My Love/Hate Relationship With Woot-Offs

I can't help it. I love Woot.com. They offer one deal every day. It's simple, it's easy, it's a great business concept and they often have cool stuff at great prices. Every single one of my Roombas (I have four) came from Woot (okay, I did get one from my dad, who got it from Woot). I haven't always had good luck with Woot. My dad and I both ordered a GPS from them and when they arrived, it turned out they only operated in Spanish (they accepted the return and apologized...in English).

But the Woot-Off...oh, the Woot-Off. A Woot-Off, in case you don't know, is when Woot offers deal after deal throughout the day (or a series of days). There's no set time limit for how long any item may appear, no one knows what items will show up, and there's always a "Random Bag of Crap," which typically sells for $3.00 (+$5.00 shipping) and could be anything. I once ordered a RBOC and it had...ready? A Roomba. Yep, one of my Roombas cost me a whopping $8.00.

Now, I love the Woot-Off because it's exciting and you never know when something awesome's going to show up. But I hate the Woot-Off for the following reasons:

1. It creates the worst of the worst in impulse buying. You don't know how in-demand something will be, so you only have a brief moment to decide, "Do I really need this?" I find it's best to start with the assumption that you don't need anything.
2. It creates a compulsion to sit at your computer all day, waiting to see what deals they'll put up. This is much worse if you're looking for a specific item. For example, I have been waiting for two days for a Scooba to show up, since I missed it the first time it came around at 3:30 AM yesterday morning, when I happened to have insomnia. It came up and sold out faster than my sleep-deprived brain could process. So now I'm waiting for a second Scooba to come up.
3. There's no automation like with eBay, so you can't walk away from it. Sure, there's Wootalyzer, so you don't have to keep refreshing your screen to keep track of the items, but you can't set anything to automatically make a buy for you.

So here's a business idea for a savvy programmer: If you can get Woot to give you access to their API, perhaps you could develop a program like the auction sniper software you can use with eBay. If I want a Scooba, I could choose "Scooba" from a menu of items that have been on Woot previously, set a price range I'm willing to pay, and select an option to just buy it when it shows up on Woot. And if you could automatically get me a RBOC, I'd be tickled pink. Let me know when you get it programmed and I'll happily beta-test it for you. Mama wants a Scooba.