to cover shipping costs, packaging costs, and the off-chance that there are a few scam buyers on SR. That being said, I have 8 transactions so far and no one has tried to scam me yet (although 7 are still in transit thanks to the CP strike).
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I too hope that a referral system will be added as a way to gain a seller account, because this auction system would be disappointing in itself. It does seem to minimize the presence of scammers, especially if seller accounts are lost by people who receive too high a proportion of complains, but IMO enhances the presence of LE by relying completely on financial resources and not on a network of trust. If the only sellers wanted here are the biggest then I may as well sign out now. I don't plan to make my living by selling drugs, I just came here to sell a few obscure items I couldn't safely offer otherwise, pick up a few items I haven't been offered before and to see what might become of this novel new concept. Besides, my spending money has been invested in RCs, not bitcoins, so I would have to sell to buy a seller account. Maybe there needs to be another trading site for ordinary people like me. And I do see this as a trading site, since bitcoins seem to be primarily FOR drugs, at least at this point.
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@JackDan
The buyer assumes all of this risk, the risk to the seller is purely a financial one.
How can you belittle this risk? If there is no security for sellers then who would sell? I have a lot of money still in escrow and it really worries me watching as the days tick down to zero. I guess that's the price of being on the cutting edge. ;)
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This is bullshit, so some of us already with accounts who were going to turn into sellers now have to buy a seller account? All this will mean is every big seller will be law enforcment because they can afford to buy all the accounts. Seriously wtf silk road, you are basically setting up every single buyer to be caught in one massive web. I reckon this is just about silk road making more money.
And what about sellers being scammed? Happens an awful lot more than you realize. If this is what silk road is doing now i may as well set up my own server you get me? For the price of an account i could buy some old hardware to make a web server.
Jesus Christ this is shit.
And yeah i know i don't got to sell here and all that stuff, just sayin it's a bad idea yeah.
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1 scammer can make 20 buyers account and make bogus buys, although if the price is deducted from his account when placing an order sounds much better, because every account will have to have some Bitcoins that will be on hold during the whole transaction.
I overlooked this one before, but still don't know if this is how it works on SR or not.
So the seller can loose his product and postage cost every single time a transaction occurs (I doubt that a seller will take the buyers reputation points into account, because there are a lot of one time buyers and "one nick name for one buy" buyers). Or he loose his reputation.
The buyer can loose an address if something goes wrong (fake seller, LE). So what can the seller do with an address that might be:
- completely fake (in case the scammer's goal was to make the seller lose his product and postage cost)
- a safe address (unlinked to the buyer)
- the buyers home
If there was just a small amount for personal use, the fake seller or LE might have opened a telephone book to point out a random address with much less effort than faking sells on SR, he has about the same chance to find something illegal in that random house he pointed at in the phone book, as in that address he got from the buyer.
For bigger amounts nobody should use his own address IMO, but that is obvious.
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Oh and guys i don't think you considered something, if you have to buy an account you're no longer anonymous. When you purchase bitcoins you usually do it with a card, bank account etc. These coins can be tracked to see what you buy with them, if it's a silk road account then you're screwed. This is why bitcoin washing services exist, to disguise the connection between the individual coins and what they are used for.
So buy your bitcoins in cash, with disposable credit cards or something else.
This is a mistake silk road, and yeah i'm pissed cause i wanted to sell and i have this kind of moral issue with buying an account to sell illegal shit. You guys could of at least given all existing accounts the option of upgrading to sellers for free.
Oh and what if people buy accounts in large quantities and resell them? The same person winning every 48 hours, i'm guessing silk road won't give a fuck, they make money anyway lol
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I say sellers provide a picture of whatever they are selling with a note in view showing user name and date of listing.
or
in auction be able to set a max bid until an auction is won.
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I say sellers provide a picture of whatever they are selling with a note in view showing user name and date of listing.
This is better idea than the auction, i mean people with money will just buy every auction and resell the accounts. Kind of fucks the whole purpose of it, and established sellers might buy multiple accounts to eliminate competition.
Photos can be faked but at laest it's a better idea than the auctions.
MAYBE.........a better idea would be any new seller has to send a sample to silk road admins and/or approved testers.
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IMO it'd be better to charge every transaction with a minimal amount of bitcoin this would take back on bogus buys.
There's already a 5% charge.
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I say sellers provide a picture of whatever they are selling with a note in view showing user name and date of listing.
This is better idea than the auction, i mean people with money will just buy every auction and resell the accounts. Kind of fucks the whole purpose of it, and established sellers might buy multiple accounts to eliminate competition.
Photos can be faked but at laest it's a better idea than the auctions.
MAYBE.........a better idea would be any new seller has to send a sample to silk road admins and/or approved testers.
I can understand you are pissed but how do you propose to fight scammers? Sending drugs to the admin of the site isn't feasible. Yes you can setup your own web server, as could I and a lot of others but you are on this site due to its reputation. Personally I think the auction isn't ideal and perhaps a lottery system would be better.
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IMO it'd be better to charge every transaction with a minimal amount of bitcoin this would take back on bogus buys.
Perhaps escrow decisions should never be 100% in favor of one party. So if there is an issue the buyers know they will always be out of pocket.
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Hello, >:(
So i must say this auction was really SHIT. I wanted to join but they don't even say when it ends.That is very unprofessional !!
It always said 1 hour and was not counting down the minutes and suddenly phfft... finished and it doesnt even show the highest bid.
SilkRoad...... bad job you are did there......wasting my nighttime waiting for a good point to bid.
When you go on acting these ways i guess you loose your good reputation.
For the next auction you really should tell us when it ends.
Still really pissed for my wasted time
GreenhamsterXXL >:( >:( >:(
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Even if one party decides to buy up all of the seller accounts and resell them, big deal! in the end, people with some money are able to pick up a seller account, it doesn't matter if it changes hands 2 times or a hundred.
The LE excuse is just a weasly one as far as I'm concerned. I'm pretty sure the bids aren't that high (it would be nice if SR could publish results - not users, mind you, just "winning bid amount" - to give the next round an idea of what to look for.) This would actually benefit SR I'm pretty sure becuase the benchmark would climb for a while and there would be more BC coming in for the site. Even if LE is picking up accounts big deal. They don't bust buyers like they do sellers, and there is no link back to the seller anyway except through SR.
As for purchasing bitcoins, it is an absolute must that you purchase them with an anonymous CC (prepaid gift card that requires no ID), or are generating them via a mining program. There are coin shuffling services out there too that let you mix in with a ton of other transactions so it's virtually impossible to link the origin of the coins. I believe SR already does coin mixing within the site but a second round wouldn't hurt.
@Greenhamster - sounds like you are frustrated but it's no reason to flip out like 4chan kid. This is a new thing. SR just came out with it. As with everything else, I'm sure he's open to suggestions (he has an entire forum section devoted to that), so positive results would probably be more attainable by stating the benefits of adding a service instead of throwing a type-tantrum and vomiting all over this forum.
I think having an escrow fee on the buyer side makes sense Even 15% or something just to tamp constant scamming. A buyer rating system is ideal as well from a seller perspective, so that scammers can be flagged asap and the community can know about it - other than that if you are a seller and you have issues with a customer, post his username and your story in the Rumor Mill section of the forum - sellers check there all the time.
As to the risks - a seller can be out his product, sure (I'm not mitigating the financial liability at all). I'm just saying that so far my experience has been solid so I dont' have to jack my prices up to accomodate a 50% rip-off rate. There is also arbitration whereby SR will mediate a dispute. If you are a reputable seller chances are you are going to at least have your side of the story honestly considered. This whole thing is a work and progress and it seems to be off the ground solidly. There will be many kinks along the way and that's not counting personal security issues, just keep feeding in suggestions and hopefully the good ones will be adopted over time and we can have an even better, more secure and mutually-beneficial community than we do now.
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@Greenhamster: If anyone is being unprofessional, it is you. There's nothing wrong with disagreeing with the policy and suggesting an alternative, but whining and complaining isn't productive, and furthermore I would imagine it gives potential buyers a good preview of how you handle issues (not very well from this example, IMO).
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Good sellers and good buyers do fine...but as the man said: buyers take the huge legal risk, sending out addies...nothing else compares...escrow protects both sides...I haven't heard of bunch of fake buyers going to all this trouble, just to get a few btc refunded. The serious problem is fake sellers who take the btc and run...all you have to do is trot over to Black Market and see...this place works just fine and the owners are doing a good job, and the reason for the bidding is to prevent the bullshit sellers from hopping on here to make a free buck...again: the sellers hold the buyers address...there just aren't now, nor are there going to be, a bunch of people going to all this trouble, just to lie about not receiving product.
I didn't receive product, and even so, I'm hesitant to post negative feedback...this isn't ebay...we operate on the fringes of internet society, such as it is...and we presume a bit of goodwill, or we wouldn't be here...worrying about packs of bad buyers taking advantage of sellers..use gpg, pm each other, the auction is a great idea, that and the reputation/feedback...it's working...people are worried this will get like ebay with bad reps being posted..this isn't ebay, and there are some serious reasons buyers act right on here...
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::) Well, well well....., yes, calmed down a bit. Its just... first i already prepared for a while setting up my products on SR,...then second suddenly the day i wanted to change to sellers account.. its not available anymore... and there were no replies from SR to any of my questions about that,... then third,.. there was no reply to my question when the auction will end,.. so fourth i stayed up in the middle of the night to place a good bit just to see that the auction suddenly was finished although there was still the one hour sign.
Well well i think that is something you can get pissed about. :-\
About the auction itself i think its ok, but too i see the risk of just people with big funds and big business buying all these accounts and
the small trader will not be able to get one anymore at a resonable rate. But we'll se how it goes the next weeks.
I definately would suggest for the auction to show the minutes in the last hour.
GreenhamsterXXL over and out
;)
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Here's to the the winner of the first auction, and our newest seller, "Mitanox"! May the acid be trippy! Congratulations Mitanox! http://ianxz6zefk72ulzz.onion/index.php/silkroad/user/19745
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in my opinion, seller accounts should be bought for an expensive amount (over a grand) ,and once they have proven themselves,they should be re-imbursed.that is the best way forward(IN MY OPINION)....well maybe not a grand,but 500 bucks at least..or maybe seller accounts should just be bought without re-imbursement....500 dollars a pop for a seller account....which is peanuts for a drug dealer but alot for a scammer....make this place a bit more upper class.lol
buyers should only be allowed escrow on there 2nd go with a verified supplier...but escrow compulsory for all new sellers from the 1st go...that will protect old time sellers/verified sellers from people that just want to get goods without paying...
so basically;
verified sellers-buyers entitled to escrow on second purchase onwards
new sellers-buyers entitled to escrow on first purchase onwards
so new sellers will be most at risk of getting scammed but that will soon subside once they have good feedback and get some rep behind them and move onto the verified seller status
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It doesn't have much weight but being able to refer some vendors would be good. I've run into a few who are trying to do the right thing by buyers but are stymied by the lack of seller accounts.
+1
I was "referred" to SR before the publicity by another seller. I think that has always proved to be the best solution where trust is required.
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How much did the first auction go for?
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@Greenhamster: If anyone is being unprofessional, it is you. There's nothing wrong with disagreeing with the policy and suggesting an alternative, but whining and complaining isn't productive
This.
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This will do nothing to stop scammers . It will create a false sense of security while penalizing legitimate sellers . Besides, who wants to pay $85 for a sellers account ? I think I see alterior motives at work here .
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@TheFrostyMountains: "I think I see alterior motives at work here . " do you care to elaborate ?
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Yeah, King, I mean to say that SR is trying to cash in on sellers accounts . It has nothing to do with keeping scammers out .
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How much did the highest bidder pay? Anyone?
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Im currently the highest bidder for the account. I agree that this isnt an ideal situation for new sellers, but if you are a genuine seller, this isnt alot of money to pay.
yet to see a plausible alternative
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I'm already a seller on another account, but I just want to chime in and say I could not disagree with this new policy more. This is a TERRIBLE, TERRIBLE idea.
1. It's not going to keep out law enforcement posing as sellers.
2. It's not going to keep out scammers. It might deter a few small-time scammers, but that's it.
3. This is going to cause the extinction of small-time sellers and niche products on Silk Road.
This is a BIG DEAL. Somebody above suggested $1000 to buy a seller account. Are you out of your mind? Not ever seller on here makes that kind of money. US-available LSD, for example, is already an endangered species and the people selling it clearly aren't making a fortune on it. Well, you can forget about small quantities of LSD becoming more and more available on here if this policy stands, because new small quantity LSD-sellers are NOT going to be able to sell her.
And what about the guy who has a small quantity of small hard-to-find drug and wants to sell it on here? Guess what? That's not going to happen now either.
I thought we trying to start a revolution here, people. Free market drug capitalism.
This isn't capitalism, it's elitism, and it's going to seriously retard the growth of our community here.
Please don't do this shit, Silk Road. Just let the seller accounts be free again.
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Hey Folks, ;)
Here's the link to our new profile.
http://ianxz6zefk72ulzz.onion/index.php/silkroad/user/20851
If you have any questions PM us a message.
We are going to sell Weed , Clones and Seeds.
Our encryption key will be published soon.
Greetings
ExpertGrowNL
PS: The auction system seems to have bugs and i would like to discuss this here in public when i can't get an explanation from SR
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This is a BIG DEAL. Somebody above suggested $1000 to buy a seller account. Are you out of your mind? Not ever seller on here makes that kind of money.
okay a grand is a bit much,but selling accounts for 500 bucks a pop will see the end of scamming...because a scammer will have to make that money back before he can profit from his scamming.would you not like that?500 bucks is not alot of money pal,not when youre slinging dope.. and as for a person coming along with a tiny bit of a special something he wants to flog on a one time basis,fek off with that,has he not god buddies to give that shit to?or maybe save it for a rainy day?far more people will buy drugs off here if they know the person has paid a premium to be here....
or the 500$ could just be a deposit,which will be returned to the seller when he packs in his business or when he has proven himself.this sounds a better idea actually.
as for sellers protection, just using common sense by sending out small orders to new customers and building it up as time goes by.
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3. This is going to cause the extinction of small-time sellers and niche products on Silk Road.
thank fucking god,extortionate wankers
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::) Sellers can't scam here unless people go outside the escrow system. If buyers do that and get scammed, it's their own damn fault.
Silk Road, please re-think this policy.
This is going to prevent any small-time buyers from coming here and listing at Silk Road. And unlike what redrocket insists, there is absolutely no reason small-time sellers would be more expensive than big-time sellers. Many small-time sellers are just looking to get enough Bitcoin to buy some product for personal use that they can't get locally.
In point of fact, this will give the big time sellers a monopoly here and they'll be able to raise their prices because no small time buyers will be able to get seller accounts and compete.
This is a MISTAKE and counter to what you have stated this site started for.
And any of you guys hoping for a new US LSD vendor that sells 4 or 5 hit quantities, you can forget that if this policy stays in place. You can forget about a lot of products that we all hoped were coming if this stays.
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im sticking what i wrote in this thread as this is the main thread about seller accounts.my point overrides all comments on here and i would like admin to continue auctioning off accounts because of my following theory.if anyone still objects after reading this quote,then speak now or forever hold your peace.lol...
""""this is far beyond your brain can comprehend pal. look at it from this view: hundreds of sellers selling goods=fucking chaos. keep the numbers regulated and its far easier to deal with.easier to suss out the best guys,easier to suss out the dodgy guys...i think its an okay system....better than just allowing anyone to sell....this place would be FLOODED with pathetic threads if it was reverted.so if you look at it as a contribution to law and order, this should not be a problem..80 bucks???pffttt...get the fuck out your own thread
and plus,how can you complain as a seller??thats less competition and more money for you"""""""
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^ Seconded.
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Personally I payed 4.8 btc for my seller account in auction. I didnt think it was much. The maximum I would have payed would have been 500 euro. With the recent surge of new members there are alot of potential buyers suddenly added to my circle. After 3 days I already have 59 btc in my account (not all profit and still in escrow but still).
I think that if you have small quantities to sell youre better of selling it to your irl friends. If you have alot of dope laying around you might as well invest a bit since youve done that to get that much dope anyways.
-Mitanox
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I prefer the chaos. "Seller accounts" sounds a bit too corporate to me.
Tor and Bitcoin and Silk Road is the wild west.
The world will quickly learn how to separate the wheat from the chaff.
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redrocket, by your own admission, you're a noob here. If everyone, including Silk Road, had had your kind of attitude about making this place oh-so-exclusive and keeping out the "riffraff," you never would've even found this place post-Gawker. I love that now that you found this place thanks to the growth and publicity that you're so vehement about closing it up as your private clubhouse or something.
And seriously? If you can't post without childishly insulting someone...
I repeat again that this new auction policy is a MISTAKE.
There are many, many quality small-scale sellers here, myself included, who sell products that can't be had in large quantities. Some hard-to-find products will NEVER be available in large quantities by any seller. This auction stuff is going to prevent those products from ever coming to market.
Let the market and the goddamn rating system sort out the good sellers from the bad. The escrow system already completely eliminates seller scamming, so the argument that this place is going to turn into Topix is complete bullshit and nothing more than a scare tactic.
This isn't going to lead to more quality for the buyers or better prices. It's going to lead to product droughts and sellers having monopolies over certain products.
This is a MISTAKE.
If you care about getting about getting US LSD vendors, you need to speak out against this auction stuff!
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And just to clarify, even simply SELLING the seller accounts would be better than this auction system (although I don't support that either for the same reasons). But at least with that the seller accounts would be available and (hopefully) reasonably priced for new sellers to be able to jump in without having to pay a premium auction price or having to wait around and hope they land an account.
This auction thing just shuts the door in their faces.
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I greatly disagree with this. If it was like this when I got here, I would have never got a start as a seller here. It should be an open marketplace, let the consumers sort out the good/bad sellers naturally by their service and product.
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with utmost respect to g4bb3r, I think things have changed. A small number of idiots can ruin it for the rest of us.
Small time and casual sellers are awesome. The problem is that it is hard to tell legitimate small timers from flakes and scammers. Maybe in the future Silk Road could have a per item price to allow for this. The point is that Silk Road has issues with big promises and less than stellar follow though. I do not want to see a few big sellers muscle out legitimate small timers. Even worse though is unreliable or untested people ruining the taste of Silk Road for new and potential buyers. Putting up $100 bucks to say "I believe in myself" is really not a lot to ask. Make it a refundable deposit based on good feedback if you want (thought the shill feedback system would have to be looked at).
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I just don't understand some of you guys at all.
The government says it knows best and that its people should be limited and restricted from buying and selling drugs.
So, Silk Road creates this place where we can all buy and sell drugs.
And what's the first thing some of you guys want (just as soon as YOU get access to this place, of course): You come up with "reasons" why we need to limit and restrict who can buy and sell drugs here.
Nobody sees the irony and hypocrisy there? It'd be comical if it wasn't so goddamn sad.
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>A small number of idiots can ruin it for the rest of us. The problem is that it is hard to tell legitimate small timers from flakes and scammers.
King Bud, like I said in the other thread, how can the "flakes and scammers" ruin this for us?
A seller cannot scam a buyer here as long as the buyer stays within the escrow system and tests their product before finalizing their order. And then they'll negative feedback warning everyone else away on top of that.
We've already got everything we need here to let the market sort itself. There may be a point where the amount of sellers here becomes unmanageable, but we're not even close to that yet. We need MORE sellers, not less.
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Hi Everyone.
I'm new here, obviously... I just heard about SR today, and sought it out. How marvelous. I feel like this is Diagon Alley in Harry Potter... OK, I'm actually older than 30, so don't go thinking I'm some knucklehead teen. Anyway, I wanted to comment about this new auction to upgrade to a seller account.
As I see it, there are several issues that are trying to be dealt with here.
1) trying to keep the quality of goods for sale high, as opposed to having many sellers who are pushing junk or worthless items, so as to attract more buyers because the quality of the market here is high.
2) preventing a rapid surge of sellers who flood the market, creating 'chaos' for buyers, increasing competition for sellers, driving down profit margins, which could discourage other sellers from competing, and making it more difficult for buyers to ascertain who are 'good' sellers since many of them may have little or no feedback.
3) encouraging sellers who would sell on SR for a while, as opposed to the one-off seller who is here today, gone tomorrow, and contributes little to the community.
I do not think that this should have any bearing on trying to weed-out bogus sellers who are looking to con someone, from the legitimate sellers honestly looking to do business, because the buyers are already protected by the escrow system. It would not be in the seller's best interest to try to pull a fast one regardless of whether they have paid to upgrade their account or whether they upgraded it for free.
First, lets deal with the first point. I think that it is important that the goods sold on SR be of a caliber that would attract people to shop here. If a high percentage of the items for sale are believed to be low value, questionable quality, or "junk" items, it will not be in the buyer's interest to sift through the listings to find the few unique, rare, or high quality items available. I think that having a system in place, such as paying to upgrade your account to sell, would do well to keep the quality of goods on SR high, which is in the buyer's best interests, as well as the interest of the seller's who offer these quality, or difficult to obtain items.
Second point: The fact that only one new seller is accepted every 24 hours means the community will grow slowly, and not spike with fly-by-night sellers who may not be around to help SR grow in a month or two. I think this is a good thing. But it also means that a potential seller might have to wait several days to become a seller, which makes it more difficult to become part of this system. So in addition to the 'auction' method for a seller membership every 48 hours, I think it was a good idea to also have the ability to just 'buy' a seller licensed account outright. I think that the fact that you have to purchase the account upgrade will limit the growth of sellers enough that there will not be a rapid influx of short-term sellers.
Now, about the last point. I think that while SR is still in its infancy, it would be better to have committed sellers who build a good reputation here over several transactions, rather than many sellers with few transactions who perhaps have a brief history here before they disappear. To encourage that, I see how having a monetary contribution would mean that a seller would have to conduct several transactions to make back their investment, encouraging long-term relationships.
But I think we'd all agree it would be nice to see SR have MORE goods, not less, with MORE variety and diversity, be it from sellers in different locations around the globe, or in type of goods, or in quality of goods, or whatever. In order for that to happen, there needs to be MORE sellers. And I think that strictly speaking, the fact that one has to pay-to-play, so to speak, will turn away a certain number of possible sellers just for the fact that you are starting off at a loss before you even get going.
So let me introduce a twist to the idea, and tell me what you think... the money you spend to upgrade your account is refunded. It could be a nominal refund, on a per-transaction basis. For every satisfactory transaction, 1 BTC or 0.5 BTC (whatever) is refunded. It could be that 100% of the original investment is refunded, or it could be that only part of the total investment will be refunded. That I'll leave up to the accountants of SR to decide how much profit margin they wish to keep. :o)
The point is, it wouldn't seem so negative to pitch in 10 BTC to become a seller, if you thought that you would have some of that cost returned to you after each successful transaction (regardless of your profit margin). This would a) set up a good seller habits for new sellers, who are seeking satisfactory feedback on transactions to earn back their investment, and b) encourage longer term sellers if they realized that they would need to sell at least X amount of items to recoup their original investment cost. This would discourage people from signing up for seller accounts if they only wish to sell one or two items. This would also increase the average feedback of any given seller, since they would seek to stick around selling at least for enough transactions to recoup as much of their original investment as they could. And of course, that is better for buyers, because then a buyer would have more information to use to choose reputable sellers.
Something to think about.
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In regards to what you said Whistler, I don't see a problem with people being able to pay (whether outright or at auction) to have some kind of Seller Plus account or something that gives them a little star next to their name (or whatever) and a little extra credibility.
But regular seller accounts should be free. Anything else is going to cause lots of problems.
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I too prefer the chaos, all the chaos and anarchy at the beginning of silk roads is what made me become more interested in it. with all these new "rules" this place is no more a good example of agorism than any legal marketplace or corporation, only difference is you can acquire "black market" goods here which people seem to think makes this place "innovative" and "cutting edge". at first i thought this was an honest attempt at online agorism, something like an unregulated flea market, and that anything was going to be allowed to be sold here tax free whether its against someone's morals here or not, and naturally drugs just became the major product in the marketplace. and by the way it was easy being able to sort all the scammers from the real deal just by reading some of their profile and talking to them. but sadly now this has just become a regular, regulated, marketplace just like that that can be found in the rest of mainstream society, only you can buy recreational drugs here, of which they seem to be becoming the mainstream now anyway. i'm sure by the time our generation is running most of the planet drugs will of become legal by then and silk roads will be the new ebay. just my 2 cents here :)
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I too prefer the chaos, all the chaos and anarchy at the beginning of silk roads is what made me become more interested in it. with all these new "rules" this place is no more a good example of agorism than any legal marketplace or corporation, only difference is you can acquire "black market" goods here which people seem to think makes this place "innovative" and "cutting edge". at first i thought this was an honest attempt at online agorism, something like an unregulated flea market, and that anything was going to be allowed to be sold here tax free whether its against someone's morals here or not, and naturally drugs just became the major product in the marketplace. and by the way it was easy being able to sort all the scammers from the real deal just by reading some of their profile and talking to them. but sadly now this has just become a regular, regulated, marketplace just like that that can be found in the rest of mainstream society, only you can buy recreational drugs here, of which they seem to be becoming the mainstream now anyway. i'm sure by the time our generation is running most of the planet drugs will of become legal by then and silk roads will be the new ebay. just my 2 cents here :)
Surely you can understand that Silk Road's attempting to protect the buyer and seller while still trying to keep this place up and running.
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>Surely you can understand that Silk Road's attempting to protect the buyer and seller while still trying to keep this place up and running.
But it's NOT going to accomplish that. The escrow system already fully protects buyers.
AT BEST, this might discourage a few lackluster sellers, but it will also, at the same time, discourage legitimate small sellers, drive down diversity of products in the marketplace, encourage monopolies of big sellers, inflate prices, kill competition, etc.
The negative of this so far outweighs any potential positive. It's a BAD idea.
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The buyer is already protected in the current system with the escrow. The buyer will lose the opportunity to choose from a variety of sellers with this new auction system because it discourages small-time sellers (like myself) from starting out if they're forced to pay $100 or so to even start selling here. The ONLY PERSON who benefits from this new scheme is SR himself, as he'll be making probably close to $100 per day.
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I still propose;
a picture of product with a piece of paper with date and username in the shot as well
and if there has to be this 'seller account system' make it a flat fee NO MORE than $25-50, that is a DEPOSIT (1-2mth term).
-picture proof of seller product
-seller account probationary period using a deposit
I doubt the voice of the majority will be heard, money is a great motivation.
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My primary worry about this is that law enforcement have an unlimited budget to spend buying up all of the new seller accounts. Law enforcement HAVE spent TENS OF THOUSANDS of dollars buying opiates from SINGLE (insecure) vendors prior to busting them. Dropping a hundred grand on monopolozing the new seller accounts is not out of the question for them. And I worry that although this system will combat scammers, it also puts a dollar value on law enforcement being the only ones with new seller accounts. And that is a price they are probably willing to pay if it results in SR turning into a massive reverse sting honeypot with no real vendors selling on it anymore. It could turn SR into a massive intelligence asset for the feds, and intelligence assets of that high a strategic importance are easily worth some big bucks to agencies with unlimited money (that they take from you via taxes, woot! Don't you just love being forced to pay for your own oppression?)
I don't think SR is selling out, and in theory this is a good method to combat scammers, but in practice I think it is more or less equal to offering the site to the feds if the price is right.
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speaking of seller accounts ...
I have TWO SR seller accounts left for sale.
PM me with your reasonable offer.
Also included is a set of login credentials for an exact duplicate username on these forums.
The SR auction is past 7 BTCs already, and has a new "Buy-It-Now" link for 15.25 BTCs.
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I also have an account for sale. Generic username. Send me an offer... you could be selling in a couple hours!
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I don't see why everybody's arguing about LE and scammers. SR never said this new system will keep out LE. He never said it will keep out scammers. It's just a money grab on his part. So if you're trying to point out the new system won't do that, don't bother, he already knows. And if you think it would be better for it to be refundable, he disagrees for obvious reasons.
That said I think the site would be better if sellers didn't have to pay for seller accounts.
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Money grab is fine and actually perfectly in line with Agorism considering nobody is forced to sell or buy here. However, I wish he would do his money grab in a way that isn't likely to result in the feds buying every new seller account. Selling out to the state is not compatible with Agorism, and I don't think that is what SR intends to do, but I do think that will be the end result. I suggest instead that you charge a % of each sale, and allow vendors to load an account that let's them cover the cost or the buyer cover the cost, or some combination. If you want to combat scammers, you should split sellers into ranks based on when they joined and their post counts and then make the ranks scarce by not letting new people trivially obtain them, then prune the ranks of scammers. This will result in scammer to legit ratio decreasing over time in favor of legit, but does not open up the very serious potential of law enforcement to legit ratio increased toward law enforcement over time. Silk roads best strategy is certainly to let anyone sell. It still favors law enforcement and scammers who can make a shit ton of malicious accounts for everyone who is legitimate, but at least it doesn't lock out legitimate people and open the door for law enforcement if they are willing to pay the price. Also, by splitting the members into ranks based on their join date and current reviews, you could probably limit law enforcement and scammers even more so, particularly if law enforcement did not start mass registration of accounts prior to the Gawker rush. Accounts should indeed be scarce commodities, however it is imo foolish to make the qualifier financial superiority, because this will certainly tilt things towards law enforcement rather than combating them.
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Hey gang,
So it looks like charging for seller accounts is pretty controversial. Here's what happened and why we're doing this. Please read and give your input.
We received a threat from a very disturbed individual who said they would pose as a legitimate vendor, but send carcinogenic and poisonous substances instead of real products and because seller registration is open, they would just create a new account as soon as they got bad feedback. This was shocking and horrifying to us and we immediately closed new seller registration. Of course we need new sellers, though, so we figured that charging for new seller accounts would deter this kind of behavior. To be honest, we are all for open seller registration as we have been all along, but have to guard against a threat like this being carried out.
What should we do?
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What should we do?
Require 2 valid forms of ID?
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Hey gang,
So it looks like charging for seller accounts is pretty controversial. Here's what happened and why we're doing this. Please read and give your input.
We received a threat from a very disturbed individual who said they would pose as a legitimate vendor, but send carcinogenic and poisonous substances instead of real products and because seller registration is open, they would just create a new account as soon as they got bad feedback. This was shocking and horrifying to us and we immediately closed new seller registration. Of course we need new sellers, though, so we figured that charging for new seller accounts would deter this kind of behavior. To be honest, we are all for open seller registration as we have been all along, but have to guard against a threat like this being carried out.
What should we do?
If he is an serious threat, he will buy the account, and he will do it.
Contract some hackers, find him, cyberbully him, make an SR hacker army with the money you will steal from him , start stealing cash from credit companies, give free LSD and weed to all SR members, make SR a better place, recieve blessings from god.
No, im joking, silk you cant stop something like this from happening, you can make obstacles like you did. And as long the seller account has a reasonable price its ok, in fact (my opinion) it make SR safer.
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maybe a probationary seller rank could work. i dont know. i think this points out the need for test kits being sold on this site. maybe someone can get on that
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I think this will be a good thing. You can't really trust a seller based on feedback anymore as anyone can set up accounts to buy their own product and build up a rating. At least it will hopefully keep most or the small time scammers away.
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Hey gang,
So it looks like charging for seller accounts is pretty controversial. Here's what happened and why we're doing this. Please read and give your input.
We received a threat from a very disturbed individual who said they would pose as a legitimate vendor, but send carcinogenic and poisonous substances instead of real products and because seller registration is open, they would just create a new account as soon as they got bad feedback. This was shocking and horrifying to us and we immediately closed new seller registration. Of course we need new sellers, though, so we figured that charging for new seller accounts would deter this kind of behavior. To be honest, we are all for open seller registration as we have been all along, but have to guard against a threat like this being carried out.
What should we do?
It is most likely just a troll. Second most likely is that it is law enforcement PSYOP trying to get you to close registration. Third most likely it is actually a crazy person or maybe an anti-drug extremist who thinks drugs are already poison so who cares if they cut them with poison. The third threat is pretty serious, but making accounts costly wont prevent a determined extremist. Test kits are helpful but they are actually not likely to be enough to detect low dose poisons. To really combat this drugs need to be GC/MS tested at least, NMR is another option. Unfortunately most people don't have access to this sort of analytical equipment, and it isn't very safe to have a go to guy who gets products from every single vendor to verify their quality. There are testing services in the Netherlands and a few other places that do advanced analytical testing for free + take anonymous samples. Obviously the person selling product can not post the results themselves or they will just post fakes, but you could have a sub-forum for buyers who get product to post the test results if they choose to send in samples for testing themselves. Unfortunately, even the testing centers in Netherlands require you to actually ship the sample to be tested from Netherlands, and then there is the issue of 'we can't have a dude in the netherlands who gets drugs from a fuck load of people to send in for testing, or else he will end up getting busted' again.
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We received a threat from a very disturbed individual who said they would pose as a legitimate vendor, but send carcinogenic and poisonous substances instead of real products and because seller registration is open
FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCK.
Silk, I apologize for ever questioning you. I could not for the life of me understand why you instituted the auction system, but something like this never would've occurred to me in a million years.
Hopefully there can still be another way besides the auction system, but considering that information you won't hear any bitching from me if you have to leave it in place.
Fucking crazy.
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So let me introduce a twist to the idea, and tell me what you think... the money you spend to upgrade your account is refunded. It could be a nominal refund, on a per-transaction basis. For every satisfactory transaction, 1 BTC or 0.5 BTC (whatever) is refunded. It could be that 100% of the original investment is refunded, or it could be that only part of the total investment will be refunded. That I'll leave up to the accountants of SR to decide how much profit margin they wish to keep. :o)
The point is, it wouldn't seem so negative to pitch in 10 BTC to become a seller, if you thought that you would have some of that cost returned to you after each successful transaction (regardless of your profit margin). This would a) set up a good seller habits for new sellers, who are seeking satisfactory feedback on transactions to earn back their investment, and b) encourage longer term sellers if they realized that they would need to sell at least X amount of items to recoup their original investment cost. This would discourage people from signing up for seller accounts if they only wish to sell one or two items. This would also increase the average feedback of any given seller, since they would seek to stick around selling at least for enough transactions to recoup as much of their original investment as they could. And of course, that is better for buyers, because then a buyer would have more information to use to choose reputable sellers.
whistler - interesting idea. i also think it will help to attarct more serious sellers.
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So let me introduce a twist to the idea, and tell me what you think... the money you spend to upgrade your account is refunded. It could be a nominal refund, on a per-transaction basis. For every satisfactory transaction, 1 BTC or 0.5 BTC (whatever) is refunded. It could be that 100% of the original investment is refunded, or it could be that only part of the total investment will be refunded. That I'll leave up to the accountants of SR to decide how much profit margin they wish to keep. :o)
The point is, it wouldn't seem so negative to pitch in 10 BTC to become a seller, if you thought that you would have some of that cost returned to you after each successful transaction (regardless of your profit margin). This would a) set up a good seller habits for new sellers, who are seeking satisfactory feedback on transactions to earn back their investment, and b) encourage longer term sellers if they realized that they would need to sell at least X amount of items to recoup their original investment cost. This would discourage people from signing up for seller accounts if they only wish to sell one or two items. This would also increase the average feedback of any given seller, since they would seek to stick around selling at least for enough transactions to recoup as much of their original investment as they could. And of course, that is better for buyers, because then a buyer would have more information to use to choose reputable sellers.
whistler - interesting idea. i also think it will help to attarct more serious sellers.
this is a pretty good idea.
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only problem is people will have a financial reason to cheat feedback
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>>>only problem is people will have a financial reason to cheat feedback
theres already financial reason to cheat feedback, but its usually easy an quick to spot phony feedback
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I like this idea...
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Since the bromo-dragonfly mixup http://www.erowid.org/chemicals/bromo_dragonfly/bromo_dragonfly_death.shtml I hope everybody here is aware that research chemicals should be tested at doses below the active dose and slowly increased to ensure the product is OK.
Perhaps SR's first move should have been to recommend people do this for all drugs on the site. Even if the attacker is credible (which I believe he is not), surely he wouldn't proceed with his plan once people were aware what could happen.
SR, could you go back and PGP clearsign your last two messages in this thread?
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I'm dirt poor and the only thing I want to sell on here is my art. Kinda sucks that some terrorist douchefag has to go ahead and ruin that for me by employing scare tactics when if he had any real agenda to do so he'd have bought the account anyways. Not to mention why warn people in advance?
And doesn't your notifying us about this kind of scenario reinforce the repping system as a clear indicator as to whom to buy from and whom not to buy from? I applaud the transparency of your actions, SR; you had a situation arise, you dealt with it as best you saw possible and you openly explained the reasoning behind it. It doesn't matter if anyone agrees with you, just that they know why. Info always remains power and sharing it is a benevolence. Cheers, keep it up.
... please let me sell my art. else i'm hooped. :(
edit: especially since the only listing otherwise is an admitted shitty drawer. i mean, the fuck?
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$150 USD for a seller account is entirely reasonable. Auctioning seller accounts is a bad idea from everyone's standpoint. All the new seller accounts would be going to people dealing in hard drugs and higher quantities. This would completely cut out marijuana distributors. And eventually when the prices for seller accounts become low enough for marijuana sellers to enter the market, these type of sellers are going to be selling in quantity. People (such as myself) new to Silk Road don't want to buy in quantity. We just want a taste. We just want to get our feet wet. Newbies won't be comfortable dropping $110 on a quarter from some anonymous person. So from this standpoint, you are boxing out the buyers and sellers.
It should be noted that there is a severe shortage of variety in marijuana that can be gotten from US based merchants. Especially for those who just want to buy a couple of grams. For this reason you should not limit yourselves to one new merchant per day. I'm not saying you have to open the floodgates, but I'm suggesting something more measured.
I was expecting this thread to on and on with peoples grievances with the proposed auction system. But Silk Road not only did you come in and address those concerns directly, you appealed to us to find a solution. That shows strong leadership and the people here place a high amount of value in being listened to. We all have high hopes and expectations for this marketplace and when we hear things like "auction system" and "limit 1 per day" our hopes are quickly dashed. When I first read about it, I thought, "ok, the person(s) who operate this site think they've reached it's potential and want to start milking this for what it's worth." Then I read about how some crazy guy made threats. To go to the extreme of having an auction system and a limit of 1 per day made me think you were just using this nutjobs email as an excuse to milk. Time will tell.
$50 alone would be enough to deter scammers by my estimate. But for such an illegal operation, a 5% middleman cut doesn't quite do you justice. I have no problem paying $150 (If I ever decide to sell weed. No plans as of yet). This website deserves it and will improve it's integrity.
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I'm dirt poor and the only thing I want to sell on here is my art. Kinda sucks that some terrorist douchefag has to go ahead and ruin that for me by employing scare tactics when if he had any real agenda to do so he'd have bought the account anyways. Not to mention why warn people in advance?
And doesn't your notifying us about this kind of scenario reinforce the repping system as a clear indicator as to whom to buy from and whom not to buy from? I applaud the transparency of your actions, SR; you had a situation arise, you dealt with it as best you saw possible and you openly explained the reasoning behind it. It doesn't matter if anyone agrees with you, just that they know why. Info always remains power and sharing it is a benevolence. Cheers, keep it up.
... please let me sell my art. else i'm hooped. :(
edit: especially since the only listing otherwise is an admitted shitty drawer. i mean, the fuck?
Ebay ::)
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So you claim someone told you they would post poisonous substances, ok so lets deal with this stupid justification. If a person wanted to do this we have to understand why.
1. They're an anti-drug extremist
2. They're law enforcement trying to shut down open registration
3. They're just nuts
In the first instance you won't stop an extremist by charging cash, they'll make enough money to do it anyway. Secondly law enforcement wouldn't send poisons but could always buy every account anyway to track customers, third the nuts person will also find the money to carry out such a plan.
Basically your justification is a lame one, and i have no doubt it's made up.
You also still have not figured out a way to protect SELLERS! Sellers take big risks being scammed for quality product. Maybe make buyers pay for accounts huh.
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Buyer rating system, and show how many disputes a buyer has had in last 30, 90, and 180 days. This will raise a ton of red flags immediately for the little parasites trying to get our product for nothing, and will only make the good buyers that much better. Don't even have the rating system link to an item or anything, just a 1-5 with a small text blurb about how the buyer was to deal with.
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It's definitely a PSYOP. If I were you I wouldn't have even mentioned it since that is exactly what they intended. Remember that bitcoin has the potential to be seriously disruptive to the power's that be and they will do what they can to fuck with it. Couple that with the power you have over the exchange rate (you saw the gawker spike - shit, silk road is probably the only real backing bitcoin has atm) and it's really not surprising that they're trying to discourage users.
I don't think charging for accounts will help regardless of whether the threat is legitimate. Anyone who was actually determined to kill would not be dissuaded from that just because they get charged to do it. Law enforcement would also have no problem paying for an account. It will however deter genuine business from small sellers. The time it would take to start making a profit by selling my prescriptions just wouldn't be worth it imo. And I especially wouldn't want to pay knowing that such a terrible idea can't last.
Whistler's idea is a stroke of genius though. I'd have no problem paying a retainer to be used as collateral until I have a reputation that can speak for itself. As for monetizing the service you provide, just take a slice of each sale and call it a transaction fee.
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Ebay ::)
I'm already on there.
You missed my point entirely. As a Canadian with only CAD available I'm subject to outrageous exchanges from CAD to USD before being turned into LR, then changed to BTC. Even with the CAD being higher value than the USD, my 440$ CAD bought me 330$ USD, which I purchased my BTC @ 20$ at, which has since obviously dropped to 13$. Granted, the BTC drop was just something that comes with the territory, but imagine how thrilled you'd be at the prospect of your every BTC purchase being at retardedly inflated prices that took a chunk out of your every transfer. Just so that my 440$ CAD can buy me 210$USD worth of coke. No offense to anyone but the American buck can still keep going on fucking itself, not my dollar.
If you pointed out to me a Mt.Gox.ca that accepted CAD and had the right exchange rates for it, fuckin' A, I'm sold. But I may have to just take the risks with the locals' overpriced, overcut, shitty grade drugs that have no feedback as to their quality. But I'd like to believe in this site. And user/seller feedback. And Fiat currencies. And my talents. I don't believe in terrorists. My balls don't let me.
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>Basically your justification is a lame one, and i have no doubt it's made up.
For fuck's sake. He's not making it up.
I don't like the idea of seller accounts being for sale either for the numerous legit reasons I mentioned, and also for the selfish reason of I want to see more US LSD vendors and this will hurt that...
But I just don't see a better way than what Silk came up with (although I think selling them outright would be better than auctioning them).
I'm also sure that the threat is pure bullshit and wouldn't actually happen, but I'd probably feel obligated to do the exact same thing in Silk's shoes. I would not want anyone's deaths on my hands like that.
If you or anyone else has any better ideas, feel free to speak up. Silk listens to good ideas.
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Silk listens to good ideas.
How's this one: Make two seller group types and only charge for seller accounts planning on selling drugs (discouraging the practice that terrorist was threatening with) and have all other types of sellers (art, xxx, cc #'s) register freely?
Might allow for a more closely monitored group of recreational vendors.
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I was tracking down some btc today, and I saw it had dropped in value again, and I finally realized what a motherfucker that must be for sellers, and even when I dispute their reasoning, I listen. I think you should charge/auction memberships to all, buyers included. I could see charging xtra to be a seller, as that's where most of the scams seem to lie, but I don't like the idea that sellers are at the mercy of both the btc system, and an unscrupulous or naive buyer who immediately thinks the seller hasn't shipped when product doesn't arrive on time.
Charging buyers to join would eliminate the bad ones, and maybe downgrading escrow to where it's limited when sellers have a certain amount of points, or eliminating escrow when both buyer and seller are in agreement that seller is known and trustworthy. I know my sellers, and if you had a place I could click, when making transaction, to eliminate escrow, I'd click it. Leave it open and anonymous, like everything else, but this might relieve some of the strain on sellers lately...
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We need more buyers like you making suggestions in the Features forum :)
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isiredsami - yeah except there is a glaringly huge difference between the state and SR.
You are here 100% voluntarily. nobody is standing behind your computer chair with a gun at the back of your head, saying that you have to be on SR and SR forums or you're dead. SR is not your property - the owner of SR can change it however he wishes and you either stay or go, his changes will reflect his desire to keep people around doing transactions because that is the only way he makes money from SR.
The government uses these excuses to do exactly what you say, except there is no voluntary aspect to it. You either do, or you get kidnapped and locked away, or hospitalized or murdered, or your property is stolen from you. This isnt' legislation on SR this is somebody doing whatever he wants with his property, no force involved. I had a seller account before and he's not going back and retroactively charging people to use it now, it's a "from here on out" situation - which is completely fair. He could insist that every prospective seller send in a picture proving he has blue hair or eats dog food from a can if he wants.
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phubaiblues hit the nail on the head. buyer accounts should be bought for a small fee.....$50 a pop for a buyer account of something like that....maybe even the same price as a seller account....there goes multiple accounts out the window....buyers should also have a 'meter' next to there username which indicates how many successful buys they have had and how many sour ones
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Imho SR accounts should be free but require a deposit, or at least a refund from successful transactions which will prove it isn't a scam. It's far from perfect, but an improvement, just look at the posts about qPasteBin, some scum in BM revealed addresses of some of his clients.
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He didn't make seller accounts paid-only until he put up that post. I have a seller account. I was here before the change was made, selling on SR. It doesn't affect me in the least, it only affects new people trying to get into the business.
It's like signing a contract with your phone company for $20/month, and then next month they raise the price to $25 for all new customers. I still pay $20.
Here is SR's original post in this forum:
"
Hey gang,
As some of you noticed, we shut down new seller accounts briefly, but have now opened them up again. This time, we are limiting the supply of new seller accounts and auctioning them off to the highest bidders. Our hope is that by doing this, only the most professional and committed sellers will have access to seller accounts. For the time being, we will be releasing one new seller account every 48 hours, though this is subject to change. If you want to become a seller on Silk Road, click "become a seller" at the bottom of the homepage, read the seller contract and the Seller's Guide, click "I agree" at the bottom, and then you'll be taken to the bidding page. Here, you should enter the maximum bid you are willing to make for your account upgrade. The system will automatically outbid the next highest bidder up to this amount. If anything is unclear, just drop us a line. Good luck!"
I'm sorry I'm not seeing anything dishonest here. It doesn't get much more straight-forward than this. I'm not sure where you are seeing a "tragic excuse" or anything contradictary. He explains the reasoning, it is his site to do with what he will, and to boot it makes perfect logical sense.
For the record I don't believe in "fair". Fair is the word people always use when they want to steal or start imposing violence on people.
And yes this is a "from here on out". It is not retroactive to existing sellers, it is from the time this post was made onward.
Where is the misleading, lying, or manipulation in this? I'm obviously missing something.....
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Most of us here--buyers and sellers--are grateful for what SR does, and realize his position is not easy either. But the reality is, something needed to be done to prevent fake seller scammers from easily joining and wreaking havoc among the buyers. He did that. All I'm saying--as a buyer--is that there might be other ways of spreading the burden around. And perhaps a way of lessening the burden on sellers who have proved they are legit, by making it more difficult for fake *buyers* to join easily also. I hadn't realized this was a problem until lately, and it seems it's in areas other than the ones I follow. But good sellers protect us buyers in many ways: in the packaging, in the labeling, in pm-ing us when packages are late, in posting gpg public keys so we don't freak about our addresses: all kinds of ways.
I get defensive when buyers are attacked, or when sellers want private forums...but the best way to avoid those outcomes is by accepting that some of the seller complaints are legit, and supporting them in finding ways to make this a good safe place for all of us....we're in this together. It's a new venture, international, disliked by *all* governments, and hopefully a harbinger of a future where we won't need to operate in the shadows, where what we put in *our* bodies is *our* business.
So it seems one of the biggest problems facing sellers is caused by abuse of escrow system, and I don't see why there couldn't be a way where after one transaction, where both parties are in agreement it went well, where buyers couldn't have a way to bypass proxy and let seller get paid. The sellers I deal with won't rip me, so if pkg goes missing, I don't feel they burnt me. This would let legit sellers and buyers just do business, and only new sellers and buyers would be 'under the escrow gun.'
And I *want* SR to make money. Damned straight. We can have dreams and hopes and political views all day long, but this is a business venture, and needs to be profitable. SR takes risks--provides service.
On the other hand, tho, the auctioning/selling of seller accounts is a good idea, and needs to stay. Nitpicking at SR's posts to prove inconsistency of ideology isn't fair...we all jabber about all kinds of things on here. That was something needed to be done, and he did it. Well done. What we want to do now is continue improvements, and find ways to get rid of bad buyers, or at least make it more costly for them to join: that will get rid of the fly by nite scammers, and whatever fee, even retrocative so as not to be hypocrite, is fine with me. This site, so far, has survived quite a bit, and we need to help it along, when we can.
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OK sorry if I missed the post on this one, but I registered a seller account a few weeks before this new policy, and now that i want to sell I put up a test listing. it still hasn't showed up after 24 hr. Do I need to bid to become a seller even though I registered as one before this change?
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i would prefer that they lie...cause i get butthurt quite easily..
seriously,who cares,its much better this way,much more organized....i like things color coded....i dont wanna have to rummage through thousands of sellers threads....and im sure SR doesnt wanna deal with all the 'chargebacks'.....keep the numbers regulated and limited just as it is....the only people who are getting hurt are those who are up to no good,and those who dont have any friends to sling a small amount of drugs to
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Well, this is an interesting development.
I had registered as a seller solely to be able to post my public key in my profile because apparently there's no other way for a buyer to supply their public key, and not all messages are buyer->seller... And now apparently my account is worth money? Interesting. Maybe I should sell it. Not like I really need it.
But more importantly, does this mean that buyers no longer have any way to post their public keys? That's a shame and should be fixed soon.
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Well, this is an interesting development.
I had registered as a seller solely to be able to post my public key in my profile because apparently there's no other way for a buyer to supply their public key, and not all messages are buyer->seller... And now apparently my account is worth money? Interesting. Maybe I should sell it. Not like I really need it.
Isiredsami - so now you are just bitching about the rationale cited for the change, and not the actual outcome. You have no reason to be whining then, becasue it's his property and the few sentences he might have written regarding what he does with it is basically a nice gesture on SR's part, and something he sure as hell doesn't have to do if he doesn't want to.
Again, I am not seeing where he has said he was going to leave it open seller accounts - you still haven't shown me anything to that regard. You are moaning about a few sentences and basically saying you don't give a damn that seller accounts are now restriced, but only that they are restricted based on a perceived "threat". This is pointless at best, and at worst you are misdirecting your anger at the fact you missed the boat while the loading ramp was still down. Get some BC and bid on a damned seller account if you want, but otherwise take a hike because you are prattling about pointless details.
The seller side is pretty tightened up, it's the buyer side that we need to deal with - we need a transaction history section (% of transactions delivered/funds-released of total transactions). If anything, LE is going to try to get on here and gum up the seller works so they can keep prices high as hell and keep every vendor's float tied up in mailed transactions (then say not received). This would alert sellers pretty quickly if a buyer is playing this game. THIS is the kind of stuff we need to be concerned about to keep SR alive.
But more importantly, does this mean that buyers no longer have any way to post their public keys? That's a shame and should be fixed soon.
Yes this is a feature that has been recommended numerous times - currently there is a thread going where buyers can post their public key and sellers can grab it, so the community has come up with a sort of stop-gap solution.
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@isiredsami - I feel like you're confusing what he didn't say with saying something false. True, SR didn't say he wanted to make more money. i think we all know he'd like to make more money. Most people like making money. Why does he need to spell that out? But what is also true is that this policy was in response to an actual, not fictional, problem. The market was becoming flooded with bogus seller accounts, seeing if they could walk away with a few BTC before a pattern emerged of their scamming. Now that someone has to invest, they're more likely to actually be here for the long haul. That makes sense to me. Where's the fiction?
I also wouldn't mind charging a small fee for buyer accounts, since buyers are capable of scamming too. Making people invest a small amount of money into a semi-private anonymous marketplace is a stabilizing force.
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Gettin' sold bad dope on SR is the same as buying bad dope on the street. I remember a NYC brooh-hah-hah back in the 90's because dealers were selling heroin that was just a little bit too good, and a lot of folk ended up in emergency rooms.
I'm still of the opinion that buying and selling should be wide open, and folk will let the marketplace separate the scoundrels from those that want to do good.
We're on the hairy edge here, my brothers and sisters... Too many rules and regulations are not why I came here.
- Bit
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Letting the market decide is fine, but why not have a screening process too? This isn't, strictly speaking, the free market; this is a privately owned marketplace that we participate in because the people who own it allow us to. They set the rules and we choose to participate. We choose to participate based on them making the overall quality of the site satisfactory for buyers and sellers. If we don't like it, there are plenty of other places on TOR to get your drugs from.. I agree we shouldn't be overburdened by rules and regulations, but I wouldn't call a small one time fee for entrance into a privately owned marketplace overburdening.
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Sr has the rep, because they've set up an escrow system so buyers couldn't be ripped. Other sites don't do as well. And SR does seem to be aware of problems and requests, and changes if they seem wanted by all sides. I agree that large quantity sites are totally different, money is a bigger deal...but that's not the case here, and what we have works. I tried other sites, didn't like them, lost some money on one, so I came back here.
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Is there any plan in the future to revise the new seller account process? The price to become a seller is insane. If I was the kingpin, I wouldn't care so much, but my word! There has got to be a better way to let small business in. Not everyone is looking to make $500 per transaction.
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sling small and limited quantities of dope to your friends at home????you make it sound like you only got a 50 bag.......i think that would be an easier option for you.the fee is not alot mate,you will soon make that back anyways,unless you really are only wanting to shift a 50
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There is always plans for the future but right now there are two ways to get a vendors account gamble with a auction or purchase a vendors account.
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How about letting new sellers in with little fee, if any, but limiting the amount of transactions at first in number and price?
So far SR isn't a market, unless we find a way to let people sell more easily.
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It's a market - there are almost 300 sellers on here. And more coming every week. If the auctions keep rolling there will be a thousand by year-end.
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I wouldn't pay the fee but I admit I respect and agree with it in terms of profit. Sellers are here for a reason. You know the deal before going in, take it or leave it.
Since people pay it , that to me shows its a "far market value" at least to enough where it's working charging.
One solution to sellers who don't want fork over money to get started but are legit might be letting them work it off. It's alot easier to pay in product than cash for most. Why not let them work it off? Seller account is 160? The guy has to move 160 in retail volume through escrow, that will then go directly towards his sellers account.
Sellers would have to actually have REAL transactions and feedback to get on board fully. Sure, he could fake a 300 dollar sale and do it in one transaction but that it would still make him pay for it.
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@marketmaker - In a scenario where a seller has to get x dollars in sales to become "legitimate", if he were to buy the product from himself, he would not only have a "legitimate" seller account but a positive feedback score to boot, attracting some of the 28,000 or so members who are not registered on the forums, now that the waters have been tested. Same result as if he had just bought an account for the roughly $100 they are going for, but now he also has a feedback score.
Scammers generally don't like putting a whole lot out there. Legit sellers are probably going to be more likely to do a solid bid for a seller account than a scammer who is just trying to skimp some BTC from the unsuspecting user-base. I think the way it is is great - still a lot of room for competition but also keeping away fly-by-nighters. SR's quality will increase as the seller-base grows, and prices should come down a bit on the buyer side. But this way we already have a ream of established sellers carrying basically every mind-altering product available, and new sellers have to be extra legitimate to pass over that benchmark. This forces not only quality of product up, but quality of overall service by sellers on SR, including shipping, which is a biggie. If someone has to compete with the best walking right in the door, this is good for the buyer.
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The way I see it, You arent able to provide the best product if you don't even have the money to pay for an account.
Not having money leads to poor products, poor packaging, and less care. Someone who pays for an account has an added devotion to their sales. People who like making money wouldnt spend money unless they knew they were going to provide their everything to make more. Maybe they are trying to clean up from the people trying to nickel and dime in a field that should have only the most dedicated selling. Let's be honest with ourselves, would you rather buy from someone who is going out to buy from their person once an order is made, or from someone who is full on dedicated and ready to sell to you in hand.
Not necessarily. I would like to sell Greendot Cards for Bitcoins.
And I might once I get the money to cover the expense of the seller account.
I think that having to pay for the sellers account just puts money into SR's pocket and drives up prices....
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How much has a new Vendor to pay if he goes through auction? Average.
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The way I see it, You arent able to provide the best product if you don't even have the money to pay for an account.
Not having money leads to poor products, poor packaging, and less care. Someone who pays for an account has an added devotion to their sales. People who like making money wouldnt spend money unless they knew they were going to provide their everything to make more. Maybe they are trying to clean up from the people trying to nickel and dime in a field that should have only the most dedicated selling. Let's be honest with ourselves, would you rather buy from someone who is going out to buy from their person once an order is made, or from someone who is full on dedicated and ready to sell to you in hand.
Not necessarily. I would like to sell Greendot Cards for Bitcoins.
And I might once I get the money to cover the expense of the seller account.
I think that having to pay for the sellers account just puts money into SR's pocket and drives up prices....
I had thought about doing that. Except, I would have to add so much to add so much to make it worth my while, I wouldn't think that I would get a lot of orders. You have he 5 dollar fee to get one, then you have to ship it. so you would have to add 10.00 to the price just to break even. so, would people purchase a 50.00 greendot card for 70 bucks? thats the question...
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How much has a new Vendor to pay if he goes through auction? Average.
Last I checked, it was about 10 BTCs to purchase outright. And 9.5 to auction.
Or over a hundred USD either way...
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dont change the way it is,i dont fancy seeing scammers crawling in and opening up multiple accounts etc etc....people who are serious about doing business will pay for an account.
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dont change the way it is,i dont fancy seeing scammers crawling in and opening up multiple accounts etc etc....people who are serious about doing business will pay for an account.
yup, and they'll hike up the prices to get their money back. the cost of a seller account should not be that high. It should be half of what it is. At most.
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The cost of a seller account is purely market based - it's an auction, and is therefore fully driven by outside demand. The price is whatever the highest bid is.
$140 for a seller account is not bad. I will have done almost 100 transactions by mid august. That is $1.40 per transaction, in less than 2 months. That is less than the SR market fee!
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The cost of a seller account is purely market based - it's an auction, and is therefore fully driven by outside demand. The price is whatever the highest bid is.
I don't disagree with the auctions, but the cost isn't purely market based in that sense since it's also a function of the supply of seller accounts, which is "artificially" limited to one per 48 hours. If the supply were increased, the price would go down and vice versa. I think loginathome was just pointing out that sellers will pass this cost on to buyers, although I'm not sure it's not worth it.
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Also you can buy them outright for 10 BTCs last I checked...
I just feel that 5 BTCs should be enough to keep scammers out, but I'll admit to being biased.
:shrug:
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Whoa...did we just lose around 80 sellers?
I noticed a big drop in seller numbers next to my rating
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wouldn't a drop mean that we got more Sellers?
Or am I misunderstanding you?
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You're right, loginathome, but I think the real number is more like 120 gone. 288 or so, down to 167 when i looked at it.
Probably a big part of them are in "vacation mode" as they didn't have a sale in X days.
Other than that, we would need SR or another admin to explain it.
It does really illustrate how thin the market really is. We need more *good* sellers on this site. A lot more! :)
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I see this new seller account fee as being problematic not just for myself, but for the community in general. What I have seen in this thread have been cost analysis done on a most base level, to simply state that because you are nearing 100 transactions and the new seller account fee (which wasn't in place at your time) is 141 dollars, it essentially is $1.41 for each transaction! This is the cajolery I expect on late night infomercials not on open market forums. The second dubious element is the arbitrary valuation of the seller's account, sure there is an auction where we can bid a 'fair' price but this auction block is directly underneath and is firmly entwined with the 11 btc price-tag in pretty bold print. I understand that scammers are bothersome and measures need be taken to eradicate them, but it seems in this process honest the small-quantity high-quality seller or seasonal sellers are left to face the monochrome readouts after inputting 'insignificant' digits.
I understand this is primarily to keep out unsavory resellers, but couldn't it also act to serve certain avaricious resellers monopolistic hopes? If they're able to buy up new accounts as they come to market, keep competition to a minimum, couldn't they make back what those accounts cost and more by controlling every items price? I know this is taking things to an extreme, but who's to say otherwise? Well I guess you need to pay to ride this train, and with all the swaying and clattering going on, I am weary of paying to ride the luxurious Orient Express in hopes of peddling my quality nonetheless scant wares...
I would think a fee re-evaluation or a "sample transaction" means of verification would be as efficacious and cultivate a richer more diverse marketplace.
Thanks,
peaches
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I have won the 2 last Seller auctions to be a seller, but its some error, everytime the auction restarts, with my maxbid as outgoing bid.
Annoying :)
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Heya there.
Not entirely following that discussion, but though throwing in my two cents:
I am a good example for reasons versus such high fees.
I would sell a lot of stuff here if it weren't for the fees. I don't want to put in a lot of money just to be able to sell my stuff here. I do realize that silkroad should get compensated for his service, but I think it is heavily overpriced.
IMO fees of >100$ are pretty ridiculous. I won't pay them :/
Now, I feel we will experience a big shrink in seller count on SR and that we are already doing so.
A dealer has shitload of things to do and it isn't as profitable as most people think.
If SR thinks this is necessary, then fine. But don't expect much sellers then.
Greets, M
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Really people, if you don't like the cost involved, then do what you have to do elsewhere. It's as simple as that. They are offering the option of either a one time fee or bidding on an auction. It all comes down to the question, would you rather spend $0 standing on a street corner amongst crack heads, heroin junkies, and narcs, or pay ~$100 and sit in some coffee shop anonymously with your latte, biscotti, and laptop amongst book worms and corporate execs? If it's worth it, which it seems to be to a number of members, then people will happily pay. And even if there is a charge, I would still think it to be a free open market. The word free does not necessarily mean without cost.
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Did any of you guys even read what Silk Road posted?
He doesn't want to charge for seller accounts and he's not doing it to make money or try to deter scammers or non-serious sellers.
He had a nutjob threatening to send out lethal products to buyers just to create a shitstorm, and it was the only way Silk had of doing ANYTHING to deter that.
So all this argument about "Well if someone's not serious enough to pay a fee and blah blah blah" is moot. Silk said he didn't want to restrict the market that way, and it has NOTHING to do with that.
I fucking -HATE- that seller accounts cost money now, but I probably would've made the same call in Silk Road's shoes. Would you want to worry that some asshole might poison a bunch of people anonymously unless you did SOMETHING? I wouldn't.
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you guys are slinging drugs,not fucking wine gums,the fee should not be an issue...youre sacraficing 1 or two orders to sell here permanently,fuck you cheapskates.i dont want to buy from cheapskates....good luck curb crawling
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you guys are slinging drugs,not fucking wine gums,the fee should not be an issue...youre sacraficing 1 or two orders to sell here permanently,fuck you cheapskates.i dont want to buy from cheapskates....good luck curb crawling
oh don't worry. i can assure you that no seller that's had the pleasure of reading your forum posts wants to sell to you anyway. you come across as a childish asshole in need of some ritalin. you're exactly the type of user this place doesn't need more of. (thanks gawker!)
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any help would definitely be appreciated in helping me find the road... thanks in advance
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This thread is almost a year old buddy. Besides, how did you find the forums without finding the SR?
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This thread is almost a year old buddy. Besides, how did you find the forums without finding the SR?
Haha, wow, I nearly had a heart attack thanks to this zombie thread being resurrected.
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Lets lock this thread now too Lim.
:)
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This thread is almost a year old buddy. Besides, how did you find the forums without finding the SR?
Haha, wow, I nearly had a heart attack thanks to this zombie thread being resurrected.
I didn't even notice the dates and thought it must be important and read bloody 7 pages before i noticed the date said 27th July, then i was confused for like 3 minutes thinking I had lost several days or something and then i figured out the stupid thread was from last year!
F*ck that was good joint!
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This system of auctioning off seller positions sounds unfair in the extreme. It sounds like you're just trying to make more money. Although on the other hand, you might find you get more by leaving things as they are and having people pay a set price for a seller account.
And who says only the more dedicated and professional will get these positions? That's crap!
goblin
Goblin...This post is a year old..LOL
You really need to pay a little more attention to what you are reading before you post!
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Hey Lim----
Lock this year old thread please... so more people that don't read well ...yet feel they need to add there 2 cents don't do it.
:)
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i am a 3 month buyer with good stats why wont you let me in?
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i am a 3 month buyer with good stats why wont you let me in?
Dude, others like myself been here for quite some time.
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Im ur guy for the job, i have connections in almost anything so just send me a message guys thanks again.