Stigmas surrounding auctions still exist in the present day and age. Some confuse it with gambling, others consider it as an activity only those with excess money take part in. Or for those interested, auction houses aren’t at an accessible distance. Perhaps this false image could be rectified if auctions were more common and accessible for the general public. Online auction platforms are an answer to this issue while also solving the inaccessibility problem.
Online auction platforms aren’t a novel idea. Sites like eBay have auction features where users can put up items for bidding and bid on others’ posts. These platforms have existed for a long time, and so have scalpers. It’s not uncommon to hear of items being sold for exorbitant prices.
There are people who simply post a stock image of a popular item, slap an inflated price tag on it and claim it to be an authentic listing. When PlayStation 5 was just launched, hundreds- if not thousands- of scammers jumped on popular reselling sites “selling” PS5s for sky-high prices.
From Business Insider, “… some scammers are taking advantage of the scramble to get a PlayStation 5, with deceptive listings for photos of the consoles, some of which have prices already bid up hundreds of dollars.”
What’s Bid Point?
As the name suggests, Bid Point is an auction platform- an online auction platform. The site is similar to existing services like eBay and Etsy where users are both buyers and sellers.
Instead of a fixed selling price, sellers have to set a “starting amount” (the usual procedure for an auction) and other users (“buyers”) will bid on the item.
In physical auctions, the price gradually increases till the bidding ceases and the last person to bid walks away with the item. In Bid Point, the hammer hits the gavel when the seller closes the listing. In this case, the person with the highest bid (or the last bidder at the time of closing) will be the “winner”.
How does Bid Point overcome the challenges in the auction scene?
In traditional auction settings, bidders have to be present in the auction house for the entire bidding session, which can be inconvenient for many.
Being an online platform, users can take part in auctions without having to leave their houses. With a simple and intuitive user interface, the site allows people from all walks of life to bid on whatever interests them in just a few clicks.
Website Architecture
The entirety of the website is constructed using Python, Django, Bootstrap, HTML, CSS and JavaScript.
User and post data is stored using SQLite in form of tables as illustrated.
Queries are used to send data from the HTML forms to the database and vice-versa. Data validation takes place using these queries as well.
The web application has made use of the CRUD (Create-Read-Update-Delete) model when it comes to the admin panel. From the panel, admins can:
- Create users, listings, bids or comments directly.
- Read all available information on the website, including user comments, current listings, comments and user data.
- Update/change values of any of the above information.
- Delete users, listings, bids or comments from the database.
Risk Analysis
Multiple third-party services exist that have the capability to give the website a more sleek look and make certain functions easier to code. However, if the website were to heavily depend on these, failure of one service may cause the entire website to stop working as intended. To counter this, third-party integrations have been kept to a minimum.
Conclusion
Bid Point is a simple, easy-to-use platform that allows users from all over the world to engage in bids from the comfort of their home.
Packed with security measures to ensure neither the buyer nor the seller get swindled out of their money, Bid Point is a step ahead in the online market space. The project has potential to give way to more professional and polished sites with stronger security checks that can completely change the online auction scene.
However at the end of the day, users are responsible for their own monetary decisions and no amount of artificial intelligence will be able to prevent the consequences of humans’ actions.