Vic, I just read thru this part four of your blog and I agree, that spending money on MD or Doritos you don't plan to consume, could be better spend on paying down your credit. In a small way I helped you, by giving you free codes.
After years of struggling, I am in a better place.
First of, I am prepaying bills. Insurance, phone, internet etc pp.
I have five cards open.
One for gas, Emergency, Zero balance
One for the truck. Plan to pay that of by April 2018.
One for the House. Use payments to pay down this loan. Difficult as stuff always breaks.
Yes I have some savings, but at times credit will have to do. WOOHOO 2017 has been good.

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Pluto will always be a Planet to me.

The main purpose of this sort of scheme (scam) is to increase sales in a product- in general they will be looking for between 5:1 and 20:1 increase in profit value over the value of the goods being "sold" for the duration of the scheme - absolutely nothing altruistic in it, just pure greed on behalf of the companies concerned.

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Bob Smith
Member of Seti PIPPS (Pluto is a Planet Protest Society)
Somewhere in the (un)known Universe?

I just looked up the price of an Xbox one X console. on the Microsoft site. Its listed at $ 499.00 US.
Id like to know VIc, Is how much you have spent of your own money or put on your credit cards buying soda and chips that you will throw away?
Seems to me that you could have saved the money and bought one. Every day the bid just keeps on getting higher. Your wasting money on a fools errand.

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[/quote]

Old James

Less than half, lots of items on sale.

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The T1 Trust, PRR T1 Class 4-4-4-4 #5550, 1 of America's First HST's

OK I'm at 38,100 points, I'm done entering all the bottles and bags, ugh.
I had to hunt thru 6 bags to correct an error, but I corrected that error.

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The T1 Trust, PRR T1 Class 4-4-4-4 #5550, 1 of America's First HST's

Vic, I just read thru this part four of your blog and I agree, that spending money on MD or Doritos you don't plan to consume, could be better spend on paying down your credit. In a small way I helped you, by giving you free codes.
After years of struggling, I am in a better place.
First of, I am prepaying bills. Insurance, phone, internet etc pp.
I have five cards open.
One for gas, Emergency, Zero balance
One for the truck. Plan to pay that of by April 2018.
One for the House. Use payments to pay down this loan. Difficult as stuff always breaks.
Yes I have some savings, but at times credit will have to do. WOOHOO 2017 has been good.

Thank you for your effort Ulrike.

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The T1 Trust, PRR T1 Class 4-4-4-4 #5550, 1 of America's First HST's

Ok, I'm in 1st place out of 50 entries for an Xbox One X Console and a game, I have 38,100 points.

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The T1 Trust, PRR T1 Class 4-4-4-4 #5550, 1 of America's First HST's

Time listed is 7:42am PST, on 11/20/2017, and I think I will win one today.
Wish Me luck!

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The T1 Trust, PRR T1 Class 4-4-4-4 #5550, 1 of America's First HST's

+1

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...

There must be a certain strategy to playing this game. Are the other 11 top contenders holding back on their bids until the final hour? Do most contenders keep from emptying their points bank until the last minute? Do contestants know what other players' highest bids have been in other rounds? I can see a strategic advantage to knowing this information.

Vic, I wish you the very best of luck, but even if you win a gaming system today I still think that the three BIGGEST winners are PepsiCo, Frito-Lay and MicroSoft. This is a relatively cheap way to move product. This is a relatively cheap way to attract new customers. This is a relatively cheap way to advertise.

There must be a certain strategy to playing this game. Are the other 11 top contenders holding back on their bids until the final hour? Do most contenders keep from emptying their points bank until the last minute? Do contestants know what other players' highest bids have been in other rounds? I can see a strategic advantage to knowing this information.

Vic, I wish you the very best of luck, but even if you win a gaming system today I still think that the three BIGGEST winners are PepsiCo, Frito-Lay and MicroSoft. This is a relatively cheap way to move product. This is a relatively cheap way to attract new customers. This is a relatively cheap way to advertise.

Yes.
If you register you can access this page which gives you bidding history.

This was yesterday's trend. You can access by day or even the trend for the entire game. You can select which version of the prize and even bid times.
Here is today's detail.

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I'm not sure if these two links will show the information I see outside of the USA:
The first link is to the current state of play in all today's auctions:
https://www.every60seconds.com/auctions

The second is to the auction I think Vic is taking part in:
https://www.every60seconds.com/auctions/shadow-of-war

From what I can see, one places a bid, and it is "ranked" onto the table, if later someone places a higher bid you move down the table - only top and bottom place bids are shown, you can't see if the bidder in front is ten points or a thousand points ahead of you.

This is a bit like a Dutch Auction, a sealed bid auction and a game of chance - right up until the last second of your bid being "top dog" you can be out-bid, then, as far as I can see, you are moved across onto the next auction (unless of course it's the last one of the day).

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Bob Smith
Member of Seti PIPPS (Pluto is a Planet Protest Society)
Somewhere in the (un)known Universe?

I can see the contests from your links. Thanks! Very exciting, but oh no!!! Somebody just outbid Vic.

That does it! If I can manage to get to the grocery store this evening, there's going to be a bag of Cool Ranch Doritos in my cart.

Hang on, Vic!!!

Edit: Oh silly me. The numbers aren't rankings, but rather Auction Numbers. Looks like Vic is still winning. I still want the chips though... Damn those advertising geniuses!!!

You've fallen under their spell - now you must buy all the Cool Ranch Doritos you can find ;-)

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Bob Smith
Member of Seti PIPPS (Pluto is a Planet Protest Society)
Somewhere in the (un)known Universe?

The Force can have a strong influence on the weak-minded.

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Don't take life too seriously, as you'll never come out of it alive!

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I got a bag. The outside of the bag said it was worth 200 points.

I opened the bag and dumped the chips into a Tupperware for later enjoyment.

There is some writing inside, so I assume that is the code. I'll pm it to Vic now.

Eric and I often have cocktails and appetizers for dinner on Monday nights. Some couples do this on Friday nights, but we like to start our weeks out right! Eric will be so excited to find that one of our cocktail nibbles for the evening consists of a big Tupperware container full of Cool Ranch Doritos. He likes them almost as much as I do.

I can see the contests from your links. Thanks! Very exciting, but oh no!!! Somebody just outbid Vic.

That does it! If I can manage to get to the grocery store this evening, there's going to be a bag of Cool Ranch Doritos in my cart.

Hang on, Vic!!!

Edit: Oh silly me. The numbers aren't rankings, but rather Auction Numbers. Looks like Vic is still winning. I still want the chips though... Damn those advertising geniuses!!!

Yes Angela, I'm in 4th place now, I'm still among the 50 and so I'm not worried, beyond 50 and one gets nothing, though ones points are returned.

My auction ends at maybe 6:11pm PST, a bit later if someone bids above Me.

I just got back from having some work done on My car, I had the new tires put on, now the car has a smoother ride, not so jarring, and I had the serpentine belt replaced, I also got 2.099 gallons of gasoline for the car @ $2.859 a gallon($6.00 paid).

I also got a FREE 2018 calendar of exotic cars, a Yellow 2014 Ferrari 458 Speciale is on the cover, the FORD GT is the April pic, but no FORD Mustang calendar. sigh.

On Wednesday I'm going to take about 5 bags of bottles into Barstow and recycle them, plus get about 7.59 gallons of gasoline for My trip, I get about 33mpg out of the 18yr old car, and then get the car washed.

If you want Doritos, you'd have to come down here Angela, I doubt Free chips would be an incentive, they'd be various types of Doritos Mixed chips, plus two of the Limon variety that are in the wrong bags, one as Nacho Cheese and one as Cool Ranch, all folded at the top, and stapled shut. And I have no idea on how much it would cost to ship and box what amounts to maybe a trash bag of chips via the USPS.

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The T1 Trust, PRR T1 Class 4-4-4-4 #5550, 1 of America's First HST's

If you want Doritos, you'd have to come down here Angela,...

My bag says 12 chips = 150 calories. I'm not going anywhere near your giant stockpile of girth expanders!!! I will be hard pressed to stop at 12 chips later this evening.

Nom, nom, nom, nom, nom, nom, nom!

Thanks to Angela, I now have another 200 points, so My total points are at 38,300.

Thanks Angela, much appreciated.

Vic

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The T1 Trust, PRR T1 Class 4-4-4-4 #5550, 1 of America's First HST's