So for those of you that remember, last year I sold the Neocell 2G on eBay. Well now I’m selling the Neocell 3GS on eBay starting today. The auction should end Sunday, August 22nd. There’s no reserve!

Why’em I sellin’ the Neocell 3GS? Because I’m getting a new AT&T account (I’ll explain later) and, with it, an iPhone 4.

It should be interesting to see the outcome of this auction, considering the results of the last auction. I’d love it if the Neocell 3GS went to one of my readers like the Neocell 2G.

The Neocell 3GS is still rockin’ it and lookin’ sexy as ever. In fact, it’s much better than what it was before.

I removed the wood and gold plating from the front. The gold and wood plating on the front was perfect. But I had to keep it protected, so I used an Invisible Shield on the front. The Invisible Shield caused a problem, because of the “levels” between the gold to wood to glass caused there to be bubbles in the Invisible Shield. That caused cleaning problems and caused problems with the smooth “feel” of the iPhone. So I took it off and realized it was much better plain on the front.

The back gold and wood plating was great, but the Invisible Shield on the sides annoyed me. So I made a custom shaped Invisible Shield for that back that only covered the back plating perfectly, so that the sides still feel nice ‘n’ smooth.

I don’t have a design plan for an iPhone 4 yet. Not really sure what I’d do. I’m gonna’ continue with the whole “gold” theme. Just like with the Neocell 3GS, I’ll get the iPhone 4 and then decide on what to do with the design.

I’ll keep ya updated on how things go.

Peace, JbB

What’s up y’all? Wanted to give an update on how the sale of the original Neocell 2G went. First, though, let me tell you what I had to go through to sell it.

I first listed it up more than a month ago to sell on eBay. It sold fine, but the person who bought it was jack *** from Nigira who phished an eBay account of an American. Of course this bidder was the highest bidder because they were willing to “pay” anything. The SOB then sent me a fake email from Paypal, stating that “you have received the money” from Paypal, trying to get me to send the item without actually, um… receiving any money! Yeah, come on.. of all people, I am not the person to mess around with.

So it didn’t sell. So a few weeks ago, I tried again. This time, within an hour left of the bid, someone accidentally placed a bid too high. No big deal because the person retracted their bid immediately. But eBay’s system decided to… be lazy, and not actually retract this person’s bid, even though it clearly stated it was retracted. So when it came down to the last few minutes, the person who retracted the bid was the highest bidder. Way’ta go eBay, the world’s number one leader and pioneer of online auctioning. Clearly I’m not going to force this person to pay what the item “sold” for, because it was never meant to be sold to that person.

eBay has a “second chance offer” system, where you can offer an item to the second to highest person who bid on it. It gets offered at the person’s maximum bid. In other words, the highest amount they were willing to pay. Fair enough. I offered it to the second highest bidder…

The highest bidder retracted the bid (reason wrong price entered), so you can be the winning buyer for your $***offer if you want.

I sent the message out within 10 minutes of the bid ending, so the person should have been jumping for joy. But what’s the person do? He gives me his answer a day later…

if i do the second chance offer…..will u express mail it to me for free. to ….los angeles california…///??? thanx

The shipping was set for only $5, but not only did he not wanna’ pay the $5 (it would have been about $10 standard shipping to California, he wanted free shipping  which would have been much more expensive). Wow, what a moron. My answer…

No, it will be the standard shipping. I need your answer within a few hours or the item’s going to relisted for a new seven day auction.

Of course the guy doesn’t even bother responding. In addition to this, I had to answer so many stupid questions sent to me via eBay. Questions you shouldn’t even be asking. (I was polite and responded to every one of them.) Questions like “how many 3gs  u have like that for sale”, “i have 2g iphone i want os 3.1.2 how did u do that???”, “Do you have a buy it now price”, etc.

I put it up for a third time, and at this point I’m starting to get really disenchanted with eBay. But by eBay, I mean the people on there. But for the listing, nothing goes wrong and it sells. I go down to ship it out and realize that the shipping from Florida to Massachusetts is more than the $5 shipping. Great. Not only that, but I then realized “Hey, don’t feel safe sending the Neocell 2G out without any kinda’ shipping insurance.”. I realize I’ve now gotta’ pay the extra shipping and insurance outta’ my own pocket. I emailed the buyer, letting him know what the tracking number was, and also that I spent my own money insuring it, etc.

Man, at this point I’m feelin’ really disenchanted with dealing with people. Friend and family that knew the issues I was dealing with also felt the same way. Such a shame…

But today I get a letter in the mail from the person I shipped the Neocell 2G to. I said “Man, I ‘freakin’ swear if this is some kinda’ crap complainin’ about somethin’… I ain’t havin’ it. I’m so sick of this eBay crap!”. The letter…

Re: IPhone

Dear Mr. Baird:

Thank you for the Iphone. Enclosed please find $10.00 too cover the extra postage in mailing the item.

God Bless.

(signed)

And you see what’s included inside the letter. So that makes me feel better about the “human condition”, at least regarding eBay, haha. The person who bought it is a long time reader of theneocell.com (referred to me a “J”, which is what I used to sign these posts on theneocell.com months ago).

So even though I had to deal with attempted theft by international criminals, system screw ups and greedy non-buyers… the auction turned out to be a success. And most important, it seems the Neocell 2G is going to a good home, which is really want I wanted the most. I’ll miss ya baby…

Peace, JbB

I’m sellin’ my baby… Yep,  it’s true, I’m finally sellin’ the original Neocell on eBay.

A recap for those new to the site, the Neocell was my first iPhone (the one for sale), a 24K gold and wood plated iPhone 2G 16GB. There’s a pic of me ‘n’ my “new baby” the first week I got it.

I was in a contract with T-mobile at the same, so the very first thing I had to do once getting the Neocell was jailbreak it to work on T-mobile. I had a choice between an iPhone 2G 16GB or an iPhone 3G 16GB. The reason why I went with an iPhone 2G is because of me bein’ on T-mobile, it’s impossible for 3G iPhones to access T-mobile’s 3G network. So why pay more money on a 3G iPhone if I can’t access the 3G speeds. So a 2G was a perfect choice for me. See, I did my homework before hand. This is how theneocell.com got started.

About 9 or 10 months later, once I was out of my contact with T-mobile. it became time for me to upgrade to an iPhone 3GS. So I’ve had the Neocell 2G sittin’ and lookin’ all pretty on my desk for a few months. I’ve put off sellin’ it because, well… it’s my baby. Hard to sell somethin’ that means so much to ya, ya know?

I remember all the great and wild comments I’ve gotten from people. There’ll be times I’d be out somewhere, messin’ around on the Neocell 2G and I’d look up and see a chick starin’ at me. I’d say to myself “If she’s checkin’ me out, she’s got a weird way of staring at me…” and then I’d realize “Oh, she ain’t checkin’ me out, she’s checkin’ the Neocell out.”. I’d get the same reaction from guys too, I’d look at a guy and think “What the ‘freak you lookin’ you??” and realize “Oh… the Neocell. It’s cool, it’s cool…”. It would happen out with people too, someone would ask “What was that guy lookin’ at?” and I’d say “Oh, my phone…” and they’d go “Oh… I thought he as a weirdo or somethin’.”

One thing I had to get used to (which I still get now with the Neocell 3GS) is that people will mistake the Neocell 2G for other phones. My banker, who sees me about once a week, regonized that I had a new phone instantly and asked “Wow, that’s awesome looking… is that the new Blackberry” (talkin’ about the Blackberry Storm). I got offended and said “Blackberry? Does this look like a Blackberry??” and showed him the Apple logo on the back. His response, “Oh, I didn’t think it was the iPhone because it has that… what is that, wood?”. That was the first time I realized that people will sometimes not recognize it as an iPhone because it’s so unique. So now, when I get “Wow! I love your phone! What type of phone is that? The new Blackberry / Palm / Droid / Nexus One??”, I take that as a compliment and simply say “No, it’s an iPhone…”.

I remember one person who checked out the Neocell 2G, they asked if they could feel it. I said sure, and they said “Ooo, I feel the wood…” and then they leaned in and sniffed it! I said “Whoh, what’er you doin’?” and they said “I wanted to smell the wood…”. I looked at this woman strangely and had to say “Yeah… sorry… it… it don’t smell like nothin’.”. Haha, wild.

Made a lotta’ memories with the Neocell 2G, I’m gonna’ miss it.

Peace, JbB

The free eBay app has gotten better. It was sorta’ pointless to use before, because eBay’s mobile site is very, very good. And the eBay app didn’t allow you to refine your search, such as lowest price first. So it’s pretty pointless trying to search for anything on there, let’s say an iPhone, ‘cuz you wouldn’t be able to find one through all the crap of accessories and other junk… Thousands of results and only a few hundred are actual iPhones. Yeah…

But now the app let’s you refine your searches. And, on top of that, the eBay app does something that the eBay mobile site doesn’t. It gives you a normal view of the description and images of the product. It doesn’t make the page wrap to your iPhone, so you have to scroll from side to side, but that’s ok because it’s very fast and smooth (at least on my 3GS).

I like the changes they did to the app. It also makes managing your eBay account a breeze. Keep it up eBay.

Peace, J