Craiglist Razzie's vintage bike edition 2018

This is, mostly, tongue in cheek as I realize I am both a bike nerd and experienced in working with Craigslist.  I do realize not everyone gives a lot of thought to what will make an item sell and they may not really even know what they have or how to present it.

Yes you sensed a "but" coming, nearly everyone in North America has a mobile phone, and even the most basic has a camera function.  And both the camera and the laptop you may be uploading it to have editing software that a chimp could use, believe me most chimps would probably be better at it than I am.  My premise, then is that there is really no reason to A) not have a picture of your item, and B) not have a halfway decent picture or half a dozen decent pictures.  Craigslist allows you 24 pictures per  post in fact.

Finally my basic assumption is that you put something on CL because you want to sell it, wouldn't you want to make it easy for someone to like your item then if you want to sell it?  or heck forget like how about being able to identify it.

With that background I present the 2018 Craigslist Razzie's bike category.

No photo

Yes in 2018 people with internet access are posting CL ads with no photos.  My example is a person who advertised a "Raleigh Super Coarse" for $350.  Now it would help if they spelled Course correctly but I am no spelling whiz so I will let that slide.  I am puzzled though as to how you can ask premium dollars for something you don't even have a photo of.  I would normally just brush this off but I actually responded to the ad and, kindly I hope, suggested that without photos the bike would have a hard time selling and btw its spelled Course which will make it easier for people to find it.

Lazy

I have two examples of the Lazy category.

This was advertised simply as blue road bike, I would like your $40 but I can't be bothered to take 5 seconds to back the bike out of the dark hole to take a decent picture.  I will say that many folks who take only one picture do at least identify the maker and model of the bike so I can use the interwebs to figure out what it should look like,

This is lazy for another reason, I get that taking a bike down off the hooks is a hassle, even if you are figuring to sell it, BUT you can use the orient button on your edit software- and in like 5 seconds the bike looks right side up. And you can spend and additional 5 seconds to apply the "magic wand" button and clear up that focus.  This seller posted two pictures, they were exactly the same....smh.

Deliberately obtuse

This person took 3 photos and to their credit even a couple nice close ups...

They were all with bike upside down!  Do you think I need a neck stretch, or that I will actually try to ride it this way?

Clueless

Again I get the fact I am looking for details in bike ads but..

this is your only shot, really?  What can I tell from this shot, its got a rack and flat bars and is presumably a mountain bike?  Why do I have to be Sherlock Holmes when you want me to buy this?  Hmm where should I take this shot? hallway or outside in the great outdoors, I'm going with narrow hallway.

In the Dark

I see a lot of these and they would be pretty easy to fix by either taking the shots in decent light or

using your editing software, btw dark or a cluttered background - pick one.

The Grand prize winner

This one actually made me laugh out loud...

What I imagine happened is the bike got leaned up against a picnic table next to a campfire at about 10 pm and then the seller ran by the bike and snapped a picture.

Ok rant over, is it just me?  tell me its not just me.