I recieved a message from another trader that was spreading the news, it seems like the creator has been out of reach for a long time and the site started to have problems.
Sad to see it go, I discovered barter just a bit over a month ago and I liked it.
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(Speaking as someone who chatted with him on a regular basis, including the day before his absence:)
He vanished from all communication avenues (despite every indication that he'd be logging back on in the next day as normal) all at once, over a year ago. The working assumption is that he's no longer able to go online. The site, however, still works perfectly fine, except by the same niche mislinking for games that SG itself has, and that the site still links to SteamGifts for feedback rather than to SteamTrades.
Put another way, there's nothing within the site itself that'll inherently break itself without maintenance, and the site itself has been functioning just fine on its own for a long enough while now that there shouldn't be any chance at surprises from that avenue.
That said, it looks like it's no longer validating Steam logins correctly, so it may have become functionally dead all at once, with that.
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Woah, that kinda sounds like he died. Is a bit scary when you stop to think that unlike IRL on the internet people just vanish without leaving a trace when they pass away.
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Not anymore, really.
People have stopped being able to log back in if they get logged off.
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Hey, you look familiar... ;)
I was logged out this morning but had no trouble logging back in. Is this still an issue for other people?
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Well I've talked with the owner of Barter.vg before and I'm friends with a guy who's trying to create a barter replacement(haven't talked to him in a while though but I'm part of his group). I stopped using barter about a year or 2 ago myself. Reasons being unfavorable trades but that's another story.
Anyway by the looks of it the owner of barter quit maintaining the site almost 3 years ago. The site was just some economic project for him if i remember correctly and he was done with it. The site has been breaking down (wrong links, prices, trade options, etc) slowly over time even a year ago. I have no idea what the state of the site is now though. But I seem to recall that the owner stopped paying server fees or something and eventually it's all gonna come down anyway since he never transferred ownership to anybody else.
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Just a few threads down from yours: https://www.steamgifts.com/discussion/Uo7iP/anyone-else-having-trouble-with-bartervg
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Pretty much, basically you've only got until your login cookie expies to continue using the site.
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This workaround has been making the rounds so I might as well mention it here:
You can extend the expiration date of your cookie using a cookie editor like http://www.editthiscookie.com/
Not a fix by any means, but it's something.
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Thank you, my login would expire in 3 days.
Glad I was ahead of it.
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Thank you for this tipp, I extended my cookie. Not sure if it'll be of much help, since a lot of the userbase is going to get lost and nobody new will be able to register.
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A replacement site has recently gone public, hopefully it will gain enough popularity to properly replace barter.
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I'm sure it's a great tool for most people, but I never managed to figure out its interface or how to actually use it. 😐
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I'd be very interested in suggestions to improve usability.
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The first thing that comes to mind is the section where you pick what you want to give and what you want to take, when creating a trade offer.
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Apart from the fact that it's overcrowded, it does the job it's asked to. I'm staying close to that on LT, albeit less crowded for now.
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Well, I never meant to criticise it, I just don't get it. Some people and some interfaces are just a bad match.
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At least now you'll have a good opportunity to offer suggestions on improving the system!
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Fair enough! :) If I was in charge, I would probably make it a two-pane, wide element. And less white, going by memory I would give more visual structure to the whole thing. It seems I was logged out of Barter and as expected I can't log back in, so I can't be more precise right now.
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Barter has a dark theme for logged in users. But it's fugly so I never use it. I'll try to implement a good deal theme in the future.
Wide panes are only good if you expect your users to have a 1080p screen. The default at steam is <1000px wide so it's a de facto standard. I actually tried making a horizontal layout for my system that would turn vertical on smaller screens, but it forced me to forego crucial information like ratios, rating and card number. I had to make a choice. Nothing that can't be fixed in the future, though. Just tell me what you think when I release the trade system.
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Interesting. It's cool that you listen to feedback like this. But what do you mean with the <1000px thing? That the majority of Steam users have a screen with less than 1000 pixels in width? Or are you talking about the safe area of Steam's website?
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Safe area yes. 960px is the de facto standard width for web designers who work with grid based layouts, because it's divisible with many numbers (of columns). The steam site is a bit wider especially in profile headers but it's the same idea. When the site was launched most people were in 1024x768 so it's probably a remnant of that era. Personally I'm in 1280x1024 (any developer will tell you that screen height is more important to them than screen width), and i have a sidebar in my browser for tabs, so my width is about 1000px, which helps me develop layouts for the standard width. Finally, don't forget about mobile. They're between 480 and 640px in effective width these days. Not using the full width of a window later makes it easier to adapt to narrower screens. Again, just look at the steam mobile site.
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I do some web design too, although I'm not a web designer, so I am aware of the issues you're talking about. I'm surprised you're using a 5:4 screen and considering all monitors and laptops on the market are 16:9 since a few years, I personally find the 1000px rule outdated and detrimental - the Steam website being a perfect example of that. Gotta say the Steam site is also pretty messy. :)
I tend to use flex as much as possible and for mobile screens, my general rule is to stack elements vertically instead of having them side by side.
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Why be surprised? It's true that it's hard to find 5:4 monitors these days... (And if my monitor breaks down at one point, I'll have to buy myself a 16:10 because I don't know where I'd find one).
I have a SyncMaster 971p which I bought towards the end of its public availability. I just didn't want a stupid 16:10 screen where I'd have to scan the borders of the screen by actually moving my eyes or, worse, my head. And I don't have enough space on my desk to push it farther. Just like I'm one of those guys who prefer small screen phones because they can be manipulated with a single hand. And I'm confident that as people get older, they'll do the same as I do, ah ah.
Anyway, yeah the Steam site is messy, but it's mostly because it's probably been modified by a hundred different people over the years. If you'll have a look at the CSS and JS files, it can be hilarious how sometimes the "work in progress" comments are still in the files (they could save millions just by minifying their files and removing comments!), or even some stupid typos in class names... It really doesn't look too professional.
flex, the CSS rule? Yeah, hmm... Flex is just... Disappointing overall. I was one of the first to use it in a public release, and even just ignoring the issues with browser support at the time, it's just too confusing to use IMO. Heck, for most of my flex use, I ended up coming back to declaring display:table elements because at least that was a predictable behavior.
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Sorry about the delay - I was suspended. Anyway...
Surprised - maybe not the best choice of words - because 5:4 is a very "squarey" format and everything now is 16:9, which is very "unsquarey", so content (movies of course, games, and increasingly websites) are designed with a wide ratio in mind. Obviously I'm 100% pro-choice, whatever-floats-your-boat and so on, but I think when you design stuff for a public, you should consider what the public is doing. Like using their smartphones for everything, for example, on those stupidly big screens! ;) I'm with you in favoring smaller ones (4 inches maybe), but it seems small means 5 inches by now. As a lefty I'd be happy to reach those "righty" positioned buttons without stretching my thumb! :D
I never took a look at Steam's CSS and JS, but you certainly can tell there's a certain lack of direction and no one dared to just do it over - which they should.
Finally, I humbly suggest you give Flex another chance: it's not the solution for everything, but it's not that confusing and it's quite predictable once you get in tune with it. Back then I started from this page (they keep it very up to date) and just experimented a lot. If you decide to give it a shot and have any questions or stuff to discuss, feel free to drop me a line. :)
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Lestrades.com is working on an alternative offer system, you can join the steam group to be notified when it's ready.
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Could you please elaborate on how do you define "back" and where you got this news from?
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Thanks for your message. I'm still a bit biased regarding Lestrades. On the one hand it's good to know there is an alternative site going, but building everything up from scratch and getting used to yet another system is more of an effort I'm currently willing to make, since I'm only casually trading.
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Well, building an alternative site is an effort I was willing to make for a year, so taking a few minutes to get used to it isn't that big a deal in comparison ;)
I still find it 'odd' that Barter coincidentally came back the day after I released the trading system that signified Lestrade's status as a replacement for Barter.
I could have stopped working on it, but nothing says this won't happen again, plus I've invested too much time in it to stop now...
Casual traders are most welcome, actually I have some ideas to make their life easier. ;) Won't be for a little while though.
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cant even find out how to add any games there. neither is there some button to add games nor does the sync tradeables with barter work. so yeah, no real alternative
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LT can import from Barter if you have a Barter account prior to registering to LT's and your target LT list is empty.
You can add games directly from the game pages, like Barter does.
I added a bulk add feature yesterday, so you can now add to your lists directly from your list pages. I think you'll enjoy how I'm presenting it. :)
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at the time i wrote that the sync/import function didnt work. later it worked. could click sync as much as i want and it still was empty.
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The problem happened mostly with users who registered at barter after March 23. It was fixed since then. ;)
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The only elaboration I can give you is that I have tried logging in, myself and others I know as well, and it let us in. Don't know if there needs to be any elaboration other than to try it yourself. And if you did so, feel free to let everyone know if it let you log in or not. Also, regarding how "back" is defined, it means that the site returned to its somewhat functional state instead of not letting anyone log in, that was the topic either way.
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Thanks, didn't know people were able to log back in. That's the information I was looking for, thank you.
I was never logged out, so I didn't experience any difference, but I feared trading would make no sense there anymore, since the userbase was vanishing away.
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No worries, that gave barter.vg a big hit but I am user many of the users will be back, including me. Also I would like to suggest to you and anybody seeing this to backup their barter.vg cookies, just in case.
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I already installed some cookie manager and extended my login cookie till December ;)
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On a whim, I went and tried to log in, and was successful today.
Not sure what changed, but I was able to log in fine for what it's worth.
~David.
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For what it's worth, the replacement that's being stood up is looking just as promising. I'm not going to be torn about where to attempt to do my trading.
Give the other a try and make your choice (or do both!)
~David.
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the Barter.vg admin is back online: https://steamcommunity.com/groups/bartervg/discussions/0/616199736993680912/?ctp=20#c133260909494397118
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I used to joke about the barter admin reappearing as soon as a successor was launching and he actually did it..
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I'm using to being the butt of the joke, but not when the joke lasts for a year :)
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Now that's unexpected.
Have to feel bad for Nao after all the work he did to give barter users an alternative. lestrade website also shows "This website has been suspended." now. :/
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Yea, hopefully Nao can find new hosting for lestrade so those links work (Turns out the person who was hosting lestrade pulled the plug as soon as she saw the barter admin was back -_- ).
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Ahah thanks, I should have kept up with this topic sooner ;)
The host, Alex, is a Barter fangirl. She took LT offline without warning and applied to be a moderator for Barter. As a host, one has duties to clients, even if they're hosting for free. Thanks to @devotee for saving the site :)
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I made like 5 offers of humble monthly bundle game for another humble monthly game - all of which were rejected because 'it wasn't a fair value trade'. I was looking to trade 'The Witness' for 'The Forest'. I also made an offer for KONA (steam key lowest historical price of 6.99) for The Witness.
Personally, I find that 'traders' are full of shit.
I want to trade a game that someone wants to play for a game that I want to play. Not for some 13 year old to profit 13 cents... or take a 13 cent trading loss. I don't have time for trivial bullshit.... I seem to be unique in that perspective though.
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On barter the value of a game is generally based on how many people have it vs how many people want it. Next to the title of games these values are listed so you know what is considered a fair trade on there.
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that would make sense under normal supply side economics however that does not take into account outside vendors who actually sell the game at a listed price. You cannot place the value of your game above the listed sale price from the outside vendor simply because the supply is low.
If every game has an inherent dollar value, then you cannot decide that your games dollar value is above the vendors sale price based on the trade community supply.
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The problem is people who trade games don't treat it like an exact science. I explained some of how it works there in this thread: http://steamcommunity.com/groups/bartervg/discussions/0/152390648090211816/
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I wish there was like a split SG/barter.vg so when you completed a trade, you were required to activate the title in your steam library.... that way it was more about trading games to play instead of trading games to profit.
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I agree. Traders are often telling you that your stuff is worthless because it was bundled or given away (sometimes many years ago!), has low price or low trade value, whatever. But they want to trade their own "garbage" (bundled/given away, low value games) for those so-called valuable games, like The Witness, Stardew Valley, Dark Souls, Firewatch...
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You can't really generalize behaviors like that. ;)
Most traders on Barter/LT recognize the importance of H:W ratios, but a large majority also takes other factors into account. For instance, Humble Monthlies are owned by most users, so when a game isn't too popular you'll find more tradables than wishlists for it, yet you'll rarely find someone who'll retrade it for a rarer Happy Hour game. ;) After all, technically the Humble Monthly game would be valued about 20x more. ^^
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I don't know a thing about bundles, since it's hard for me to use dollars/euros... all keys I get are from (mostly) reliable traders
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This is really disheartening for me as well. I try to trade for games I want to play, but even ones that aren't worth much get held onto like they're holy grails. Occasionally I hit someone who's reasonable, but otherwise... urgh. >_<;
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Bump for the revival of Barter
Plus Lestrades has been created too so there are multiple options for trading
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It's just a pain in the ass that Barter came back the day after I unplugged synchronization between Barter and Lestrade's. Meaning it became very hard to sync with Barter from that moment on, and each minute spent without sync made it even less likely, since trades made on Lestrade's would also need to be transmitted to Barter, but trying to synchronize all wishlists and tradables in real time would be too risky-- any server crash and you'd lose synchonization. For instance earlier today LT experienced high server loads due to an improper change in my table indexes that I didn't realize before going to bed, and as a result the website was responsive at times when it was too busy, making it impossible to synchronize lists in real time.
There isn't a real solution for that that would respect both LT's and Barter's offer histories.
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After a few weeks of not being able to log in, this morning i managed to log in again. Don't know yet if it was a fluke or what....
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It's not a fluke. The site owner was abducted by aliens and has finally managed to escape. It's all good now.
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Funny thing is we still don't know why he left, or even why he didn't come back until the day after I launched Lestrade's. ^^
I understand the value of one's privacy, but it's hard to rebuild trust when you don't want to show your cards on the table even after a year off.
(Is that proper English?)
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barter.vg admin is back and he's actively working on stabilizing the site.
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Oh, I've heard some rumors, but didn't pay much heed to it, seeing as everything was (and is) apparently working fine for me. I even had to re-log in a couple of days ago and had no issue, but it's true that I haven't been receiving few-to-none offers.
I was very surprised to learn here from Elaine that barter.vg has been basically adrift for three years, lol, and to think I started using it about a year ago, with great results, I must add, at least for the first few months.
I'm already registering and syncing with lestrades, good to learn about that too.
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Depends what you have in your tradables & wishlist and whether you're proactive or not.
Out of my tradables on steamgifts, the only thing that interests people seems to be Subnautica. I never receive offers for anything else, so for me, Steamgifts is pretty dead. Barter, I receive interesting offers from time to time, I'd say a couple of months, so it's more active and better quality to me. But its matching system is so slow (3+ minutes to find a match) that I don't use it anymore. At Lestrade's there's an even smaller community, but since I get fast matches and the offer creation page is optimized for easy offers, I'm able to send many offers quickly. Thus, when I find time to look into new trades, I can complete several offers a day. Others will tell you that they haven't traded a game in months at Lestrade's, it all depends on your tradables, your wishlist, and your willingness to send offers yourself.
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Isn't it, same owners, same codebase, same user base basically? It's only been a few months since they split both in half...
Anyway...
Most people say SG thinking of both sites. I don't see the point of splitting them up. If ST was a really, really cool trading site okay, but all it has for it is its user base... There are no proper tools for basic fair matching of games...
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personally, I swapped from Barter, to lestrades.
The dev of Lestrades is a -LOT- more active and is continually adding/revising features.
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The one thing that I wish Barter, Lestrades, and other similar sites could accomodate is trading for Paypal. Most trading sites are about trading games for games or keys, but only Steamtrades can accomodate trading for money. I'm not sure why that is. Steamtrades being a forum system while Barter and Lestrades are web apps may have something to do with it, but I don't know why the functionality of setting or negotiating prices can't be included in these apps.
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A lot of people have been talking that lately
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