CA Announcement Coming Tuesday January 9, 2018

[The Computer Audiophile]

Hi Guys - We've been working behind the scenes on something special for the last six months. We'll make an announcement Tuesday January 9, 2018.

 

Here is a teaser:

 

[The Computer Audiophile]

Hi Guys - I love it!

 

Just what I'd love to do to bolster integrity, announce a serpentine cable :~)

 

That German women's clothing chain is pretty similar. I'm sure there are others.  Here are a couple good articles about similar logos, it happens all the time:

https://digitalsynopsis.com/design/famous-logos-that-look-similar/

https://www.logodesignlove.com/similar-original-logos

[The Computer Audiophile]

18 minutes ago, rando said:

My guess is he lined up sponsorship deal for new women's side of the forum to cross market appeal.  Effectively forming another source of income by using the resultant data to create a design studio for audiophile designers.  By partnering with a fabric and fashion conscious brand he can tie the two services together.  Now she can have the utmost of WAF when friends come over and the new speaker grilles go on that make those pesky speakers acceptable to look at.

With ideas like this, I know why I love you guys so much.

 

You guys are awesome.

[The Computer Audiophile]

Again, you guys a too good. Thanks for the interest!

 

Burning the midnight oil to have everything in place for Tuesday. Wish I was just listening to Midnight Oil instead. Would be a lot simpler :~)

[The Computer Audiophile]

Ha.

 

shooting for 10:00 am central us time on the 9th. 

[The Computer Audiophile]

 

[The Computer Audiophile]

12 minutes ago, rando said:

Now that you've had enough time to sober up from the gala opening party last night.  How did the launch go yesterday?  

Ha!

 

With 6 hours sleep in two days, I went to bed as early as I could. The launch went really well. No major problems to report, only minor hiccups / hiccoughs. 

 

We are receiving inquires from manufacturers and dealers, as well as private sellers to list items for sale. So far so good. I love the fact that I can send work to my brother rather than doing it all myself! Refreshing :~)

 

 

[The Computer Audiophile]

2 minutes ago, GUTB said:

I noticed the tonearm banner is animated and I'm pretty sure it wasn't at launch.

It has been animated for months :~)

[The Computer Audiophile]

8 hours ago, Superdad said:

If you want private party members to embrace buying and selling there, I seriously think you need to add a means to filter/view private seller ads versus the resellers who are setting up shop.

 

For one, presently the reseller listings swamp the few private listings.  People who want to hunt for nice deals on used stuff have to scroll through pages of list-price reseller listings--even if one narrows to a category such as cables or headphones.

 

Hi Alex - Thanks for the feedback. Even though you are the only person ever in the history of CA to request the ability to see advertisements when you are a paid ad-free member, I highly value your input.

 

The ability to filter private seller vs commercial seller is already built into the platform. It can be done a couple different ways. If someone tags an item Private we can display a little logo in the upper left corner of the image in the search results, and the products can be filtered in the left-hand column. We can also include an attribute option for sellers to select if they are private or a commercial entity. This is really easy. 

 

More information on this to follow.

 

 

 

 

8 hours ago, Superdad said:

Secondly, when viewing a listing from a private seller, there is not much clue that the goods are offered by a private party. (I tried filtering on Used, but still mostly Ciamara listings came up.)

 

 

 

How do you suggest we differentiate this other than how it's already done? Perhaps I'm not following you here.

 

 

 

 

 

8 hours ago, Superdad said:

Also, knowing who is shipping the product--Superphonica or the seller--would be helpful.  And you should not allow listings where the seller has not set shipping costs (here is an example: https://superphonica.com/all-products/components-digital/streamers/lumin-u1-lumin-power-supply/ ; You can go all the way through checkout--to just before the payment button--without getting a shipping rate.)

 

 

When Superphonica is handling fulfillment, it will clearly state this is the case. Because fulfillment is vastly different from all other marketplaces, we assume people will default to thinking Superphonica is NOT fulfilling the shipment, unless otherwise stated. 

 

 

 

8 hours ago, Superdad said:

Frankly, the more I think about it, the more I think that reseller shops and private party listings ought to be in entirely different--but similar looking--sections of Superphonica.  This would also allow you to do various listing and back-end tweaks appropriate to each.

 

Not following you on this one. Please help me, I'd love to know more and improve what we have.

 

 

It's all a work in progress and can be adjusted as needed. 

 

 

[The Computer Audiophile]

8 hours ago, PeterSt said:

 

Hey Alex - it is there in the text (like "buyer pays for shipping"). Personally I think that there should be a formal text field for this. Also, it is quite undoable for larger items to list one price for shipping.

 

Another remark would be that no-one uses PayPal etc. for the larger amounts. It is too expensive. So now we need wire transfer data.

Otoh, these things normally are dealt with by email exchange. YMMV it maybe it is what one is used to.

 

 

Hi Peter - Because shipping is so variable and everyone has their own limits as to where and how they will ship, we leave it open for the seller to have some freedom. 

 

you can say in the description: Please contact for a shipping quote or shipping determined once product is actually shipped etc... For products like a small widget that someone specified will only ship within his own country, then shipping is simple to set a flat rate.

 

We leave it open for people to also specify in the description that they will only ship to certain countries or only ship next day air etc...

 

You can also specify that you won't accept PayPal. You can't disable PayPal, but if you say in the description that you will refund all Payments received by PayPal, it makes no sense for someone to use PayPal. Sure they may not read the description, but that's on them.

 

 

 

 

[The Computer Audiophile]

1 hour ago, mfin said:

make sure that the experience is right for people wanting to buy from private sellers.

 

Hi mfin - Thanks for taking time to give us feedback. We gave people the ability to filter by private sellers only. This should make the experience just right for them. 

 

Its currently dependent on tagging a product  as Private Seller. Then buyers can view only private sales if desired. 

 

Perhaps a private seller only area is desired?

 

 

 

1 hour ago, mfin said:

Any chance of things like a UK section with £GBP prices? Euro-wide section with Euro prices. Does the platform you are using have potential for that?

 

 

Looking into this now. 

 

 

 

[The Computer Audiophile]

14 minutes ago, mfin said:

I think it is important to have a very clear and instantly easy view of "Private Sellers only" because people tend to use Forums for private sales and buying, mixing them up with Retail Sales is not that appealing to a lot of people. If people think it becomes mostly Retail Sales, you will fail in getting traction right from the off.

 

Of course, it is simple to understand how and why Retail Sales are important to you too.

 

Forums are where people go looking for used equipment, it is the natural habitat as forums are populated by these communities. Pushing a retail agenda alongside it can mess it up. Look at WigWam, to most people the store is completely polluted by retailers, so it's hardly worth looking or searching through if you want to ignore retail sales.

Hi mfin - Perhaps you can help me a bit on this one. 

 

When I'm looking to buy something, I search for what I want or I filter based on my own criteria. If I want something used only or new only, I am happy to select such criteria if the store or marketplace allows such filtering.

 

If we enable users to filter by their own criteria such as used, new, private seller etc... why would they feel that the marketplace was polluted? Honestly, I want to understand so we can best serve people.

 

When I'm looking for a DAC I don't feel like a store is polluted if they also sell amplifiers.

 

From a consumer / buyer perspective we want to offer people the most options. Searching for a DAC to purchase, it's nice to see the new options and right next to it, the used options. The choice is right there in front of people, rather than searching several different places. 

 

The only agenda we are pushing is choice for the consumer and a central location for all audio gear. 

 

I shop at B&H Photo quite a bit. I really dislike the requirement to browse the used section in a completely different area of the site. I'd love all the products co-mingled, with the ability to filter out results. 

 

We are certainly not right, as there is no right or wrong here. We appreciate the help you're providing in making Superphonica the best it can be. Also, feel free to PM me if you'd like. 

 

 

 

[The Computer Audiophile]

I should also note, there is a view of the products that's ugly but I want to offer it because some people will prefer it. It's called Product List View. There are some filters and we can customize this a bit more as well.

 

https://superphonica.com/list/

[The Computer Audiophile]

I just added some filters to the list view. So far I can't do multiple selections within a filter.

[The Computer Audiophile]

1 minute ago, Superdad said:

Chris:

 

For at least two used items that I put into a cart--and went all the way to entering my address, with the screen ready to hit the payment button--the items in the cart still said "The seller hasn't set a fixed shipping fee."  Which seems to mean that either:

a) The seller would have to contact me for payment of shipping;

or:

b) I would compete the purchase and the shipping charged would simply be a surprise.

 

Neither scenario will be appealing to buyers.  Please explain.

 

Thanks,

--Alex

 

P.S. @mfin has done a great job explaining the sentiments that I and many other average-Joe buyers--coming from say Audiogon--are likely to have.

 

I've been working the resolution to that shipping issue this afternoon and I'm about to put it into place this evening.

 

The issue revolves around components that may have very wide price swings depending on the shipping options, and people not wanting to charge too much or too little. Thus, we let people opt not to put in a shipping charge. It's not how I would sell something, but people want it. 

 

In a few minutes, there will be messages in the cart and at checkout that explain to the buyer that the seller has either accidentally not entered a shipping cost or purposely not entered a shipping cost because he wants to charge the correct amount. It also explains that the buyer will have to contact the seller to have him enter a shipping cost in the product in order for it to be purchased. 

 

We are trying to accommodate sellers in this strange HiFi situation. Ii can't think of many other scenarios where people say - contact me and I'll determine shipping and then you can purchase etc...

 

Again, this isn't how I'd do it. In fact, i'd be turned off buying something if I had to go through this type of thing. I want add to cart and to see a shipping charge. If it seems reasonable I'll buy it. If I was shopping eBay and someone said shipping determined later, I'd move on to the next person selling the item. That's just me. 

[The Computer Audiophile]

1 minute ago, mansr said:

I agree. The full cost must be known before committing to anything.

Absolutely. We don't allow checkout unless full cost is known.

[The Computer Audiophile]

3 minutes ago, rando said:

 

You forgot the ®.  

 

@mfin Might not have been clear what my intent there was.  You more than took up the torch leading off into the wilderness though.  Without banging on about originality, or lack thereof, it is this very thing that will be needed for success.  You recognize it is the core functionality that needs to be sculpted into rough form at this stage.  This is the type of input it appears they need to hear.  Being based in experience with a fair amount of previous attempts by forums to split off in this direction.  

 

I'm as wary of giving free advice as receiving it.  With that grain of salt, would it be worthwhile to have @Dave pencil in an hour every week to add some form to these discussions?  Randomly attacking whatever comes to mind doesn't account for where he is currently facing difficulties or would prosper from outside input.  

 

Hi Guys - Thanks for the continued feedback and advice. It's all helpful. 

 

We'll be posting regular updates on the Superphonica forum section about what enhancements, changes, updates have been made, and encouraging feedback. I'm working on a little update right now.

 

https://www.computeraudiophile.com/forums/forum/94-superphonica/

 

 

[The Computer Audiophile]

I just posted the update for today in the Superphonica forum.