Well, the Jellyfish Smack Shopping “Deal of the Day” has been live for approximately one week… let’s take a look at how the new game has been going.

As we posted earlier, Jellyfish is offering a limited quantity of a single product, per day, in a real-time, Dutch auction. After logging in to your Jellyfish account, you watch a counter reduce the price (at approximately 1 cent to a few cents per second), and when you feel you’ve gotten a good enough deal, you place your order to lock in that price. Obviously, the longer you wait, the more you save…. but the trick is not to wait too long, or the limited quantity will be sold out. When you buy, you end up paying the sponsor’s full price for the product, and the discount is credited to your Jellyfish account. You can get paid by either check or PayPal after a waiting period, typically around 60 days.

Overall, the game is a rather entertaining experience, if you can spare the 1 1/2 to 2 1/2 hours it typically takes for the product to sell out. (Note: Jellyfish begins each game auction at 1:00PM Eastern/10:00AM Pacific, presumably to allow working folks to play & buy during their lunch hours. The psychology of the game is rather addicting, however, so I suspect that quite a few people are taking extended lunches. Bosses, send your complaints to Jellyfish!)

One of the most interesting aspects of the game is watching the chat comments that appear while the price is ticking down. The verbal group frequently encourages each other to hold out for a lower price, but as the discount grows, this becomes more difficult as — I am sure — each player envisions the available inventory flying out the door. It reminds me a little of the prisoners’ dilemma; should I stick with the group (so we can all benefit more), or should I buy — possibly ending the game — to ensure that I get the product (benefiting myself)? Since all of economics is based on predictable behavior, it’s not surprising that the game usually ends before the group’s “target price” is reached.

So how have the deals been? Here are the products that Jellyfish has offered in it’s Smack Shopping Deal of the Day so far, and the last (i.e. lowest) price paid:

• Day 1: Apple 2GB iPod Nano - Silver (Store price $149.00) A large group of lucky people actually got 100% off, but this was due to technical difficulties. Apparently, on this first day of the live auction, all of the bugs hadn’t been worked out. Different prices were being shown to different parts of the country, and some people were seeing — and getting — the iPod for free when others were being shown a much smaller discount. (The technical difficulties still haven’t been completely fixed; see below.)
• Day 2: Canon Powershot SD450 5MP digital camera (Store price $199.95) No freebies this day; the best price gotten was $98.46, a 50.76% discount.
• Day 3: Toshiba SD-P1700 portable DVD player (Store price $179.99) Best price was $62.45, a 65.31% discount.
• Day 4: Apple iPod Video 80GB (Store price $348.95) Best price was $204.37, a 41.43% discount.
• Day 5: Microsoft Xbox 360 Core System (Store price $325.12) Best price was $173.45, a 46.65% discount.
• Day 6: Microsoft Wireless Optical Desktop 3.0 Keyboard & Mouse (Store price $64.91) Best price was $11.73, a 81.93% discount. There was a huge cry of disappointment (and a lot of smart remarks) when this product was put on the reverse-auction block. After the series of iPods, digital cameras and Xbox systems, a keyboard/mouse combination didn’t cut it. (Even when they are getting a great deal, apparently people only care to see products that they actually want.) In addition, people noted that the original price of $65 was way out of line; it was possible to get it online for much less. Product-wise, this day was definitely a stinker… even though only 35 were offered, this product still went for a discount of more than 80%. (Several chatters said they werent going to buy no matter how low the price got.)
• Day 7: Sony DCR-SR40 Digital Handycam Camcorder (Store price $479.95) Best price was $289.64, a 39.65% discount. The relatively low discount today makes me wonder… as this site becomes more popular, are the discounts going to be less? Probably; I don’t think Jellyfish is going to increase the number of items available, so the Dutch auction bidding can only get more competitive.

So far, the Jellyfish-subsidized deals have been quite good, so you may want to Sign Up and play along.

One thing that Jellyfish needs to fix as soon as possible is their real-time price display. I do not know what technology is being used to implement the “real-time” counter, but it was clear from the comments that different people were still seeing drastically different discounts. (Yesterday, one chatter was seeing 98.5% off when the others were seeing a discount of around 50%.) Although the Buy It Now page corrects the price, it’s not a good experience when visitors think they are getting a huge discount, just to have it taken away.

Jellyfish’s game is fun and the deals have been encouraging… but they need to get their technical platform more accurate and reliable for this to be a completely enjoyable experience.