This is odd. The cables are all pieces of crap. But for the old dock connector, I never had any problems with the $1 cables; they were essentially identical in quality.
These guys have the lightning security cracked (for the most part; they have that annoying unauthorizied accessory bug that shows up from time to time) but did they have to also go and use the cheapest possible materials?
The general poor quality has nothing to do with the lightning chip itself. Do these guys not know that they're just shooting themselves in the foot? You can make a quick money grab now, but once everyone uses ebay protection and gets their money back, it's just foolish business 101 on their part. They're hurting their reputation. And for nothing; if they can make pretty good quality dock connector cables, then they should be able to make pretty good quality lightning cables for the same price. Is saving 1 cent worth the negative reputation that they're going to get?
And these daily deals sites should actually buy 1 cable and test it before they sell it. These deal sites are supposed to be real web stores and a step up from your anonymous ebay store of the week. Guess not. Lesson learned.