Rainman Pricing tool? (1 Viewer)

[ssanel54]

This post is obviously directed @RainmanTrail, but it seems like others are clued in as well and Im not sure to what extent?

I have seen numerous references within different classifieds about a price tool that is being developed. I can gather that its some type of pricing database or price scraper attempting to keep an accurate record of current market prices. I have also seen several requests to preserve the "Sold Price" information within classifieds for the good of the community.

I was hoping to understand -

What is this tool?

How does it work?

Is it being designed as a public tool for the PCF community (A la the Chip design tool) or is Rainman trying to develop a personal arbitrage algorithm for chips?

 

[JFCJ]

Rainman started a thread about a week or so ago, requesting data from recent chip transactions... I believe he was use it for some data visualization project... And provide the results/tool here...

I may be totally mistaken tho..

 

[bergs]

This seems completely pointless to me. It won't take into account member to member sales that aren't made public, negotiations post-sale, unusual spiked demand because of a need for a specific individual to finish a specific set, etc. Without a public clearinghouse to determine final sales (like what they have in real estate), it will be useless at best and actually hurt buyers and sellers at worst. Actually, I can see it completely pissing off (alternatively) buyers and sellers.

Even if I was interested in creating such a tool and was disillusioned enough to make it publicly available, it would have the net effect of metatarding threads. If I were a seller of a rack and I had a buyer who wanted to pay over market price to complete a set, and he was willing to pay $200 for it but then came back and tried to haggle based on what the relatively arbitrary price tool catalog thing he should pay, I'd be pretty upset at whoever created the tool.

It's simply supply and demand, it's not the fucking Pythagorean thereom.

 

[Chicken Rob]

Lol at "metatarding"

 

[liftapint]

I agree that it could be bad. Let's say there are rare chips that have very few transactions, and the transactions that are available are from before the recent spike in prices. Buyer will only see pricing data that is irrelevant in today's market. The tool has no way for taking supply and demand into consideration.

Seeing recent sales data on readily available and frequently traded chips is one thing. But many of the chips traded here, no way a tool like this will do anything but lead to frustration for buyer and/or seller.

 

[manamongkids]

I agree that it could be bad. Let's say there are rare chips that have very few transactions, and the transactions that are available are from before the recent spike in prices. Buyer will only see pricing data that is irrelevant in today's market. The tool has no way for taking supply and demand into consideration.

Seeing recent sales data on readily available and frequently traded chips is one thing. But many of the chips traded here, no way a tool like this will do anything but lead to frustration for buyer and/or seller.

I just checked my personal tool, it says all your chips are worth $100. I will offer you 1 crisp $100 bill, shipping included

 

[Chicken Rob]

Chips are not a commodity. There is not enough volume to make reasonable inferences on value based on previous sales. I don't see how any good comes from trying to track prices over time. I agree with the others who think this tool is going to be a net negative to the buying/selling community here.

 

[Chicken Rob]

I just checked my personal tool, it says all your chips are worth $100. I will offer you 1 crisp $100 bill, shipping included

My tool says they are worth $200. I will offer 4 wrinkled and worn $50 bills.

 

[manamongkids]

My tool says they are worth $200. I will offer 4 wrinkled and worn $50 bills.

Your tool is making a fool of you, clearly overpaying. Mine is set at exactly fair market value.

 

[ssanel54]

I agree that it could be bad. Let's say there are rare chips that have very few transactions, and the transactions that are available are from before the recent spike in prices. Buyer will only see pricing data that is irrelevant in today's market. The tool has no way for taking supply and demand into consideration.

Seeing recent sales data on readily available and frequently traded chips is one thing. But many of the chips traded here, no way a tool like this will do anything but lead to frustration for buyer and/or seller.

Yeah, I wasn't sure if this was trying to maintain a database for all chips or just certain chips, and if it was 100% reliant on Rainman manually finding and document each sale, or if it was more of an eBay aggregator mixed with PCF data

 

[Chicken Rob]

Your tool is making a fool of you, clearly overpaying. Mine is set at exactly fair market value.

Hmm. Maybe you're right and I'm overpaying, but I want them, and this is the only source. Maybe we should let the market price be decided by the market place.

 

[liftapint]

You guys are tools.

 

[RainmanTrail]

This seems completely pointless to me. It won't take into account member to member sales that aren't made public, negotiations post-sale, unusual spiked demand because of a need for a specific individual to finish a specific set, etc. Without a public clearinghouse to determine final sales (like what they have in real estate), it will be useless at best and actually hurt buyers and sellers at worst. Actually, I can see it completely pissing off (alternatively) buyers and sellers.

Even if I was interested in creating such a tool and was disillusioned enough to make it publicly available, it would have the net effect of metatarding threads. If I were a seller of a rack and I had a buyer who wanted to pay over market price to complete a set, and he was willing to pay $200 for it but then came back and tried to haggle based on what the relatively arbitrary price tool catalog thing he should pay, I'd be pretty upset at whoever created the tool.

It's simply supply and demand, it's not the fucking Pythagorean thereom.

You're sure making a lot of assumptions about what I'm working on. I think it's funny that you're so quick to call it pointless when you don't even know what the point of it is yet lol

 

[Chicken Rob]

You're sure making a lot of assumptions about what I'm working on. I think it's funny that you're so quick to call it pointless when you don't even know what the point of it is yet lol

But irrationally rushing to judgement is so much more fun than patiently waiting for facts. Anyone can wait for facts.

 

[Blaster]

I just checked my personal tool...

I'm sure you did . :

 

[bergs]

You're sure making a lot of assumptions about what I'm working on. I think it's funny that you're so quick to call it pointless when you don't even know what the point of it is yet lol

I guess it's not pointless if your purpose is to tard other people's threads with what you think accurate prices are, taking into account only a portion of actual sales because the chipping community lacks a governing big-brother like body that reviews, approves, and catalogs sales. I'm not selling or buying for a long time, so have fun, but I feat no communal good will emanate from your efforts.

 

[RainmanTrail]

I would agree, that if misused, it could be bad. But that's true of any tool. All chip transactions in the database will have a lot of information in them. If there were only 5 chips sold on April 3, 2013 of a particular chip, and these 5 chips were notched, it will tell you all of that. You'll have access to every piece of information regarding the sale. That is to say, you'll know that only 5 chips were sold, you'll know the date they were sold, and you'll even see the notes regarding the sale stating that they were notched in the popup of the mouse-over action.

If someone tried to use it to say "this chip is worth X dollars because the pricing tool says so", basing the price on a chip that was notched and sold in a quantity of 5 almost 3 years ago, then they are the one's being foolish. It's not very useful for stuff like that.

However, it is very useful for some things. Case in point is the recent thread where genghiskhan had been out of the chipping game for over a year. He comes here and is browsing around PCF and eBay trying to figure out what his Paulson Pharaoh's might sell for today. Looking this set up in the pricing tool would show thousands of these chips having been sold within just the last few months, all within the same price range. He could then use that information, knowing what buyers usually pay for these chips to price his set to sell (somewhere in the $2-$2.50 range) instead of listing them at $4 ea and not finding any buyers. It could also give buyers a resource if they're new here, and keep them from getting skinned by buying those $4 chips, then they turn around to resell them a month or two later and lose half their money, walking away feeling like they got scammed.

Knowing that the $25 Pointe After chips went for 85c ea from Jim's ChipRoom offering 5+ years ago wouldn't have affected the recent sale of these incredible and extremely rare chips that just went for $17.50 a piece last week. They still would have gone for the same price. For chips like these, you obviously can't use it to say those chips are "worth" $X. On the flip side, you also couldn't say they're now "worth" $17.50 ea, as I doubt bluefish would be able to find another buyer at that price. In fact, I was the penultimate bidder on that auction, and if he reached out to me today saying, "hey, something just came up and looks like I'm gonna have to sell these, would you still offer me $2000?" I'd probably laugh.

I'm sure we've all spent countless hours browsing through previous sales here and on eBay to get a feel for what our chips might sell for, or for what a set might cost us to put together. This tool is extremely useful for those purposes as it puts everything together into one place. It also gives you some insight as to how difficult certain chips are to come by, since it tracks a large portion of the market and is directionally accurate.

I'll post more information later, and a much deeper and more formal write-up for it.

It is what it is. It's not trying to be a chip pricing bible. What it is, is information. It is a database of previous transactions in a well organized format that is directionally accurate. It is better than looking up sales on eBay manually (capped at 90 days) and is better than browsing through 100s of pages here on PCF trying to find out how much putting together a set of "Le Cove" chips might cost you. Moreover, it puts all of this information together.

It is an extremely useful and valuable tool. I was planning to offer it for free to the community, but based on the feedback I'm getting so far (having posts deleted for "crapping" & the tool being called 'useless' getting numerous likes), that will likely change.

 

[RainmanTrail]

I guess it's not pointless if your purpose is to tard other people's threads with what you think accurate prices are, taking into account only a portion of actual sales because the chipping community lacks a governing big-brother like body that reviews, approves, and catalogs sales. I'm not selling or buying for a long time, so have fun, but I feat no communal good will emanate from your efforts.

I don't really care what you think

 

[pltrgyst]

....it's not the fucking Pythagorean thereom.

Hey, lay off Pythagoras. I met him playing 2/5 at Greektown, and he's a hell of a nice guy.

 

[Joe Harris]

Yes, how dare anybody try to use data science to form a better picture of reality.

 

[Chicken Rob]

Yes, how dare anybody try to use data science to form a better picture of reality.

 

[RainmanTrail]

This seems completely pointless to me. It won't take into account member to member sales that aren't made public, negotiations post-sale, unusual spiked demand because of a need for a specific individual to finish a specific set, etc. Without a public clearinghouse to determine final sales (like what they have in real estate), it will be useless at best and actually hurt buyers and sellers at worst. Actually, I can see it completely pissing off (alternatively) buyers and sellers.

Even if I was interested in creating such a tool and was disillusioned enough to make it publicly available, it would have the net effect of metatarding threads. If I were a seller of a rack and I had a buyer who wanted to pay over market price to complete a set, and he was willing to pay $200 for it but then came back and tried to haggle based on what the relatively arbitrary price tool catalog thing he should pay, I'd be pretty upset at whoever created the tool.

It's simply supply and demand, it's not the fucking Pythagorean thereom.

I guess it's not pointless if your purpose is to tard other people's threads with what you think accurate prices are, taking into account only a portion of actual sales because the chipping community lacks a governing big-brother like body that reviews, approves, and catalogs sales. I'm not selling or buying for a long time, so have fun, but I feat no communal good will emanate from your efforts.

What I find funny, is that @ssanel54 posts here asking for information about the tool I'm building, and you (@bergs) start slamming my project without even knowing what it is yet, or perhaps more importantly, what it is not.

If these posts aren't the definition of "thread crapping", then I don't know what is. But apparently you've amassed quite the following. So it's cool I guess.

----
Please don't delete any posts from this thread. Disagreements are welcome, and I don't want valid concerns to go unheard. I don't like the practice of deleting posts for "crapping". I believe in free speech.

 

[Chicken Rob]

Yes, how dare anybody try to use data science to form a better picture of reality.

I'll try this reply again. I just typed a long response and my iPhone ate it. This one will be shorter and lack all the nuance of the original.

The issue for some of us is the sample sizes, and available sources, can lead to a misleading understanding of chip values in the current market.

I have a PhD in an applied stats field. I embrace data science. The sampling that is available here might paint a perspective of history, but cannot tell us what chips are actually worth. It's not really science based on the level of available data.

Good chips are a limited resource. They are not always available. Supply and demand will both fluctuate continuously, and prices will change based on that.

This tool may be of some use to some people, but I suspect it's less likely to add as much value to the community compared to the disruption. Current reactions alone are pretty indicative of this.

 

[JFCJ]

If you could tap into the historical transactions of eBay... that could be quite interesting and insightful...

 

[Tommy]

I believe in free speech.

So do I but it doesn't give users a pass to be disruptive either. We have guidelines in place to keep things civil. If someone feels there is a problem, use the report post button and it will get looked at. Not all reported posts get removed. Sometimes it doesn't warrant instant removal but instead a friendly PM. That's how I like to resolve issues.

We (myself and the mods) are not trying to rule with an iron fist but thread crapping posts in someone's classified won't be tolerated here. Outside of the classifieds, the General Posting Rules normally covers most issues when they arise.

I'm interested in seeing this tool as well. It sounds like it could be helpful. More info about something is a good thing. Nothing is 100% so adding a disclaimer to it would be good.

 

[RagsPoker]

I think it's a pretty good idea, kind of like a Kelly Blue Book is for cars. I know I have used the "Advanced Search" many times on eBay and wish I could go back further than just a few months. I think this could be very good reference material, especially for newbies in chipping. Good luck in your project Rainman.

 

[RainmanTrail]

This post is obviously directed @RainmanTrail, but it seems like others are clued in as well and Im not sure to what extent?

I have seen numerous references within different classifieds about a price tool that is being developed. I can gather that its some type of pricing database or price scraper attempting to keep an accurate record of current market prices. I have also seen several requests to preserve the "Sold Price" information within classifieds for the good of the community.

I was hoping to understand -

What is this tool?

How does it work?

Is it being designed as a public tool for the PCF community (A la the Chip design tool) or is Rainman trying to develop a personal arbitrage algorithm for chips?

I'm going to post a more formal write up hopefully in the near future that explains what it is, what it is not, what it is useful for, what it is not useful for, how data is gathered, what data is collected, how it is presented, and eventually how to use it.

The cliff notes are:
-It is a database of transaction histories from eBay, PCF, CT, and a few other random sources
-It is not a 'your chips are "worth" $X tool'
-It is an interactive database
-It allows the user to get as granular as they want, and to slice the data in numerous ways
-I was planning to offer it free of charge (though based on the feedback so far, that may change)

Why some feel threatened by the access to information this tool provides, I cannot answer. But I'm guessing every single one of the critics have probably browsed listings on eBay and here on PCF to do the exact same thing. I'm just making that job easier by putting all the data in one place and putting some nifty visualizations around it.

Here are a few other useful examples of slicing the information in various ways:

Curious about the chipping world's manufacturer market share over the last quarter?



Curious about average rack prices by manufacturer over time?



Want to know the distribution of mint chips vs used chips for a given set?
Want to know how often a particular set pops up?
Want to know if you should snap buy that set of Bud Jones chips you just found on eBay but aren't really sure what similar sets have sold for in the past?
Want to filter the tool to get a look at the ceramic chip market?
Want to know how often spotted starbursts pop up for sale?
Want to know how much it might cost you to put together a set of HHR 414 blanks for that relabel project you're thinking about, and how difficult they might be to find?

You can answer all of these questions with the tool, and much, much more.

Perhaps that's all useless information to @bergs and the thumbs up crew, but I find it to be quite valuable and worth my time to build.

 

[Poker Zombie]

This post has none of the intended nuance of Chicken Robs eaten post.

I'm sure we've all spent countless hours browsing through previous sales here and on eBay to get a feel for what our chips might sell for, or for what a set might cost us to put together. This tool is extremely useful for those purposes as it puts everything together into one place. It also gives you some insight as to how difficult certain chips are to come by, since it tracks a large portion of the market and is directionally accurate.

I have never tried to get a feel for what my chips would sell for. If things became that dire, I would simply put up a price that was close to what I paid, knowing that it would likely drop in value. That said, the tool would probablly be interesting, even if of dubious usefulness. It would be akin to using Trulia to see what houses in a rural area are selling for. The number of houses moving is not enough to make a realistic assessment (although the tax assessor will do just that). Each house is going to be varied for reasons that cannot be accurately relayed (cleanliness of a house or breakdowns of sets) because what is useful for one person may not accurately set a price expectation for another.

Still, I applaud the effort. It will be broken in some respects, as there are many trades where we never even find out who the buyer is, much less what the final agreed price is. But some info is better than none.

Just don't expect to use the info for anything more than entertainment value.



...and I love graphs.

 

[Joe Harris]

The issue for some of us is the sample sizes, and available sources, can lead to a misleading understanding of chip values in the current market.

More misleading than having no information at all?

Good chips are a limited resource. They are not always available. Supply and demand will both fluctuate continuously, and prices will change based on that.

Yep. That's why this tool isn't gonna change buyer behavior much. It's not like you have anywhere else to turn for a given chip at any particular moment.

Why some feel threatened by the access to information this tool provides, I cannot answer.

Near as I can figure, because it means you can get a sense of historical trends without having invested years in marketplace observation. In other words, it could make it harder to sell chips for significantly more than their actual value.

 

[bergs]

Ok, so I'll stop being so heavy handed and just state this ---

This place was great for chip transactions when we first got here, but like anything that is already sufficient, people try to improve on it.

I think it's ultimately going to cause problems for chip transactions, but like I said, I'm not in the market and when I am it'll be customs, so good luck.

(The idea of me (or any of us from the northeast) with a "following" is outright laughable. A lot of strong personalities up here and sometimes we happen to agree on things. Sometimes we don't - witness me and Chicken going at it re: gun control about 4 times on here and the big blue defunct board that once was but never again shall be. Relax with the mean girls BS. Sometimes an idea just invited criticism).