Classic & Vintage - Craigslist Vigilantes

I suspect a good number of people who frequent this forum also spend a decent amount of time on their local craigslists. So, I was wondering what people thought about "craigslist vigilantes". In other words, those people that call out others on craigslist for overposting or inflating prices. The former-overposting-is easy to quantify, the latter-inflating prices-is of course subjective. I for one don't believe in the inherent value of something, rather value is determined by the seller and the buyer. Even though I believe this, I also don't like it when sellers prey on the ignorance of potential buyers. Contradictory: Yes, but that's the way I am.

Anyway, would like to hear your opinions on this topic.

I think some people have way too much time on their hands. Craigslist is what it is; an electronic form of the old bulletin board that we often read at the grocery store and laundromat. I would tell vigilantes to mind their own business with the exception of a known subject running a completely illegal scam.

As with everything, caveat emptor.

IMHO they are wasting their time. unlike here CL has no real way to responed to a seller in a way that other 'buyers' can easily read you comment. chances are the seller would not care anyway.

several of here have made comments to a seller on ebay about mislabeling Campi parts he basically told me to...... well never mind *blushing*. but some people like TRADERJIMK on ebay are just crooks.

The only time it irks me is when they are selling something for more than it costs new.

The only time it irks me is when they are selling something for more than it costs new.Yeah, but that goes with the "buyer beware". If the buyer refuses to do his or her due diligence, then they deserve what they get.

The only time it irks me is when they are selling something for more than it costs new.
+1 When I see someone selling a Walmart bike used, then stating they paid $600 for it, I will call them out. Asking a high price is one thing, outright lies are over the top.

Yeah, but that goes with the "buyer beware". If the buyer refuses to do his or her due diligence, then they deserve what they get.

True, the buyer didn't do their research and perhaps got "ripped off", and got what they deserved. (And if they're happy with their purchase, good for them.) But then, did the seller who took advantage of the buyer's ignorance get what they deserve?

I agree with wrk (for the most part). When people radically over price their bikes, they usually don't sell. Eventually the market teaches them to lower prices. If someone is willing to make a major expenditure without doing the preparation, I agree that it's on them. The top posters annoy me like they annoy everyone, but calling them out for it just creates MORE spam and never gets them to stop anyway. I think the proper technique is just to flag them.

The exception to me for when things need to be called out is when a seller is being outright dishonest...like painting Cinelli on a varsity, lieing about condition or deliberately obfuscating their ad to confuse newbies. The other exception is when something is clearly dangerous...like a heavily damaged frame or fork.

Well I used to flip a ton of cheaper bikes, but then post a friendly warning in my listings about other people profiteering selling similar items.

There was one obnoxious flipper who offered "fully restored" huffys and the like for $100 and up. I sold similar bikes for $40... I didn't specifically call him out, just noted that In my mind, restoration does not simply equate to a tune up and repacking of bearings.

I have routinely flagged sellers who tried to hold auctions on Craigs List (and will continue to do so).

There's a fine line between helping out and a personal vandeta.

There is stuff like this..

My first thought is why didn't you call the police and make a report?

http://portland.craigslist.org/mlt/bik/1436639401.html

MISSING A STOLEN BIKE IN SE??? - I know where it is... - (SE Madison)

Today will live in infamy as the day I expose the biggest most brazen bike thief in southeast pdx. If you have lost a bike, especially in the SE Portland and Hawthorne areas, then I know where your bike probably is. This thief is a full blown kleptomaniac - stealing everything in sight. I recently caught him in the act cutting our bike lock cable with a cable cutter and taking two of our bikes, in broad daylight, in front of a chuch, five minutes after we had just locked them up. I had been cased and targeted by this bike thief while in the process of locking up my families bicycles!

I locked our family bikes outside the church on SE 35th and Madison. Only minutes later I saw this jackass cut my cable while I sat and watched from a vehicle fifty feet away. He then rolled the bicycles across the street and into his backyard. When I confronted him he did not want to return the bikes because he said "they did not look like they belonged to me". This means he watched me lock them up. He then lied and said they were unlocked when I had just locked them up myself. Only when I threatened him did he reluctantly return the bikes. Then when my family arrived back a few minutes later and found out what had happened - he mouthed off to them - the woman and little girl whose bikes he had just stolen. Outrageous!

While retrieving my families stolen bikes I glanced into the door, windows and backyard of this persons house and saw literally hundreds of bikes of every kind imaginable piled up to the ceiling. Everything from treks, cannondales, specialized and schwinns to little girls and boys bikes, even trikes, scooters and wagons. You name it this guy has it stuffed in this house. If you are missing anything with wheels from your SE Portland yard then its probably in this guys house. The bikes and stuff is piled up in every room and window and backyard. If you don't believe me then please - go see for yourself!

According to reviews there have been a tremendous amount of bicycles disappearing from the SE Hawthorne area lately. I did some research and found out that the person in mention rebuilds the bikes on different frames and sells them right off SE 35th and Hawthorne with a for sale sign. He locks them up with multiple shackle locks and angle iorn. This is probably just one of his fencing operations. He is the most brazen thief I have ever encountered and is absolutely shameless and indignant in his words and actions. He thinks he is beyond repute and has the right to steal.

I considered reporting him to the police. Then I realized the best way to neutralize this problem is to expose him to the people in the community he steals from. I also hope to give the many victims a chance to try to recover thier stolen merchandise. You may catch a glimpse of your missing bike from the many uncovered windows of this house full of hot bikes. He probably has roomates you can talk to. I only caught him stealing our bikes. However from how brazen he acted in doing so he is obviously a seasoned professional. He cut our lock in one swoop so he knows exactly what he is doing. He watched us lock them up so that is how he operates. He cases people locking up thier bikes then watches them walk away then goes up and then confidently pops the lock just like its his bike. You can't even tell he is cutting it. He thinks he is above being caught - well I caught him in the act and got 2 bikes back!!!

This is the se pdx bike thief. I took these pics from the sidewalk as I walked away from recovering my daughters bike. You can barely see my friend holding the other stolen bike we recovered in the background of the third photo. The first picture is the house on Madison where he stashes all his stolen bikes. Its just one block off of Hawthorne Street and 35th. There must be dozens if not hundreds of hot bikes in this guys house. The fourth picture is how a bike thief locks up a bike he is selling. Good luck getting your ripped off bike back!

Click for location: http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=en&geocode=&q=SE+35th+%26+Madison+St+Portland+Or&sll=45.519299,-122.628353&sspn=0.007187,0.019248&gl=us&g=SE+35th+Madison+Portland+Or&ie=UTF8&hq=&hnear=SE+Madison+St+&ll=45.512873,-122.628214&spn=0.057499,0.15398&z=1

i love the creative, humorous vigilantes on the ever-busy philadelphia listings...i wish one could actually have comments below listings....:)

"fully restored huffy" does that mean he loosens the cables and untrues the wheels?

UB - interesting. I've found both the vigilantes and their targets to be poorly educated, barely literate buffoons in Philly. The whiners post as much, or more, spam than those they complain about.

I actually had one very odd encounter just now...we have a guy in Philly named Joseph S who is constantly putting up vintage parts with no photos or descriptions. I often end up asking him (without realizing it's him) what the things are since you can't tell from his ads. Once I realize the stuff is his, I invariably show no further interest since the guy's stuff is always over priced and in very poor condition. He just sent me this incredibly rude email complaining that I always ask him what he has and apparently assuming I was harassing him or something.

Here are a few of his ads...
(please feel encouraged to email him asking what the stuff is)

http://philadelphia.craigslist.org/bik/1437136005.html

http://philadelphia.craigslist.org/bik/1437130479.html

UB - interesting. I've found both the vigilantes and their targets to be poorly educated, barely literate buffoons in Philly. The whiners post as much, or more, spam than those they complain about.

I actually had one very odd encounter just now...we have a guy in Philly named Joseph S who is constantly putting up vintage parts with no photos or descriptions. I often end up asking him (without realizing it's him) what the things are since you can't tell from his ads. Once I realize the stuff is his, I invariably show no further interest since the guy's stuff is always over priced and in very poor condition. He just sent me this incredibly rude email complaining that I always ask him what he has and apparently assuming I was harassing him or something.


I've seen his ads and stay away. Can usually smell it when something is not right...

Ejust...I'm not trying to bug the guy, but he generally puts up stuff that COULD be interesting. He tells you just enough to spark your interest, but not enough to know what the heck he's selling.

If I had a way of knowing it was his stuff, I'd never bother him.

He's clearly a mensa. Here's the email I received:

what do yo u think mavic bone head !some jappy hubs and i dont think it matters wienneman wheelset means what? *BLEEP* wienneman! are you the *bleep* biggest *Bleep* on here or what you answer all my ads and beg for info on crap! yo crap is crap! you will never find carbon hubs if thats what you are hoping for on 27 inch wheels! read a couple books pick up a few mags open your eyes look around~! i dont know go buy wtf your looking for and stop bothering people that put a good description to people that know a little bit about a bike will know what the *bleep* we are talking about! but maybe your just a *bleep* thinking he's doing someone on here a favor by asking for all kinds of stupid *bleep* if you dont know what the *bleep* some one is talking about go the *bleep* on to the next ad, *bleep*! god damn!are you trying to help sell my *bleep* because it all sells

I have better things to do than get worked up over CL nonsense.

I believe sellers can ask any price for an item they want.If a potential buyer were to ask me [say a friend asks me about a bikes price] I would tell them what I think.Its a free market,ask what you want and let the market set the price. Buyers should do their homework and investigate what they are putting their money into.

I enjoy reading the rants. Breaks up the monotony of searching for the same damn things every day, reading the same damn ads for $450 Grand Prix's and 'Vintage Italian Frienzenze's.'

If you want to see anarchy in action, check out the SFBA computer listings. You can't find anything there anymore - too much spam. The spammers and chiselers won, they took over the whole category.

I'm all for the CL nazi's flagging and posting about stuff that pisses them off. Keeps it honest. Er, honester. Maybe I mean a little less dishonest?

Without bonehead sellers what would we post on the CL thread?
But I will lament the scum that circumvent the rules and set up multiple accounts so they can continually repost the same unsold crap over and over weekly!

Ditto Miamijim

For everything except obvious fraud I'd say stay out of it. A price being too high-- yes this happens, but I don't think it warrants sticking one's nose in other people's business. The market does what work it will.

But I will say that if you spot an obvious fraud or a scam (or what you know to be a stolen bike being sold), that it probably is a good idea to warn.

"fully restored huffy" does that mean he loosens the cables and untrues the wheels?
:roflmao2:
This HAS to be your best post yet.

I've said this before and I'll say it again, I call our local CL vigalante the "Village Idiot". Most CL areas have one. Our Village Idiot used to attack almost anything, high prices, someone who picked up a bike cheap off CL, then flips it for more on CL, prices on vintage bikes he didn't agree with. He POd somebody because one dude threatened to sue him. He's been quiet since then.

While I agree that a seller should be able to ask any price he/she wants, I am going to take a different track.

We are deep into the world of virtual communities. C&V is a very good example of that. Shared interests, friendships, alliances, rivalries developing between people who, in all probability, will never meet face-to-face.

As part of the virtual community, eBay, specialty sellers/buyer forums and, to a degree, Craigslist create a virtual national and international community of specialty buyers and sellers who operate on reputation and trust. In that buyer/seller eCommerce world, your reputation is everything. One or two deals gone wrong, particularly on the bike specific specialty forums, and your are tainted. Therefore, these virtual communities are sort of self-policed.

In this virtual world, the vigilantes are financial gad flies reminding those who lack anything close to perfect market knowledge that many of the asking prices are too high. Are they accurate? Sometimes. Is this an outlet for crazies and malcontents? Yes. But such is the nature of the market and Democracy.

I remember that guy Rocco...he was incredibly annoying. Even more annoying than the guys he ranted about. If memory serves, he ended up accusing our local top posters of being some sort of bicycle mafia that were all in cahoots to steal, convert to fixie and over charge.

+1 When I see someone selling a Walmart bike used, then stating they paid $600 for it, I will call them out. Asking a high price is one thing, outright lies are over the top.

I'm pretty laissez-faire about the whole thing. I seldom flag anything, things rarely upset me on cl, and I sometimes find the vigilantes to be more harmful than the dubious sellers. Those sellers never seem to move their stuff.

I do appreciate the occasional post outing a seller for hocking something for more than it costs new, but I won't be the one to write it. I figure the market will govern itself. I find craigslist buyers to be intelligent people - at least the ones I come into contact with - and if one is foolish enough to make a poor buy from a dubious seller, I figure its a match made in heaven. I don't really think that way, I just don't waste my time considering what kind of off-color deals might be happening.

Paternalism is really the subject at hand. How much can we really save the public from themselves? I'd rather work towards educating the people who come to buy things from me, so they understand what they're getting and why. If I got into trying to prevent people from being ripped off, I'd have to start picketing on the street in front of certain brick and mortar bike shops. :eek:

I pretty much only flag the things where people are trying to hold an auction or if they are making over the top lies.

The flippers who repost there 5-20 over priced bikes every few days are the real scourge, and there is no way to control them. If enough people flag them, and the ad goes away, they just repost. They create so much clutter, well they take half the fun of scanning CL ads away.

There's a fine line between helping out and a personal vandeta.

There is stuff like this..

My first thought is why didn't you call the police and make a report?

http://portland.craigslist.org/mlt/bik/1436639401.html

MISSING A STOLEN BIKE IN SE??? - I know where it is... - (SE Madison)

Today will live in infamy as the day I expose the biggest most brazen bike thief in southeast pdx. If you have lost a bike, especially in the SE Portland and Hawthorne areas, then I know where your bike probably is. This thief is a full blown kleptomaniac - stealing everything in sight. I recently caught him in the act cutting our bike lock cable with a cable cutter and taking two of our bikes, in broad daylight, in front of a chuch, five minutes after we had just locked them up. I had been cased and targeted by this bike thief while in the process of l...

Human nature dictates that the expose' and vigilante types probably have a juvenile personality (are one maybe) or share some blame for the problem they howl about (like firefighters burning down building to get recognition for saving lives).

I've caught the same cat accusing folks of being frauds three times in the Electronics section here and he actually responded, scolded and penitant only to do it again.

Maybe he should stick with Atari and dial phones...what is worse he sounded like one of my relatives down dad's side.

+1 When I see someone selling a Walmart bike used, then stating they paid $600 for it, I will call them out. Asking a high price is one thing, outright lies are over the top.

This happens when the gold bullion and crack are gone and the 1973 Ford Country Squire Wagon can't be sold because where would you put all your junk?

That and eBay. See it enough and it warps your mind in the worst way.

Want your mind warped the right way? Watch a lot of Rocky and Bullwinkle

If you get seriously ripped off - here's an example.
I checked out Phillies tickets for fun - I was somewhat amazed that people would hand over $1,000 for 4 tickets only to get to the game to find out they're fake.

http://philadelphia.craigslist.org/tix/1437896659.html

I've been on CL this summer in the bikes section like it's crack cocaine or something. Can't stop myself. So here is my .02. If you post something on CL, and someone emails you a question, answer the email. If the item is sold, delete the listing. It's really not that hard.

I have also found that Craigslist has brought out the most illiterate group of human beings I have ever seen. It's as if no one knows how to use punctuation or sentence structure at all. And do not get me started on spelling. There is some idiot in my area, (Mpls/St Paul) who misspells Schwinn as often as possible, uses "coll" for "call" and is always looking for $100-$150 for $50 Huffy's and Magna's. Maybe he's from another country, maybe he's a drunk, maybe I shouldn't care. But I had to get that off my chest.

And I will flag each and every Razor Scooter that shows up on the bike board. Those are not bikes.:mad:

We also have such vigilantes on the Atlanta CL. I don't understand these people and the need to police the site warning people of rip offs. If the bike is a rip off, then it won't sell. If someone is on craigslist, then they have access to information on the internet about pricing. It is just a google search away. Let the market work it out. Do these vigilantes also stand outside of Wal-Mart to warn people that certain items there can be had more cheaply at Target?

I pretty much only flag the things where people are trying to hold an auction or if they are making over the top lies.

The flippers who repost there 5-20 over priced bikes every few days are the real scourge, and there is no way to control them. If enough people flag them, and the ad goes away, they just repost. They create so much clutter, well they take half the fun of scanning CL ads away.

I agree. I only flag something that is against Craigslist rules. I might think someone is either stupid or silly to be asking for some prices they do, but I don't flag them. If it's an outright lie, then I do flag.

My biggest pet peeve is items in the wrong category. It's not bad on CL, at least not in my part of the US. But there are certain eBay categories that I don't browse any more because they are filled with items that don't belong there. It makes it much more difficult to browse the category for the things you are interested in.

Selling a $300 bike from bikesdirect for near double the cost is pretty common on my CL. Sad, but true. Everything else (C&V wise) is fair game. People will post for what they want to sell it for. If you don't like the price and can't haggle walk away.

I've flagged a few ads, mostly annoying types for spam or overpost.
Really hate when people just post a bunch of names so their ad pops up in searches.
A car dealer nearby posted their complete inventory with a huge list of key words in each one,no matter what I searched for using the main window's search bar, or on craigs helper, brought up 20 or 30 ads from them.
After a few searches for bicycles and different tools and always having to pick through their ads it ticked me off so much I went through and flagged every one of them.

Another thing that gets me, more more in a "funny" mode, is when people list something that's so overpriced and with such a limited interest that it never sells, and keep listing it forever without lowering the price. (one ad I see regularly, has been listed about every month for a few years now, and always at the same $2500 price, get a clue dude!)

Ken.

Posting banter just raises noise and reduces signal on CraigsList, as far as I'm concerned.