Things You Never Knew Existed, Or Even What They Are

I really love eBay. It’s great for buying things on the cheap, as long as you probably never need to return them, and don’t care if they may not actually be genuine, or may never show up. It’s like a really big craigslist, except I don’t have to leave my house, and am less likely to be mugged at knife-point. If there’s ever something you need, from childhood toys to a metric ton of pennies, you can probably find it on eBay. In fact, you can even find things on eBay that nobody will ever want, and I’m not even talking about used socks (people actually want those), I’m talking about, well, let’s have a look.
Gimme an E! E! Gimme an N! N! Gimme a break, it's some freaking envelopes.

As usual, the group shot. Three padded envelopes and one unpadded one this time. I think padded envelopes are more exciting, because it’s likely going to be something that is 3 dimensional, and let’s face it, that extra dimension makes all the difference. Don’t bother telling me that everything I get is 3 dimensional, I’m not interested in the boring flat dimension. That said, let’s get the envelope out of the way.

It's a trading card! What kind will it be? Baseball? Football? Comic? Not quite, no.

It’s actually not a photograph. Well, it actually is a photograph, it’s not like, a drawing, but I mean it isn’t just a photograph. No, no, it’s something much more amazing! Amazing in that it actually exists, not in any actually amazing way. It’s… “”The Elvis Collection” Vintage Elvis Presley Trading Card” [#170867422069]. Alright, so this exists. I’m not really surprised, in a way, because Elvis is a big deal. Let’s be honest though, how likely is it that someone is looking for just this card to complete their collection, and happens to be searching eBay in just the week when the card is listed? Like 7.3%, max. Trust me, I did the math. Price: $0.99

It's a collection of bits of a thing! This is an accurate description, trust me.

So. moving along from something that exists to something that… also exists… but is incomprehensible upon viewing, we have this! It’s a plastic… thing, with another plastic thing that slides around in it, and also 5 rubber gaskets and 3 Allen wrenches. Close your eyes and make a guess about what it is. Go on. Okay now open them. What did you think it was? You’re wrong. It’s actually a “Precise ABS Regulator for Makine the Tattoo Machine more upright and powerful” [#261057821782]. You didn’t know that, you liar. I actually have no clue what this is. I tried to look it up, I did. Is Makine a brand of tattoo machine? Is it a mistype of “making”? Why does it include 4 rubber gaskets? I’m asking these questions because I honestly want to know. Someone somewhere knows what this is, but that someone is in no way me. Price: $1.29.

Lanyards! You can put 'em round your neck and hand stuff from 'em. Woo!

Finally! Something I knew existed and believe people might want! “New Lots 3 Neck Strap Lanyard For Cell Phone Camera Id Mp3” [#170870968094]. I think they might be overselling it a bit, it’s just a regular old lanyard, I certainly wouldn’t use it for my Cell Phone Camera Id Mp3. Although thinking about it, isn’t that just any cell phone these days? It’s the future, people! Price: $0.99.

A necklace! This also goes around your neck, but you can't hang as much off of it. Just keys and stuff.

Last, but probably not least, we have a lovely necklace. Sorry, it’s actually a “Charming White Pearl Pendant Necklace” [#271002495482], my mistake. It even says so on the package. Twice! For once though the package claims a value of $1, so the best I can hope for is that when the economy collapses and money is worthless, I can trade this with someone to get the last Elvis trading card I need. Here’s hoping! Price: $0.90.

It’s safe to leave now if you find non-package talk boring, so I’m heading off.

Alright, I’m back. I guess since you’re still here, I’ll keep going. The bot bought a digital photograph! Again! I guess filtering out “digital picture”, “digital image”, and “digital art” weren’t enough, my mistake. I’ve added “digital photo” to the list now and all should be well. I refunded the bot, so technically it never got bought, and technically I never got the email either, so it all works out. That said, I can still terrify you with the image from the auction, here goes:

Oh god, kill it, it's got to die!

That is quite the thing indeed. “Cute pet animal digital photo picture computer desktop”, 11 cents out of pocket, but at least it isn’t a cat. The bot also bought “How To Guide on Reusing, Reuse the Keurig Coffee K-Cup and Save 80% cup !”. I’ve added “how to” to the rejected list. Spoilers, if you’re interested: open k-cup, toss old stuff, put in new stuff, close k-cup. Worth $0.99? You decide. The answer is no if you’re still deciding.

I posted again on reddit, and got a few requests for the code. I’d be happy to oblige, except for the fact that the code is a madhouse of bad ideas and worse implementation. I’ll try to get some time to clean it up, but I’ve also made changes to esniper frontend that make it less secure in order to automate some of the bidding bits. I should probably look at hardening that up, or possibly discarding it in full and just running esniper directly now that I’ve gotten used to the log formats, etc. It’s a bit of work that I’m not sure I have time for right now, although I’d be more than happy to answer questions anyone has about doing this themselves. Leave a comment or use the contact page and I’ll get back to you eventually!

5 Responses to Things You Never Knew Existed, Or Even What They Are

  1. Vashish says:

    I thought you were going to stop posting envelope pictures?

    • WolfLord says:

      I stopped posting individual envelope pictures, although I still do a group shot. It’s sort of a holdover from the fact that the comic which inspired this whole affair was titled “Packages”. Without that it’s really just “Contents”. I can rethink it though if it’s really that awful!

      • Vashish says:

        I look at it and it looks the same as every other post here and I think “why is he posting the same thing again?”

  2. notexactly says:

    For the tattoo machine thing: /r/whatisthisthing

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