Paused Deals - A Love Hate Discussion or maybe Meh

@mfladd My great grandmother used to tell me about watching this cartoon.

Edit: The upvote is for the cartoon, not the pausing of the deals.

@mfladd

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( heavens to murgatroid! )
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        o   ^__^
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@Yoda_Daenerys
Or
Murgatroid to Heavens

Your pick this time.

@Thumperchick BLATANT MOD FAVORITISM WOW

@Lotsofgoats Mods/Admin hate me and I still vouch for the pausing. Another thing I overlooked that I now appreciate is the unique factor. Not only is there no other daily deal site left, but there’s definitely never been one with stock market crash features.

@DrunkCat HOW MUCH WERE YOU PAID FOR THIS REVIEW

@Lotsofgoats @drunkcat received a discounted item in exchange for this honest and unbiased review.

@Lotsofgoats TWENTY POTATOES

@DaveInSoCal @Lotsofgoats On the contrary, @DrunkCat PAID $5 a month for this honest and unbiased review.

@Thumperchick
/giphy shill

@communist Hmmmm. You said “Normal sale” Are you in cahoots with Meh.com’s scheme or have you just drunk a big swig of the mehaid? I’m not paranoid…who said that?

@accelerator i meant the old meh.com/ old woot.com where there is 1 item and it stays whether it sells out at 12:25am or 11pm

@communist That’s still the case. The 1 item stays whether it sells out or not. It’s paused, not sold out.

@communist It doesn’t improve the site for new customers who try to check back at 4pm, but they’re 1 minute late and can’t buy the item. Wasted their whole day waiting for it. It’s like standing in line for a Black Friday deal all night, but the store only has 1 of the item you want.
“Come get this amazing deal at 4pm! Just kidding. Sold out!”

@medz I’m happy if 4pm is the worst benefit . Wording of the quantity remaining is “small” and “token” to help but it’s a let down. At least you’re already VMP at least the previous day so it’s not jammed with folks only signing up for that days deal.

@DrunkCat on the first day they exist, no one comments on it except “COME ON GUYS AT LEAST MOVE IT TO THE TOP SO I DON’T HAVE TO SCROLL DOWN”

I guess that’s a good review?

@snapster Fuck me, I’ve been waiting weeks for it and the day it finally arrives I got tired of scrolling and didn’t bother. I will atone for my hubris.

ps I approve.

@snapster Thanks for pointing it out! I actually checked after @DrunkCat mentioned it, but I must have been looking at yesterday’s or something. I had a sad, but now I’m having a happy.

@snapster I commented in the product thread and no one noticed. Maybe I should have moved my comment to the top…

@DrunkCat what’s a mehail?

@Al_Coholic meh email. Combined, it’s mehail.

@Ignorant I now buy fewer things, but I guess that gives others a chance to waste spend their money.

I am bored. It’s Friday. I am making it into a thread.

https://meh.com/forum/topics/i-have-a-stupid-idea-as-usual

@snapster How’s the daytime participation? Increased forum participation was the greater goal of this experiment, correct?

@narfcake I wanted more general energy to exist throughout the day but I didn’t identify forum activity specifically. Maybe it’s short-sighted but I see midnight audience as the most verbal and most entertaining. Mostly I’m hoping a more exciting site throughout the day leads to a larger overall growth rate and ability to leverage that into larger purchases. That’s our virtuous cycle.

@snapster Has every product that triggered the pause sold out?

The reason I ask is that I’m primarily an impulse buyer here. There was a time or two where I saw a product that I would have purchased, but it had paused. Once that happens I generally don’t come back got round 2 or 3. My money stays in my pocket.

If it sold it anyway it’s all the same to you, but if not it means you missed some additional sales.

Meh…

@snapster
tl;dr

Looked great tho. Thoughtful! Humorous! Exciting! I’m sure it was really really worthy and totally beyond awesome. So congrats!
/giphy tl;dr

/giphy insincere praise

@f00l those gifs didn’t work out to be nearly as sarcastic (or relevant) as you probably intended. Which I think is just great.

@harveydanger
They worked out as stooopid as I intended. I specialize.

/giphy stupid

@snapster You said, “No, really, I mean that the only “I hate the circuit breaker” scenario that will make me have any empathy is the following one: 1) Our highly valued test subject customer was here at 12:00:00am eastern time to make a buying decision and the decision came very easy to them so with extreme speed they tried to buy the product and failed due to the circuit breaker flipping”

That likely would only be on a fuku night right? Hmm…so either you are saying you will never have any empathy or you are saying you are an empathetic human if conditions are right… Presuming it is the later why not continue surprising a few folks with free fukus - especially those who have given up even trying due to always being tagged as a robot… (because for sure if they finally make it past that check the circuit breaker would have long ago flipped).

@Kidsandliz
@snapster
/giphy lacks empathy

@Kidsandliz It would be more accurate to exclude fuko. I can only have empathy for people succeeding on a purchase of an unlucky bag.

@snapster Well then… you should have empathy for me (grin) as the last time I succeeded in getting either a fuku or fuko was the April 1, 2015 fuko (which was perhaps the first fuko?) Been a robot several times after that. With that one I narrowly missed (oh wait - the narrowly missed part might disqualify me for empathy?) getting the first pallet of broken TV’s - had to tell Jon no due to circumstances beyond my control. And I would still have to as the address I use isn’t mine. I’m in HUD housing at the moment and send a pallet of anything here and all that would be left 2 seconds after the truck left would be the the dust in the air as people ran/drove down the street with the loot. LOL

PS.
/giphy wall of text

@lljk
Fuck, that is the most awesome giphy.
/giphy proper sleep

@accelerator all this work to avoid raising prices on smaller batches and slow demand

It must not be that good if it wasn’t paused.

@accelerator That explains the desire over those overstuffed bags of concrete pillows!

I don’t think of it as Christmas when I wake up, but time to save money. As an Eastern time person that leaves the house by 6 every morning there are a lot of stuff I don’t have a chance at. Especially since I don’t get back until after 4 in the afternoon. I’ve missed so many things that I’ve actually cancelled my VMP membership since it isn’t doing me any good. More money saved! Thanks meh.com

I am curious to hear what @cshillaber thinks of the feature.

@lumpthar
Do,
Or Do Not.

There Is No Pause

/giphy no pause

@lumpthar I think the Meh Event Circuit Breaker is perhaps the best thing I have ever seen. Not only is it new and exciting, it really brings the magic back to the daily deal venue!!!

I also really enjoy the daily email blast! I was away at work for weeks and when I got back to my throwaway meh email account I was greeted by weeks of highly entertaining information about items I only wish I had been here to rave about!!!

Another great job meh!!!

@cshillaber
Since you’re so lukewarm on this, can you elaborate with a little more detail? How does this assist your family life, your career, and your sociopathic tendencies?

@MrsPavlov nah I’ll probably stay here and say I don’t like it.

@MrsPavlov
Thanks! Love you! So sweet for you to think of us!

You just go right ahead and STFU yourself, you cutiepie! It’s not only for us, it’s for everyone!

/giphy bff kiss kiss

@Ignorant Typical…
/giphy typical

@MrsPavlov Ummm… No!

@MrsPavlov Empty bed syndrome again? Hope @pavlov comes home soon.

@dashcloud It’s just coincidence. Meh had a dry spell lasting several months; the products meh has been putting up lately have been better. So you have some pent up demand plus better products equals more sales.

@dashcloud when faced with a smaller sized batch of product in the past, the temptation to raise the price was stronger because it made the item quantity seem more appropriately sized. Basically we could lower demand and optimize for making more money. With the circuit breaker, we can be less concerned with the negative aspects of a sellout on the morning crowd. Instead of making more money on a boring sale, we can have an exciting sale and ideally get a boost in traffic/interest. It also lets us pick from these pools of shallow inventory when we need more variety going.

So what @uwacn said also has some validity but as a side effect of above.

@snapster “let us pick from these pools of shallow aMeh.ricans and Meh.xicans…” - that’s where i thought that statement was going . i’m glad to be pickled picked as a shallow ET Meh.nnonite so I am able to get some products that are nice-ish with sleep.

we test subjects are just toys puppets on a string in this Meh.nderful world, and this one - happy to be along for the ride.

@snapster
That’s rather coherent for this early in the morning, don’t you think?

There are appropriate hours and days for thinking and writing clearly and in one’s full mind. Do you really think this is such an hour and day?

Please, sir, consider the setting! Think of the children!

/giphy proactive

@don
/giphy life’s little pleasures

@sjk3 The preceding poster gives a good representation of a lazy east coaster with an overdeveloped sense of entitlement who can’t be bothered to show up when the item goes on sale, preferring to participate in, and profit from, the disenfranchisement of those who actually made the effort.

@duodec

@baqui63 WTF?!! are so many of the giphys for miranda of scantily clad (or less) women? What about the frakking planet, giphy? Huh? What about it?!!

(Not that I generally have problems with clips of scantily clad women, but @miranda might be my 20 year old daughter… some things are just not appropriate, even for me.)

@snapster, et al, I also forgot to mention that I like the whole circuit breaker thing primarily because it is really simple and yet difficult to explain plus it gave me some puzzles to work on, for example, do the breakers trip based on number of items sold or the rate at which the items sell? (Definitely the rate.) And then trying to figure out the algorithm for the VMP reserve (last time I looked, I was thinking it appeared to be 5% of stock on hand, but I’ll admit I got distracted and haven’t looked at it for a while).

TL;DR: I like it. I am strange. These facts may, or may not, correlate either positively or negatively.

@baqui63 I’m going to say it’s definitely the quantity. First, the VMP holdback is stated to be a quantity. B, snapster has referred to tweaking the quantities for midnight and 8am events before. The percentages have changed over time. I noticed today was a very even split between night and morning sales. That wasn’t the case with earlier pauses.

Also, there’s a chance @miranda might be my friend. Not that I’m friends with your daughter, I don’t think, but I am friends with a Miranda that I converted into a Meh shopper. So hi @miranda, friend or stranger!

tl;dr everybody say hi to @miranda!

@baqui63
Regarding @miranda and /image Miranda

Rule 34—"If it exists, there is porn of it – no exceptions"
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rule_34_(Internet_meme)

Partiticularly if the “it” that exists might be hot. Or not hot. Or really really disturbing. Or visible. Or not visible. Or not even actually in existence. Or “whatever”.

My sister-in-law told me, “Don’t ever Google images of your kid’s name. Just don’t.”

@f00l I went through the edit/save cycle at least six or seven times and MOST of the “miranda” giphys were of scantily clad women (I wouldn’t call any of them porn tho). Rule 34 speaks to existence, not frequency and I was commenting on the fact that there were none of the planet.

@miranda Hi. I am NOT your father. (Well, I am almost completely certain I am not your father… There is always the possibility that I “sleep donated” sperm and never found out about it.)

@djslack The VMP reserve has to be based on quantity (think about this until you agree; if you still don’t agree, think some more). I was talking solely about the two circuit breakers that pause sales prior to 4 PM. Given that the parameters for these have been changing, all conclusions drawn from their effects are sketchy at best, but I recall seeing at least one sale that had to be based on rate rather than quantity unless @snapster’s comment that they are focusing on the 8 AM crowd was “tweaked” out of that day’s sale. I’ll do a more complete analysis using Excel or something next week at work.

Finally, Hi @miraclewhispers! (Daughter unit 2’s actual meh.com account.)

/giphy miracle whispers

That isn’t porn, though he is clearly not saying “Je t’aime”

My French sucks (tho I was fairly fluent in 1992); this giphy is from Une Femme Mariée so someone (more knowledgeable than I) may know what he is actually saying.

@baqui63
All the PAUSE formulas should be Beautifully Cruel.

Build It, And We Will Come.

/giphy addicts

@SpenceMan01 tldr: I hate this because it’s too complicated. Can you add some more complications, plz?

@SpenceMan01 you said “What about the people that check-in between 12:15 and 12:45 that would have otherwise been able to buy?”

I thought I’ve been pretty clear here: they don’t get one in favor of different people at 8am having a chance.

The reflex thought that we are messaging someone who missed out to come back is flat wrong. Nothing stopping them but that’s not to be implied as a goal.

@SpenceMan01 “Most of the comments I read are literally telling me that their right to get here late is superior to someone else’s right to get here later. Think about this. Please.”

@harveydanger
@snapster
Doesn’t most of this really translate into my right to bitch comments? And who would dare argue that principle?

/giphy constitutional right to bitch

@Mehrocco_Mole @baqui63 raises hand*

*IMHO, 17 of the 94 orders I’ve placed to date would fall into the category of needed rather than wanted. Note that I consider giving someone a birthday or Christmas gift (including buying toys to put in the holiday gift bin at work) a need rather than a want. If I were to drop those, the 17 falls to about 9.

@Al_Coholic Honestly this is another big reason it grew on me. The complaints well was running a little dry.

@DrunkCat I know it’s a Woot tradition, but honestly, I can do without all the whining.

Why all that isn’t directed at the momthly scapegoat instead, I don’t know. But maybe that’s @sammydog01’s fault.

I’m also blaming my typo on Google @sammydog01. I was using an Android phone earlier when that happened.

@DrunkCat That explains your issue with zombie threads.
/giphy zombie

@narfcake

@f00l That is too complicated. Use this

@Kidsandliz
/giphy PAUSE

@f00l @kidsandliz Songs that pause (stop) when someone says “stop”:

@Yoda_Daenerys Perhaps, though I’ve changed my views on all of those things. (Some by slight degrees, but change is change.)

@Thumperchick because someone else argued you out of your then current position, or your point of view just changed over time?

@Yoda_Daenerys there have been a few instances where someone’s argument has made me take a fresh look at my position. However, the vast majority of change has been time/information/perspective.

@f00l
Is he saying “You know why?”

Calling lip readers
/giphy lipreader

@f00l Go away. Not you, that’s what it looks like he’s saying.

@sammydog01

Oooooh, you’re right.

That makes him even hotter.

/giphy cumberbatch

@sammydog01 2489 sold, and I’m guessing there’s 2500 total.

It’s been roughly about 5% of the total that was withheld for VMP.

@narfcake that’s a bingo

@Ignorant If at some point I’m really really really really really bored, I’ll look at the recent midnight/8- am splits.

@sammydog01 how so?

@narfcake Ooh, math!

@narfcake
What would it take to get you that bored? Here’s hoping!

/giphy bored

@ELUNO
Why thank you! You see, we want to suffer. And we want to be crybabies.

/giphy crybaby

@ELUNO Yes, I want them to hold 3, in fact, until I decide. Just for me.
/giphy just for me

@sammydog01
/giphy me me me me me me me

@meteor
/giphy good ridance!

@hanzov69 I first read that as “poop sleep hygiene”.

@Starblind That’s a very different sort of hygiene. I’m pretty good on that front.

@Ignorant Nope! Pretty soon you’ll be the only one

@compunaut

yep we all think it totally sucks.

Ok good I thought so. I don’t like it either. Thanks

@Ignorant

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( Ignorant is so sexy with his opp )
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@ELUNO They say that opposites attract, but I’m here to tell you that they LIE

@compunaut
/youtube opposites attract

@narfcake I love that (Grammy Award-winning) video! In the early 90s, that Abdul girl was hot and she could really dance. A potent combo
/youtube Straight Up

@compunaut
Damn. Had forgotten how good she was.