Discussion Forums - Questions about SwapaCD

I think this is more of a vent, but why do so many people post CD's that they can't send out or can't find, etc.  Five of the last seven requests of mine have been canceled because the member "can't send it".  These are wish listed CD's on auto-request, so I know they were posted right before I (the system) requests it.  Then the requests time out.

Why are people doing this?  Is it to get free credits for posting and then they never send anything out???  I rarely have this issue on PBS, and never with wish listed items.

Any input?  Do these types of transactions put a "black mark" on the members' accounts?  I rarely get notes about the problem.  Once someone said, "I can't find it".  That's fine, but when things just time out with no explanation, well, it's *very* frustrating!

JC

I can think of two reasons:

1.  The one you stated above, to get a free credit.  It's a lot of work IMO to input a bunch of CDs just to 'earn' a 'free' used CD, but some folks sincerely get a sense of accomplishment by doing that.

2.  I think this happens a lot:  Say a guy 'Joey' posts a bunch of CDs.   The usual ones at first --  Ace Of Base, Jewel, Lisa Stansfield ... of course those will stay in the system forever with no takers.  Then Joey enters a Beatles CD.  It is snapped up by someone almost immediately, and Joey gets what I'll call "poster's remorse", thinking the CD must be valuable or something since it was grabbed the instant it was posted, and Joey all of a sudden thinks he's being taken advantage of.  He reconsiders, and concludes the Beatles CD needs to stay in his collection since it was jumped on so quickly.

Jay

The "Can't Send It" and "Can't find it" are stock answers, aren't they?  Not a lot of room there to say, "I thought I'd just listen one more time, so I took it to work and then forgot it there and when I called my co-worker to make sure no one else walks away with it before I go back to work next week she couldn't find it."  Whew!

Also, the poster has a finite amount of time to respond to the request and sometimes doesn't get to it for any number of reasons. 

And people are posting their CDs for sale and swap at places other than this site.  Maybe it went out via one of them and the poster just didn't get an opportunity to pull it from their CD Tower here. 

Still, this is a bit ridiculous.  I've been a member for just a few days.  I originally requested 14 CDs, and so far HALF of them have been cancelled, with three more sitting at "Waiting for member".

That's just annoying and rude.  Over at PBS I don't have half or more of my requests cancelled by the sender.  If you have a CD available on your tower, send it out when requested.  If you don't want to send out the CD, then don't have it on your tower.  Duh.

It is just very upsetting to find certain CDs available, and think you are going to get them, only to have half or more of them turned down.  If this continues, I'll probably not use SACD.  What's the point?

A good place to display your massive CD collection without trading them is LALA.com.

There's a lot of snobs there. Join them.

Only post what you're willing to trade here. That's what is great about SwapaCD!

Love it!!

Amanda,

I went through what you are expieriencing when I first joined, but somehow, it "righted" itself in a couple of weeks, and now things are great!  Just be patient with it, and things should come around...

I've found people to be pretty conscientious here, but things do go a bit more slowly than, say... on lala, since this system inherently give more time to the sender to get the CD out of his/her door...

Brian

I hope it gets better, because I love the concept of this site.  I wonder if part of the problem is because I have requested primarily Christmas CDs, and perhaps people either can't find the CDs, or decide that they want to keep them through the holidays.  The one non-Christmas one I requested was shipped out and arrived very quickly.

Check out my holiday hummers! Might be one you like!

Steve

I started requesting my Christmas CDs over the summer and was able to get all of them.  Maybe it is, like you said, because of the upcoming holidays and people getting sentimental when they are reminded of that CD. 

I know the CVS drugstore across the street from me went from the Back to School decor straight to the Christmas stuff.  They cleared a little out for Halloween and suspect they'll do the same for Thanksgiving.  I guess seeing stuff in stores may also remind you to take stock of your Christmas collectibles.

I know it happens now and again but after swapping almost 200 discs, it really is the exception not the rule. Even now I have a disc that has been in my request slot for about 3 weeks, and no one seems to have it available to send. I know its out there somewhere, I'll just have to wait for one of those auto-requests to stick.

One solution is to make some friends while you're here, gain a rapport with some people and just request it directly from them if available. There are many people on the site who have been around from the beginning, with vast towers who are exceptional swappers! I have had many requests accepted, printed, mailed and received in as little as 3 days!

I can't speak for the rest, but I know that when I first started swapping, my response time was probably slow and I didn't necessarially run to the post office to send them out. But that began to change as I started receiving discs in the mail quickly and on a regular basic. It really became an incentive to do the same for others! Also, I know I have had to cancel some requests in the past for various reasons. I canceled one because upon closer inspection, it was scratched, and I didn't want to send a sub-par disc. One was cancelled because I inadvertently posted it incorrectly, and one was cancelled because I literally couldn't find it. So, I know it happens for various reasons, and most of them are likely legitimate and on the level.

Just try to remember that the goal of the side is to 'swap' discs and not necessarially 'order' them. Sometimes things will be readily available, Like Jewel - Pieces of You, and sometimes they will be hard to come by like The Beatles White album. But most discs fall somewhere in between. You just have to find the things you want, order them if they're available, or add them to your wish list if not. Eventually you will get what your looking for, it just may take a little time. For me the savings is worth the wait.

I thought I was going to have to cancel one that was requested from me because while I had the case, obvs, when I posted it, when I opened it up to package the disc, I found the disc was missing. Luckily I was able to find the disc for it, but I didnt realize the disc wasn't there when I posted it. Sometimes, its just an honest mistake when someone has to cancel a request.  

I think there is a fairly significant number of people who join this site (and/or lala) and when they don't immediately get the results they expected they get bored and forget about the site.  Then when one of their discs is finally requested, they are no where to be found and the request times out.

As I learned recently, when a request times out waiting for a member to respond, that disc is then removed from the member's list.  So there won't be any further problem with trying to get that disc from that member.  I recently had a specific disc time out on three people in a row.  Aarrrgh!

When I first signed up here, I hated how I had to immediately deal with requests for CDs I could send or receive. I just wanted to set up my want list and CD tower before doing any of that. But the redirects drove me mad! So I just stopped coming here and ignored every e-mail I received about requests. I didn't realize that those requests sat there for five days. So I now feel bad. Haha!

I do believe that new users should be set to a default setting that leaves the account inactive, giving them time to set up their lists and get used to how things work here before they're redirected to the trading pages and forced to accept/decline trades. They can set it to active later. It doesn't seem like a big deal once you are used to the site, but it drove me insane at first, really annoying. And that's why I gave up on the site until recently.

Are you specifying that you want the artwork with it? Maybe the requests were made to people that have the CD only, so they were cancelled. I would rather wait than get something different  or less than what I requested. 

i have had 3 or 4 cds this week from my WL that the member then decided they couldnt ship. no explenations or anything. it so frustrating. especially when you have been waiting for the particular cd for any amount of time.

i personally look at every cd condition BEFORE i post it, and once they are posted i keep them all in the same place so none of them get lost.

PBS has the same problem from time to time.  You may not have it, but I've had books cancelled recently for that reason, and every now and then there is a rant in the forums.

It may also be a growth thing--PBS is an older site than this one, so there are probably more active members for each new member joining.  So more likely the post is from someone who understands the system.

With a lot of lala folks coming over, they may not realize they have to ship the CD if it goes on their tower--from what I have gleaned from the forums, that isn't how it works over there.

"With a lot of lala folks coming over, they may not realize they have to ship the CD if it goes on their tower--from what I have gleaned from the forums, that isn't how it works over there."

It happened to me.  Then I learned to put "Hold" as the default.  Same with requesting.  Some CDs I'm pretty sure I want but don't want to request them right now.  I accidentally requested two, then I learned to put them on hold so they'll be on my list so I can have it ready for ordering later.

I bet a lot of people cross list their inventory on multiple swap sites. So if they trade something away on swaptree, they might forget to delete it from their inventory on swapacd. That's my theory. I can't imagine losing things like books and cd's so often, unless they move a lot. My apartment only has 3 rooms, so it's tough to lose anything here.

"I bet a lot of people cross list their inventory on multiple swap sites. So if they trade something away on swaptree, they might forget to delete it from their inventory on swapacd. "

I've actually had this listed as the excuse for 3 cancelled trades here at Swap, always with the "traded at another site." What I never understood is the fact that the discs were posted at all because I requested them from the "CDS posted today" page. It can be frustrating but it all balances out after a while.