Adding “are you a human” check

Hi everyone,

It’s come to our attention that, more and more, some shoppers are using automated scripts to gain an unfair advantage during stockings. These scripts access listing pages at a much higher rate than humans can achieve by manually refreshing, and, more often than not, result in a successful purchase for the script users. In addition, these scripts seem to cause undue load on the server, causing an overall bad user experience for everyone else (slow page loading times, etc.)

To combat the use of these scripts, we have just installed an option for single-store users (congos to come later) that allows you to require an “are you a human?” task before purchase. This is very similar to the strategy that sites like Ticketmaster have employed for those Hannah Montana ticket sales (they face the same issue with users attempting to purchase using automated scripts). You’ll see this option at the very bottom of your Store Settings >> Profile page.

No solution is perfect. The issue with this solution is that shoppers will now have to do a small task in the midst of their panicked attempts to hit “Buy Now”. We have chosen to use a service called “are you a human?” because it seems easier and more user-friendly than the weird, wavy text captcha’s that are typically used on the internet. We’d love to hear what you think. You can test out the shopping experience on this Hold listing (please delete from your cart after you’re done so someone else can give it a try), and this Buy Now listing (you can test purchase with no obligation to actually pay or buy anything).

Of course, you can leave this option off if you don’t have an issue with high-demand stockings, or prefer not to add this task for your shoppers. However, if you do find that certain shoppers seem to have an unusually high rate of purchase, you may consider using this to even out the playing field.

Again, please let us know your thoughts. Thanks!