Silk Road forums

Discussion => Silk Road discussion => Topic started by: dwjess367 on October 03, 2011, 04:53 pm

Title: The trend of releasing early makes me nervous
Post by: dwjess367 on October 03, 2011, 04:53 pm
I realize that trust is difficult, but a few sellers in particular are making alarm bells go off in my head. Smilebit, as an example, has had a seller account here for ages but only started selling recently, with a shiny (100) after his/her account but basically no forum presence (a poster with a post count of 1 left a short positive note in one thread) and a feedback listed densly populated with the phrase "releasing early for a trusted seller."

Not suggesting smilebit is scamming - actually the info looks pretty legit - but it looks like people have been swept up in a wave of ordering and releasing early with minimal actual feedback.

Still others write that they will only ship with an early release, particularly on large orders. Aren't those exactly the orders buyers would want to maintain the SR protections with?

I guess I just don't see how releasing early is any better than dealing outside of SR's escrow. And now that orders are hedged when placed instead of when shipped, it seems all the more pointless to be releasing early all the time.
Title: Re: The trend of releasing early makes me nervous
Post by: simplemachine on October 03, 2011, 10:44 pm
I agree. Perhaps it would be an idea to implement some kind of "release 50% up front" option. Or at least let releasing funds from escrow and writing a feedback be separate actions. Not really useful to see a bunch of "finalizing early" on product reviews.
Title: Re: The trend of releasing early makes me nervous
Post by: treebeard on October 04, 2011, 12:39 am
I agree that with the recent upgrades to the way hedging works, etc. - there shouldn't be a lot of need for 'releasing early' - I don't like seeing it so much either, it takes away from much of the point of SR.
Title: Re: The trend of releasing early makes me nervous
Post by: dance4life on October 04, 2011, 02:59 am
Well I am not sure why anyone is finalizing early at all, at least with DOMESTIC US-US shipments.

With hedged escrow there is absolutely NO FUCKING REASON to finalize early ( IMO ) unless you are sending to a 0/0 buyer.  ( US - US shipments )

Plus, it only helps the sellers really.  Especially with the BTC going down.  At least you have a chance to get its full value by the time it arrives at its destination.

I would never ask anyone to finalize early, nor have I ever.  I wouldn't finalize early for anyone personally.  Unless it was international shipment.  I can totally see this.

I also agree with the "select percentage of escrow" option in this case.

Someone please tell me why with volatile BTC prices, when hedged domestically, need to be finalized early?  I can't think of any reason but the ones mentioned above.  ( 0/0 buyer / intl )
Title: Re: The trend of releasing early makes me nervous
Post by: Bob Arctor on October 04, 2011, 07:09 am
I imagine a lot of buyers want to help seller not to loose money because of BTC fluctuation so they release early. Obviously they take on themselves some risk. If I had regular seller here, I would have no problem releasing funds early.
On the other hand, if unknown seller asks to release funds early, I simply wouldn't do business with him.
Title: Re: The trend of releasing early makes me nervous
Post by: dwjess367 on October 04, 2011, 11:15 pm
I imagine a lot of buyers want to help seller not to loose money because of BTC fluctuation so they release early. Obviously they take on themselves some risk. If I had regular seller here, I would have no problem releasing funds early.
On the other hand, if unknown seller asks to release funds early, I simply wouldn't do business with him.

Not an issue any longer, as hedging occurs when the order is placed instead of when it is shipped. This is a new policy that should really clear up this issue.
Title: Re: The trend of releasing early makes me nervous
Post by: dance4life on October 04, 2011, 11:51 pm
Exactly.

There is no reason because the money is pegged to the BTC Value once you marked "shipped."

So, lets say it goes down 1 btc then it arrives at destination.  You will get the amount of bitcoins equal to the current  BTC Value + 1 if you are the seller.

I urge people not to finalize early on domestic shipments.  It really invites a lot of headaches and frustration, IMO.

That all goes out the window when you are a 0/0.  I still don't personally make people finalize early, but it is understandable. 
Title: Re: The trend of releasing early makes me nervous
Post by: phubaiblues on October 08, 2011, 12:51 am
Yeah, I've done it, for a few sellers that I'd learned to trust, but that was before hedging, and I think it's bad overall for SR, and I don't like it if it's a requirement of the seller...I get it, that they want their money as soon as possible, but this forum was designed to protect buyer and seller both.  Buyer takes more risk by exposing identity, and seller used to take more risk, of btc fluctuation...but if things do go bad, it's escrow that protects us....to me, it's just a courtesy, that I'll lift it on reputable sellers who I've got good relationship with, but it still makes me a bit uncomfortable, as it's not in the spirit of the design of this site...sellers come here, they know escrow is part of the deal, and I want to keep it that way...

Title: Re: The trend of releasing early makes me nervous
Post by: Modoki on October 08, 2011, 01:55 am
I just do it like this: If you pay out of escrow, you get some discount, if not, that's okay as well.
To be honest, this isn't because of BTC fluctuation mainly but rather so that I don't have to wait 1-2 weeks for international orders to get the money to me. I have a tight margin.
And something to think about, I want people to learn to trust me even if they're not protected from escrow. Some time there may be situations where escrow is not possibly or whatever and I would have to have a reputation which states that if you do business with me, everything will be fine even if I don't have to fear escrow. That's how things worked before SR and it was good as well.
Much love
M
Title: Re: The trend of releasing early makes me nervous
Post by: Paperchasing on October 08, 2011, 05:22 am
I have had a few people write me to ask if they should release escrow early.  I always tell them that I do not require it (unless they are international, which I have shipped a few packages anyway even though I specify in my profile that it is required) and that they can wait till they receive it or not, their choice.  I do appreciate the buyers that release funds early because this is a cash business and waiting for your money does kinda suck once you have sent it out to them as it takes a bit of time to convert it from btc's back to dollars anyways.  Most of the time when people PM me to ask this, even though I tell them its strictly their choice, they most of the time end up releasing funds anyway.  +1 for those buyers in my book, lol...  It is important to distinguish between a seller that will make things right even after they have gotten your money though for buyers, or you may end up without your product and no recourse except ranting on the forums and putting a 1 out of 5 and some negative feedback response in the sellers feedback.  I had one person that was somewhat dissatisfied with their purchase and they gave me a 4 out of 5 along with a somewhat less than sterling review (well they at least said it was ok and the weight was over and I gave them a free sample of another product lol...)  Of course, I immediately wrote this person and ask how I could make them feel as if they were pleased with the bitcoins they had spent with me.  Very quickly they responded with a note that indicated they didn't like the commercial sensi they had bought but did like the free sample of hash that I put in with it...  so I sent them some hash.  This made them feel much better and I felt better too so all was well in the end (and they edited the 4 out of 5 to a 5 out of 5)   He sent me a note saying that he hoped that I didn't feel like he was scamming me but that he thought it was a fair and honest review (and that he hoped the special replacement package I was sending him wasn't the police knocking on his door lol lol lol...)  I told him I thought that the 4 out of 5 and the comments actually helped me at that time establish that I wasn't a scammer posting fake feedback to make myself look good (and I believe this prompted uniwiz to post in the good cannabis vendors thread that he "strongly disagreed" with this persons bad review of my commercial sensi...)  You know, the "this guy is Jesus returned" and "released early for trusted seller" type of feedback over and over when someone is brand new vendor makes me very suspicious of them...  Now when I see tetravorts or pharmville's "released early" feedback I feel that those are just is good buyers knowing they can trust an established vendor and helping them keep a cap on stringing out their finances.

In the end, the buyer must educate themselves and carefully choose whom they release escrow to early or they might wish they had not!  I have noted the forums have been quite good at alterting to suspicious behavior or listings that new vendors put up that end up being scams.

That's my 2c,
Paperchasing
Title: Re: The trend of releasing early makes me nervous
Post by: treebeard on October 09, 2011, 01:23 am
damn, the last few posts on here were really well thought out and written,

pretty much summed up my own views on the situation.

also got me thinking and I just wanted to note that I think it's the responsibility
of the buyer to ensure they leave quality feedback for transactions -

it can be extremely useful when you can distinguish between real feedback and bullshit.
Title: Re: The trend of releasing early makes me nervous
Post by: drganja on October 09, 2011, 02:33 am
I agree with this, im a new sr member and i have made 1 order (schizofreen) i saw all the feedback before i started to buy and it all read "finalized early" so i figured it was something that you were supposed to do. i realeased early, and my order did arrive from europe to the us in 7 days but i dont see how it helps.
Title: Re: The trend of releasing early makes me nervous
Post by: Paperchasing on October 09, 2011, 04:17 am
@drganga - if your buying from a small volume vendor, yep I see your point but if your buying from a large volume vender it looks very different.  You see, if an order takes 10 days to finalize, how much new product do you think the vendor has made an additional investment into just trying to keep up with the new orders?  An example would be tetravort: over the past two weeks (this is not exact, just a figure I been kinda keeping an eye on to get an idea of SR's potential) he has went from 314 to over 500 orders.   Now, think about how much money this guy has out in escrow alone, not to mention the cash he needs to re-up from his dealer, if from 314 to the 510 order hes waiting on everyone to finalize a 100.00 gram order.  do the math.  About 175x100 (cheapest price he offers for lowest amount of cocaine) that is $17500 cash money he is having to float in escrow just to keep new orders flowing and thats not even counting the cash he has to put out of his pocket during this time to keep product flowing from his dealer.  Yes, I know most people finalize for him within 4 days but still, you get the idea.  Most people at some point would just put their account on vacation if they did not have the bread to cover this spread, after all his dealer/supplier does not do "buy now pay later" I'm quite sure lol..
 
Paperchasing
Title: Re: The trend of releasing early makes me nervous
Post by: rev on October 10, 2011, 12:59 am
The overarching issue with the expectation of releasing escrow early is that THE BUYER SHOULDERS A DISPROPORTIONATE SHARE OF THE RISK. In short (tl;dr), sellers' concerns over cash flow should not trump buyers' concerns over getting scammed.

Here is why.
Paying before or after the transaction happens all the time between businesses in the e-commerce world:


Time ----------------------------Goods shipped-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------Goods Received-----------
Payment method             Pre-pay = early escrow release                                                                                          Post-pay = finalize after goods received
                                      (Seller advantage, buyer risk)                                                                                                   (Buyer advantage, seller risk)
                             
In most retail and e-commerce transactions, for example buying a book on Amazon.com, Pre-pay is expected - the customer must pay for the book before when it is shipped rather than when he receives it. Though this makes the buyer shoulder all the risk, it is balanced out by the fact that it is much harder for the Amazon.com to disappear with the customer's money than it is for a customer to disappear with Amazon.com's book. 

However, on SR, there is no such difficulty. Anonymity is an inherent and essential part of the system, so disappearing is just as easy for both buyers AND sellers. We've had a couple of examples this week with highly rated LSD sellers disappearing with customers' money.

If there isn't an asymmetry in the difficulty of disappearing between buyers and sellers, there should not be an asymmetry between the risks taken by the two sides. That is to say, both should shoulder an equal share of the risk.

The escrow system is a system to share this risk. It essentially moves the payment method to a Post-paid situation - payment is released when goods are received. Wait! Isn't this asymmetrical again? Doesn't this shift all of the risk back to the seller? It would seem so, until we point out that although the bitcoins in escrow technically belong to the buyer, the buyer does not have full control over them.  Silk Road does. For the buyer to recover his bitcoins from escrow he would need to go through resolution, in which case Silk Road has the ultimate say on where the bitcoins go. With escrow, buyer and seller is basically trusting Silk Road to be their fair arbiter when something goes wrong. With most resolutions going 50-50, the risk is literally shared equally by buyer and seller.

So why do sellers complain about this? Because money being in escrow ties up their cash flow - cash being in escrow prevents sellers from accessing it.  Most businesses in the world go bankrupt due to a lack of cash to keep everything running, and that includes businesses in the black market. This is a legitimate concern, but it is and should be considered a cost of doing business here. It is unfair for a seller to ask buyers to shoulder all the risk in a transaction so that he may have immediate access to his cash. The disadvantage to a seller of escrow tying up his cash is significant, but eventually he will get his cash. The disadvantage to a buyer of buying OUTSIDE of escrow is much worse, as if anything goes wrong, he will NEVER recover his cash/goods. This risk is disproportionate.

The restriction on cash flow is definitely a cost of doing business for sellers. In real life, businesses always pass their costs of doing business down to their customers, and this is exactly what sellers on Silk Road should do. Escrow is a protection for buyers, and makes the lives of sellers more troublesome. In which case, sellers should be well compensated for their troubles.

As a seller, acquire more cash so that you can run your business smoothly within escrow, and raise your prices in accordance to how much more work you had to put in to acquire that cash. If you are unable to acquire that cash, then perhaps Silk Road isn't the right venue for your business. This barrier to entry is essential for the protection of buyers in an anonymous environment.

That is all =]

Rev
Title: Re: The trend of releasing early makes me nervous
Post by: Paperchasing on October 10, 2011, 05:12 am
Essentially rev I agree with you, however as a seller myself and seeing the results of escrowing a fair amount of money I have released funds early to other sellers myself.  I can tell many of the sellers on here are just starting their drug dealing career and this is a tremendous load on an otherwise immediate cash flow business.  Yes, if they do not have the money to float the escrow then perhaps this is not the correct venue for them.. or they can alternatively choose to go on vacation mode thereby shutting off your access to perhaps some fine drugs, which if they did not do also would drives prices down due to higher competition.  This is a very double edge sword, the buyers will pay the price for this in your explanation and actually do so in reality here on SR right now.  For me, I came in with plenty of reserves to weather the escrow storm which is one of the reasons my prices are very reasonable, many do not.  Dont get me wrong, I dont think the escrow system should be abolished by any means... scammers would pop up like unwanted weeds no doubt.  There is no simple solution and perhaps SR has the best solution already by leaving it up to the buyers as to whom they trust to release their funds to early.
Title: Re: The trend of releasing early makes me nervous
Post by: phubaiblues on October 10, 2011, 06:07 pm
Look: on other forums, it's the escrow system that people talk about, when those *not* in the know, say this place is a scam.  I wouldn't have come here otherwise.  Sure, after being on here a while, you get to know who you can trust, and some time ago, out of fairness to certain sellers--before they had the hedge in place--I mentioned that I did that, and I had begun mentioning it in feedback, since we also had some ripoff sellers that were getting target, and the usual 'no shows' where escrow saved us.

My concern now, is that it appears that some sellers put it as a requirement, and I'm thinking of one H seller in particular who has a ton of people hanging right now, most of who lifted escrow at his request...he may or may not come thru, but when you have sketchy sellers still on there, the escrow system is what protects us.

It should remain strictly a *buyers* prerogative to reward consistently good sellers--that deliver in a timely manner--and *not* used by sellers to pressure buyers so they receive 'special' treatment.  I won't mention his name, but right now there are a while bunch of buyers hanging out on a limb because of an H seller who asks them to lift escrow...I won't do it, and he won't even answer me, much less confirm purchase...but I still can cancel, which I'll probably do...but again, I don't like that 'lifting escrow' is getting a bit institutionalized...(haha, I can't believe I actually used that word about SR)

It puts pressure on the buyers who don't do it, and if it gets to common, next they'll be asking for a 'button' to click on, that lifts escrow, and then site will loose it's credibility...
Title: Re: The trend of releasing early makes me nervous
Post by: Sugarbowl on October 11, 2011, 12:19 am
After smilebit I'm only ordering from sellers with somewhere between 90-98 next to their name. A 100 is just not realistic, no seller who is legitimately sending shit out is gonna have 100% happy customers. They'll always run into an asshole buyer at some point, something will go wrong with shipping, etc. I want to believe that all people are inherently good, but that's just not the case. No more releasing early for me.
Title: Re: The trend of releasing early makes me nervous
Post by: rollercat on October 12, 2011, 03:56 pm
have you had trouble with Smilebit?  I posted a thread here about him, but it seems to be gone!!  I haven't received my shit yet =(  It's looking like I wont.
Title: Re: The trend of releasing early makes me nervous
Post by: huecityboy on October 19, 2011, 08:10 am
After smilebit I'm only ordering from sellers with somewhere between 90-98 next to their name. A 100 is just not realistic, no seller who is legitimately sending shit out is gonna have 100% happy customers. They'll always run into an asshole buyer at some point, something will go wrong with shipping, etc. I want to believe that all people are inherently good, but that's just not the case. No more releasing early for me.
I agree totally.  I always tell sellers that, too, not to worry they get some dickhead, or also, a lot of people don't know that the *average* around here is 5 points, and think it's like grade curves or something where only the top dog gets an A/5 and spreads the rest around...as long as most of the feedback seems real and the guys up in the nineties, I'm happy.  I also check the forums too, see what's been said: that's more important than the feedback score...I *know* we have buyers that are too demanding, and gotta give the sellers the benefit of the doubt, when most people say they are good, I'm happy...
Title: Re: The trend of releasing early makes me nervous
Post by: EnterTheMatrix on October 19, 2011, 04:30 pm
have you had trouble with Smilebit?  I posted a thread here about him, but it seems to be gone!!  I haven't received my shit yet =(  It's looking like I wont.

I think it's been confirmed that Smilebit is a scammer in other threads.