Bonsai Auction/99 Cent Bonsai Shadiness - and a better alternative!

amcoffeegirl

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I like the mods on .99. I have never seen anything shady.
If I’m going to pay a fee though I would just sell on eBay.
I have got a lot of pots from the auctions.
A few trees too. I enjoy them.
 

coh

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Amen dude, I quit it not too long after the 2016 election. It became an echo chamber for everybody’s self righteous and ultimately useless opinions. Can’t make the world a better place by incessantly posting your opinion on the internet. It became all “I, me, me, mine” in the words of John Lennon. Nobody can listen or have a legitimate conversation when the platform is designed to just hold a mirror up to yourself.
It all depends on how you use it. For me, I mainly use fb to maintain contact with distant family members and old friends, plus to do stuff like bonsai auctions. I don't participate in any of the political bickering (for the most part) and will ruthlessly add people to my "blocked" list if they post too much crap. As a result, I don't see much of that. But I have benefited from fb, as I mentioned I sold several trees and got higher prices than I expected (or would have likely gotten if I was restricted to selling locally, through the club, etc).

I don't worry about the personal stuff or what facebook does with what I post. I operate under the assumption that once you connect any computer to the internet, you've basically lost any hope of privacy.
 

coh

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The resurrected Bonsai Auctions page allows more posts per week, I believe 6 of which can have a value under $20 and 6 of which can be over $20. Anyway, it is in the rules/pinned post
The nice thing about having a separate 99c group is that it makes it easier to sift through what is available. If you were to take everything from the current "auctions" and "99c auctions" and put it on one group, I feel that might be too much in one place.
 

JudyB

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I think that the new fees will drive a lot of people off those two sites. I think they'd do better with a monthly fee for use, something really low like $1 and see if that gets them the amount they are after. I wouldn't want to give someone 3% on an expensive sale, I'd just have to move my reserve up to cover it, and then the buyer winds up paying it. They also want buyers to donate.
 

Warpig

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I think that the new fees will drive a lot of people off those two sites. I think they'd do better with a monthly fee for use, something really low like $1 and see if that gets them the amount they are after. I wouldn't want to give someone 3% on an expensive sale, I'd just have to move my reserve up to cover it, and then the buyer winds up paying it. They also want buyers to donate.
Yea the big problem with a fee is it's easily just passed to the buyer since it's such a limited market.
 

BuckeyeOne

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Since when is there a fee? I've sold all kinds of stuff on .99 cent auction and i have not been charged once...am i missing something?
The only fee that I know of is the transaction fee thru Paypal. The auctions on FB don't allow payment with Friends and Family.
 

Roy Minarai

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Well, then what would you suggest in your infinite Facebook wisdom?

Seriously, I would like to know how I can participate in the Bonsai Auctions without having to post pictures of the pancakes that I ate for breakfast or having to read about the political opinions of the guy who sat three seats behind me in high school history class.
Hey ! Sorry but with no friends and a brand new profile your request was rejected. Request again and I’ll approve. Sorry about that, trying to keep spammers to a minimum. Thanks!
 

Dav4

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I think that the new fees will drive a lot of people off those two sites. I think they'd do better with a monthly fee for use, something really low like $1 and see if that gets them the amount they are after. I wouldn't want to give someone 3% on an expensive sale, I'd just have to move my reserve up to cover it, and then the buyer winds up paying it. They also want buyers to donate.
Or just sell it privately after the auction ends... ;)
 

Forrestford

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Yeah all of them.
Lol!

Potentially, but even a vacuous adult has more life experience and relative wisdom.

And 30 years ago, not many had trouble with basic conversation in person.....or the inability to maintain focus for more than 10 seconds......or a pocket full of prescription drugs that their insane mother put them on at age 3 to "calm them down"....
An entire generation is destroyed from SSRI's and social media.
That's how it looks to me.
Of course there is still hope......not every single person fits this description, but way too many do and its a shame.....oh yeah, they also have no sense of shame, which is a problem.
Shame is a good thing.....helps keep people in line in life.

I know this is all very pessimistic.....but I have found through my life to keep my hopes high and expectations low.
That way, when shit turns out half decent, its like a pleasant surprise....and when it all falls apart, that's what I expected.

Haha, whats funny is, i'm sure the generation before you said the exact same thing about your generation when you were a kid. 🤷‍♂️

The only reason i'm on facebook is for the bonsai auctions. Just looking for deals and trees that are hard to get in my neck of the woods. I'll check out that new page as well. Oh and I have a fake name, email and no friends and I didn't have a problem joining the groups.
 

just.wing.it

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Haha, whats funny is, i'm sure the generation before you said the exact same thing about your generation when you were a kid. 🤷‍♂️

The only reason i'm on facebook is for the bonsai auctions. Just looking for deals and trees that are hard to get in my neck of the woods. I'll check out that new page as well. Oh and I have a fake name, email and no friends and I didn't have a problem joining the groups.
Potentially, that could be true for some, but when my father-in-law met me, he told me that they stopped making people like me a long time ago.

I've always been an old soul, or so I've been told.....whatever the hell that means.
 

coh

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The only fee that I know of is the transaction fee thru Paypal. The auctions on FB don't allow payment with Friends and Family.
They don't allow sellers to ask for payment via f&f, but I've had a few buyers who paid that way anyway (even though I sent a request for standard goods/services payment).
 

Pitoon

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Maybe they realized they got enough members in the group that use it regularly to shop for deals that they can monetize off the usage.

You don't pay you loose the opportunity to get deals it's quite simple.
 
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