SevenSnap: Watch Time, Money Fly Out Window
Well folks, it looks like we have yet another ‘entertainment shopping’ site on our hands. SevenSnap has thrown its somewhat different hat into the 3rd ring at this 3 ring circus we have. We’ve previously covered Pennycave and Swoopo on this blog (found here and here) so what better place to cover SevenSnap.
SevenSnap, at its core, is more like a XXX phone line or live show than anything else. Rather than paying for bids and the risking getting nothing on the bids, SevenSnap charges you just to look at the item. Yes, that’s right. You have to pay just to get the chance to buy it.
Here’s how it works. A new item gets put up every 60 min. You have to create an account and buy minutes to get into the ‘Snap Room’. Yes, they actually call it that in their guide. Once in the room, the price of the item drops by as much as $100 a min, based on the number of people in the room.
Hold on; that sounds good for a second, but think about that. They are capping the rate that it can drop to $100 a min, no matter how many people in the room. If there is only 5 people it drops $5 a min, but if there are 1,000 people (or 5,000 for that matter) it only drops $100 a min.
After you have paid to gain entry to the oh so wonderful Snap Room, you can ‘Snap’ the product at any time. As you can tell, they spent a lot of time on the names of things.
Once anybody in the room Snaps a product the price goes back up to the original amount and begins the price dropping anew. So while you may try and get a good deal, the likely thing that will happen is that someone will ‘snap’ it before you, leaving you with nothing. And remember, the price only drops every min – unsure how they deal with people joining at different times – so it is not constantly dropping, just in big chunks. As with most of these sites, most people will lose out.
The worst part here is that there isn’t even risk to SevenSnap. If you buy it right away they get their asking price and then sell another one. If you don’t buy right away, the price is only dropping if people are paying. So they are still fine. They determine their minimum margin from the start and then anybody that is in the room over 100 (since the price decline caps a $100 a min) is gravy.
I would stay away from this, just as I would every other ‘entertainment shopping’ site. Go buy a lotto ticket, your odds of coming out ahead are probably better. At least SevenSnap is limited to the iPhone and iPod Touch. This way a few extra people will save their money.
So do you think this and other ‘entertainment shopping’ sites are a scam? Let me know your thoughts below.
This has been a Thought From The Cake Scraps. (Hat tip to TechCrunch for their post)
Wow does this ever seem retarded. Paying just to “see” the product is one of the most idiotic things I’ve ever seen, and the people that end up using the site deserve to lose their money. For the most part I don’t like gimmicks when buying things, Woot excluded. The thing with Woot is that everyone knows the rules and they’re not designed to screw people out of money. A new item is posted at midnight without fail and if it’s something you don’t want you don’t have to buy it, but they’re not pitting you against your peers while only allowing a small window to see the product.
I don’t see a way you’re going to get a discount, when it sounds like it’s only what they put up for sale and you don’t have the time to do research. When you paid for only 5 minutes, you can either lose that money or go ahead and buy the product for a few dollars off retail. A lot of people don’t want to pay for nothing, so there won’t be many deals here.
There can’t be much of a market for this anyway, it’s not a good way to pass the time like a Woot-off, since you’re paying for every second you’re on the site.