Subject: Re: eBay sniping

From: "Dwight K. Elvey" <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu Apr 24 12:02:00 2003

>From: Mike <[email-masked]>
>
>>  > a much preferred model for me. It is where the sale is extended by a
>> minute or two
>>  > when each bid comes in at the end of the auction.
>>
>
>This hurts the seller and should make no difference to the bidder.
>
>NO ONE should ever bid more than they are willing to pay.  But with
>sniping, people often bid a little higher just to protect their bid.  If
>there is an extention bids will still not rise higher than anyone is
>willing to bid.
>
>I have seen auctions go for $400 on items that normally wouldn't sell for
>$300.  One bidder contacted me because two people bid that $400 and he
>said, "I guess I got stuck.  I was just trying to protect my bid."  He
>paid the auction but clearly bid more than he ever expected or wanted to
>pay.
>
>The people that whine the most about sniping, NEVER win auctions, unless
>they are the first to see a "low" buy-it-now, on popular items.  They just
>NEVER bid high enough and would lose anyway.
>

Hi
 I'd once sniped a bid with a value of $145 for an item I wanted.
Knowing the current going rate for the item, $120 was about the
highest I'd seen. The winning bid, also a last minute bid, went
for something over my highest. A couple of days latter, I got
a note from the seller. The asked if I was still interested.
They didn't specify a price so I told them that I thought
a fair price would be 1/2 between the my high price and the
next lowest below me( it was $90 ). They said that I should
pay the full $145. I told them that that was a proxy bid that
wouldn't have been exposed if the other bidder hadn't backed
out and that if I'd won the bid at that price, I'd have
honored it but since I didn't, I was not obligated to pay
that amount and that it was inappropriate for them to demand
that I did, considering that it was not a completed auction.
They claimed that I was wrong and that I was obligated to pay
my high bid.
 Anyway, later, I found that the same buyer had purchased
a number of different items from this seller. What was strange
was the variety of the types of items they bought. To be
honest, it really looked like it was a shill bid. Now I tell
sellers that I will only purchase through eBay and not
after bidding when the other seller backs out.
 There is more to the story but this gives you the idea.
Dwight

---

From: "J.C.Wren" <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu Apr 24 12:26:01 2003

Why sniping is good:

	Many people get upset about having auctions sniped.  All this garbage about
extending auctions an extra minute, blah blah blah, is just a dumb idea.
The reason I regularly snipe is purely psychological: If you enter a bid
early on in an item, you're expressing an interest.  This likely drives the
price up, since *most* people seem unwilling to set hard prices and stick to
them.

	My procedure it to set the price when I notice the item, basically, what's
worth to me.  I then track the item, and don't bother bidding if it goes
over my limit.  However, if the closing time comes around, and it's still
below my limit, I want until about 3 seconds before close, and submit.

	If you're not fast enough, or haven't set a higher price, you lose.  I have
no moral quandries about this.  There is nothing that I have, do, or know
that makes me a better bidder than anyone else.  Simply the ability to stick
to my price, and not show early interest, driving prices up unnecessarily.

	And as for the "no interest" technique, no one can gripe about that.  I've
seen plenty of buyers at junk stores, hamfests, auctions, etc, that
desparately want an item, but make it seem like "eh, whatever".  Why?
Because they *know* if you say "Damn, this is the coolest widget ever, one
of only 5 ever made, I *have* to have it!" they're quite likely to clue the
seller in, or in any case, drive the price up.

	Buy low, sell high.  To do otherwise is a Enron-esque business model, and
just plain nuts.

	--John

---

From: steve <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu Apr 24 12:40:00 2003

--- "Dwight K. Elvey" <[email-masked]> wrote:

> next lowest below me( it was $90 ). 

In this situation I always offer what the final
auction price would of been if the top bidder didn't
exist, that is, the high bid of the third bidder, $90
in your case, I am suprised you offered more then
that.
(well its actually $90 + bid increment, probably
$91.50 or so)
The New Yahoo! Search - Faster. Easier. Bingo
http://search.yahoo.com

---

From: "John Allain" <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu Apr 24 13:29:00 2003

Since this seems the time to air eBay gripes, I thought I'd add mine.

Little complaint about the system on the face of it.  But my main complaint
is on the oft published figure of 1 fraud out of 10,000*.  Now, I've done a
LOT less than that number of purchases, and in that time I've seen enough
frauds to make me want to push the number closer to 1:200...  That's a
pretty big difference.
Secondary to that is just the hilarious lack of control over how the seller
will disclose his acceptable payment methods, or shipping price.
Some will leave everything out of the eBay system and send a personal
eMail, Some threaten "Do Not use Unified Checkout", others will send
nothing and rely completely on Unified Checkout...  while still leaving off
the shipping price.  Then there's the sellers who claim to accept
Check/Money Order on the offer page but the UC'out will Only have
PayPal.  Makes me think its all a mess sometimes.

So, they should be more honest about fraud, and they should make
Unified Checkout work for everyone.

just my $0.02 bid
John A.

*may have even been 1:40,000.  Anyway, way off.

---

From: Marvin Johnston <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu Apr 24 14:33:00 2003

The way Checkout is set up, it cannot work for everyone as it does not
allow for all the variables that can take place; various shipping
methods (ups, usps, etc), shipping costs (vary by zip code), insurance
(tied to carrier and amount of insurance), international shipping, and a
host of other issues including privacy concernss.

Fraud is most certainly an issue. Ebays response is basically "trust us"
when they haven't earned that trust, and in fact, have done a number of
things to give reasons for *not* trusting them ... as well as their new
acquisition PayPal.

---

From: Adrian Vickers <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu Apr 24 14:33:45 2003

At 18:23 24/04/2003, you wrote:

>All this garbage about

I dispute that - the "extension" idea is what happens in a "normal" 
auction. The auctioneer will take bids until all competing bidders back 
out, leaving the one winner. This, naturally, maximises the sale price 
(which is good for the seller & the auction house).

As for sniping itself, I personally have no real problem with it (and do it 
myself, frequently). It's also interesting (from a psychological POV) as a 
seller: I sell very little on eBay, but I find myself watching my own 
auction(s) coming to a close & wondering how many snipe bids there'll be...

Personally, I'd like to see eBay introduce the *option* of self-extending 
auctions, which continue past their deadline until 5 mins (for example) 
after the last bid is placed. That way, as a seller, I get to choose 
whether I want sniper bids or not. It's entirely possible that an extending 
auction will /reduce/ the final sale price (since people are less likely to 
get completely carried away with a top bid); but for popular items I 
suspect the reverse is true, since more people are likely to bid for longer 
right at the end.

Uninteresting (probably) collarary: I recenly won two Sinclair Cambridge 
Programmable calcs, both in excellent condition, one of them in the 
original (and remarkably un-battered) box c/w instructions, etc. Normally, 
tatty un-boxed examples of these machines go for around £45 each. I got 
both for £25.01. Chuffed, I was. However, the usual last second malarkey 
was going on, and I'd only bid £25 at the start, fully expecting the price 
to hit about £50-£60 or so before the last-second rush. Obviously, though, 
the professional snipers were away that day, since there were only a few 
bids upping the price towards my £25 limit. When it hit £24, though, I 
panicked & bid again (with 2 seconds to spare), thus raising the price over 
my own bid by 1 pence...

Duh!

-- 
Cheers, Ade.
Be where it's at, B-Racing!
http://b-racing.com

---

From: "Mike" <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu Apr 24 14:57:00 2003

> (which is good for the seller & the auction house).

Absolute nonsense!  In a normal auction, there is no specified "end time."
 These are two completely different formats.  In a normal auction,
everyone shows up at the same time and bids.  Bidding is only for a few
minutes.

In an eBay auction (a completely different format) everyone has a very
long time to decide.

If you had an extended time feature (or pathetic idea) no one would bid on
a 10 day auction until day 10.  There would be no need to, unless you just
couldn't be around.

What you are trying to do is have a completely new format for an auction. 
Specified end time with extended provision.  You don't have any such
"NORMAL" auction like this.

The only reason people place early bids on eBay is because they are
thinking like this is a "NORMAL" auction, which it is NOT.  This is like a
sealed bid auction because the auction ends at a specified time and the
winners will be those that place last second bids (i.e. not seen by
others).

---

From: Doc Shipley <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu Apr 24 15:06:00 2003

> If you had an extended time feature (or pathetic idea) no one would 
                                                               
^^^^^^^^^^^^^

   That's rude, gratuitous, antagonistic, escalatory and uncalled for.  
Regardless of agreement/disagreement with the proposition, there's no 
point or profit in being uncivil about it.

	Doc

---

From: "TeoZ" <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu Apr 24 15:33:01 2003

There was only 1 auction I didnt go thrrough on, this was for some old
memory I wanted that was cheap. The auction specifically stated checks were
ok. Once I won the guy said he only wanted a money order. I didnt feel like
getting a money order at the time since I was busy as hell so I told him
forget about it. If you state a check is ok, then its OK. If not keep your
item.

These days I pay mostly by paypal. I have never got burned on a transaction
so far from EBAY, newsgroups, or from people I talk to on swaplists or
websites. I must be lucky.

I even had one computer show up DOA (purchased on ebay)and the guy sent me
another one even before I shipped the dead one. I also purchased an old ISA
video card needed for a game rig from a guy on a newsgroup that was doa but
he replaced it without any fuss.

I think the most I ever spent on 1 item was maybe $200. I guess if your
buying more expensive items the chance of fraud goes up quite a bit more.
Expecially on any graded collectables like stamps,coins,porcelin etc...

---

From: Adrian Vickers <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu Apr 24 15:49:01 2003

>Absolute nonsense!  In a normal auction, there is no specified "end time."

Er, so?

>everyone shows up at the same time and bids.  Bidding is only for a few

Rather like a typical eBay auction then.

>In an eBay auction (a completely different format) everyone has a very

Only because (a) there's so many items on eBay, and (b) it operates in 
several time zones. Imagine having to login to eBay every day at 3pm (then 
adjust for timezone) just to bid on an item.

>a 10 day auction until day 10.  There would be no need to, unless you just

So, rather like the current format.

>What you are trying to do is have a completely new format for an auction.

Bullshit. The format is identical, with a built-in "anti-snipe" measure.

>"NORMAL" auction like this.

Of course you do. "Normal" auctions are held on a specific day, which in 
real-world terms is much the same thing as an eBay end time. Hell, you even 
have "buy-it-now" (sold prior, in a normal auction format), withdrawn & 
changed lots.

>This is like a

Absolute bullshit. A sealed bid auction does not allow you to bid more than 
once, nor do you know if your bid has been exceeded. Nor is there any 
advantage/disadvantage in bidding early or late, as no-one knows what the 
bids are until the auction finishes.

---

From: "Mike" <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu Apr 24 16:21:00 2003

> have "buy-it-now" (sold prior, in a normal auction format), withdrawn &

At best, that is a stretch.  A specified end time, is just what it means. 
eBay is exactly what a sealed bid auction is.  A "normal" auction can
theoretically go for days.  An ebay auction ends at X:YY period.

Those that bid early are just people that make a bid and announce what
they bid.  But those that place their sealed bids at the end are unknown
until the end of the auction.  Any auction, where there is any real
interest, is ALMOST NEVER won by an early bid; making them essentially
non-bids.

> bids are until the auction finishes.

Sure they do.  Maybe some don't but many sealed bid auctions allow you to
get your bid back and make a change.  Until the end of the auction, you
can do as you like.

The auction you propose is:
1) one with a fixed end time that is published
2) has an extension period for x amount of minutes.

There exists NO such auction in the real world.  Only in your imagination
for a format that you think will give you a better chance of winning.  But
the bottom line is, you don't win, unless you have the high bid.  That is
what ebay does; that is what any real world auction does.

What you want is one that you can change your mind, essentially, after the
auction should have ended.

You want an auction where they auctioneer says, "Sold!" and you stand up
and say, "I was sleeping.  Give me one more minute."

---

From: Mail List <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu Apr 24 17:51:00 2003

Hi Mike,

 > "NORMAL" auction like this.

Yahoo auctions, GSA auctions, and a local one ( that ceased operations )
called Bidzilla had the extending auctions format.

 > and the winners will be those that place last second bids (i.e. not seen 
by others)

Not necessarily so. An early bidder that enters a high enough proxy bid 
will still
win. Sniping sometimes backfires on the snipers, if they miscalculate what it
will take to win ( if it was something they really wanted ) and enter too 
low a sniping
bid.

---

From: jim <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu Apr 24 18:00:00 2003

Ebay's auctions are like what I have seen called "silent auctions"  I once
frequented coin shops that held these auctions, and at friday night at 7pm,
they would close the shop for 10 minutes clean of the auction board, and
then collect the proceeds.  You could consign your stuff, or buy theirs.  They
had the coins in bags stapled to bid cards.  you wrote your # and bid on the
back.  had to exceed the previous by a percentage.  sound familiar?

only thing was, sniping went on in person and with some heated arguments.

but it just made for a really smelly loud 20 minutes before 7pm, and lots of
frantic scribbleing as the auctions ran down.  and you could cuss the guy who
was bidding on your 1960D proof silver dime.

anyway, point being there is no ethical reason to ban sniping.  And the format
is a monitored silent auction (no auctioneer) so there has to be a way to call
the bidding, since the auctioneer is not there to force it to a close.

Jim

---

From: Paul Williams <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu Apr 24 18:10:00 2003

Adrian Vickers wrote:
> 
> I'd only bid £25 at the start, fully expecting the price to hit
> about £50-£60 or so before the last-second rush. Obviously, though,
> the professional snipers were away that day, since there were only
> a few bids upping the price towards my £25 limit. When it hit £24,
> though, I panicked & bid again (with 2 seconds to spare), thus
> raising the price over my own bid by 1 pence...

To save any confusion, I should point out that raising your (already
winning) maximum bid doesn't normally raise the current price for an
item. You only got caught out because the previous bidder's non-winning
bid was less than one increment off your winning bid. Any new bids have
to beat current bids by at least one increment.

Hmm ... maybe that didn't unconfuse things! I'm not going to reveal your
eBay name here, Adrian, but if you go to http://vt100.net/rebay and type
in the appropriate auction number, you'll be able to see a blow-by-blow
account of the auction, in time order.

- Paul

---

From: Vintage Computer Festival <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri Apr 25 02:21:00 2003

> websites. I must be lucky.

I only had one bad experience buying something through a newsgroup.  I
advertised a want ad for an Apple ][.  Some guy came forward and said he
had one.  He said it worked.  Ok cool.  We negotiated a price of $75.
When I got it, the CPU and socket looked like it had been ripped from the
motherboard.  There was no way this thing "worked".  So I brought it up
with him and he insisted that he didn't know how it happened.  And it
obviously couldn't have happened in transit.

I told the guy to give me my money back and to pay for the shipping of the
unit back to him.  He balked.  So I went on the newsgroups and posted a
few messages about the transaction.  That changed his tune quick.  He
complained that I was ruining his reputation.  I told him I wasn't saying
anything that wasn't true (which was correct).  I made the offer that if
he sent me back $50 I would post a retraction.  He did, and I did (I
posted that we had settled the dispute satisfactorily).

The moral of the story: people will always be stupid.

-- 

Sellam Ismail                                        Vintage Computer Festival
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
International Man of Intrigue and Danger                http://www.vintage.org

 * Old computing resources for business and academia at www.VintageTech.com *

---

From: Jeffrey Sharp <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun Apr 27 15:10:01 2003

On Thursday, April 24, 2003, Mike wrote:
> eBay is exactly what a sealed bid auction is.

Except that the bids aren't sealed all the way, since the highest one is
known to all bidders.

-- 
Jeffrey Sharp

---

From: Adrian Vickers <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun Apr 27 18:15:01 2003

>Except that the bids aren't sealed all the way, since the highest one is

Not quite: Everyone knows what the *second* highest one is, and that the 
highest bid is at least greater than (or equal to, depending on bid timing) 
that one.

The fact that the price changes during the auction, however, is the 
greatest indicator that eBay is not remotely like a "sealed bid" auction.

---

From: steve <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun Apr 27 21:25:01 2003

--- Adrian Vickers <[email-masked]>

> greatest indicator that eBay is not remotely like a
Not remotely? Is almost exactly like a sealed bid.
Those price changes during the auction mean absolutely
nothing, as the final price is determined in the last
5 seconds (at least in the majority of cases). Nobody
takes those prices changes during the auction
seriously, its like people talking before an auction,
discussing what the items are worth, but nobody really
tells you what they really think its worth. That comes
in the last 5 seconds.

Since the other bidders have no practical way to
counter bid those bids entered during the last 5
seconds, ebay's auction model can accurately be called
a "sealed bid" auction format, with the highest bidder
paying the second highest bid. If you change ebay's
format to extend the auction time after each bid, then
I agree its not a sealed auction anymore.
The New Yahoo! Search - Faster. Easier. Bingo.
http://search.yahoo.com

---

From: Patrick Finnegan <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun Apr 27 21:48:00 2003

> 5 seconds (at least in the majority of cases). Nobody

Um, I'd have to disagree.  I rarely try to snipe auctions, and most of the
auctions where I'm selling things, there aren't any bids in the last few
minutes.  From my experience, you can usually tell how the auction is
going to end up from watching it, and if there aren't many bids before the
last few hours, there probably isn't going to be anyone sniping the
auction.

Your experience might be different than mine, but those are my
experiences.

Pat
--
Purdue University ITAP/RCS
Information Technology at Purdue
Research Computing and Storage
http://www-rcd.cc.purdue.edu

---

From: "John Allain" <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun Apr 27 22:12:00 2003

> ... if there aren't many bids before the last few hours,
> there probably isn't going to be anyone sniping the
> auction.

I did get sniped in the last minute as a sole bidder on 
something once.  It was a particularly foul experience.
Like the guy was too chicken to bid normally.  Bidding
first and then sniping last is not too good, but a lot better
than sneaking the whole way.

John A.

---

From: Vintage Computer Festival <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun Apr 27 22:15:01 2003

> paying the second highest bid. If you change ebay's

You apparently haven't heard of the sniping services out there that can
put in a bid reliably in the last 3-4 seconds.

Though eBay's auction mechanism may end up being utilized in such a way
that renders it similar to a sealed-bid auction, in some cases, it is not
truly a sealed-bid auction.

--

---

From: steve <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun Apr 27 22:36:01 2003

--- Patrick Finnegan <[email-masked]> wrote:
> minutes.  > 

Yea, I don't know, definitely not my experience, were
these low interest auctions (less then 5 bids?). I
just did a search on completed ebay auctions, and all
the auctions with >10 bids were sniped. 

When there are only a few bidders and little interest
in a auction item, all the differences between various
auction models melt away.

---

From: steve <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun Apr 27 22:48:00 2003

> put in a bid reliably in the last 3-4 seconds.

Huh? You apparently haven't comprehended what I said,
it doesn't make a difference if you have a sniping
service that can realiably bid .0001 seconds before a
auction ends. If someone bids 5 seconds before a
auction that beats your previous bid price you have no
way to reenter a new bid before that 5 seconds it up,
ain't going to happen, and thats why ebay is a 
"sealed bid" auction model.
The New Yahoo! Search - Faster. Easier. Bingo.
http://search.yahoo.com

---

From: Brian Chase <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun Apr 27 23:42:01 2003

> I agree its not a sealed auction anymore.

Sealed bid auctions don't result in bidding frenzies.  I don't think
your comparison of sealed bid to eBay auctions holds at all.

-brian.

---

From: Vintage Computer Festival <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon Apr 28 00:08:00 2003

On Sun, 27 Apr 2003, steve wrote:

> Huh? You apparently haven't comprehended what I said, it doesn't make a
> difference if you have a sniping service that can realiably bid .0001
> seconds before a auction ends. If someone bids 5 seconds before a
> auction that beats your previous bid price you have no way to reenter a
> new bid before that 5 seconds it up, ain't going to happen, and thats
> why ebay is a "sealed bid" auction model.

I take exception to your claim that one has no way to enter a bid within
the last 5 seconds if someone tops yours.  There are numerous ways to
achieve this, with the lowest tech way being to have multiple windows open
with different bids ready to be submitted while you constantly refresh the
item page.

Sure, when you get down to the last .0001 second it is pretty much
impossible, but 5 seconds is a lot of time.

Again, while I agree that the basic premise of your description of eBay
auctions can be correct under the right circumstances, it is not a sealed
bid auction format.

http://www.agorics.com/Library/Auctions/auction4.html

--

---

From: steve <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon Apr 28 00:32:00 2003

--- Brian Chase <[email-masked]> wrote:

> 
> Sealed bid auctions don't result in bidding
> frenzies.  

They certainly do, put 10 similar valuable items up
for auction in a traditional sealed bid auction, one
week apart, as each bidder loses each week, his/her
sealed bid will increase each week so by the 6 or 7
auction a frenzie will occur, everyone fearing that
he/she will never be the winning bidder . Exactly like
you see in ebay.

I don't think
> your comparison of sealed bid to eBay auctions holds

Ebay always hides the the current highest bid, the
auction ends at a fixed time, on many auction many
bids are placed within 5 seconds of the end of auction
basically removing any opportunity for the previous
bidders to place a counter bid, sounds like a sealed
bid auction to me....

---

From: steve <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon Apr 28 01:07:00 2003

> with different bids ready to be submitted while you

Maybe if you had multiple windows up with a predefined
bid alreadly placed into another window (where all you
have to do is click a mouse button) you could do it
one out of 10 times (server response is typically
seconds, both on your end and ebays end),  but I doubt
you could enter a new bid value based on the new
information of the sniped bid, which is what you
really need to be able to do, but I suppose in theory
its possible. 

If you automated the process with a intelligent sniper
that could read the current ebay bid, well then, I
guess you would have a bunch of computers bidding
against each other in a true open bid auction, that I
agree with. (hmm, I wonder is thats coming)

> auctions can be correct under the right
> circumstances, 

Yes, thats all I am trying to say (excuse me as I am
thinking on the fly), its really a hybrid auction
model, the higher the interest in the auction item,
the more snipes are likely to occur, and the more the
auction appears to simulate a sealed bid auction
format.
The New Yahoo! Search - Faster. Easier. Bingo.
http://search.yahoo.com

---

From: Vintage Computer Festival <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon Apr 28 10:20:01 2003

> he/she will never be the winning bidder . Exactly like

That's not a frenzy.  That's a (somewhat contrived) case of the market
value going up because presumably the auctioneer has the only supply of
some one thing that a group of people want.

> bidders to place a counter bid, sounds like a sealed

The biggest and most important difference is the most obvious one.

In a normal sealed bid auction, everyone submits their bid by a certain
deadline.  Nobody knows what anyone else has bid.  At the end of the
auction, the envelopes with the bids are opened, and the highest bid
submitted is the winner.

In a standard eBay auction, everyone always sees who the top bidder is
and what the current high bid is.  If there's enough time, the high
bidder's highest amount entered can be probed by entering successively
higher bids.

There is not much room for comparison between the two.

--

---

From: Vintage Computer Festival <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon Apr 28 10:22:01 2003

> really need to be able to do, but I suppose in theory

Not only is it possible but I've done it before.

> agree with. (hmm, I wonder is thats coming)

It wouldn't be too much more to program some of these sniping services to
do just that.  But it would rely on the speed of eBay's servers, which
are prone to all manner of problems.

--

---

From: Jeffrey Sharp <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon Apr 28 11:06:01 2003

On Sunday, April 27, 2003, steve wrote:
> Ebay always hides the the current highest bid,

Whether you think of it as the high bid or the second highest bid, it
doesn't matter.  eBay shows a possibly changing price while the auction is
in progress.  Sealed bid auctions don't do that.  That's a pretty big
difference.

> many bids are placed within 5 seconds of the end of auction basically
> removing any opportunity for the previous bidders to place a counter bid,
> sounds like a sealed bid auction to me....

The time period when most bids happen is irrelevant.  On an active eBay
auction, there is some non-zero duration in which you or some machine can
see the highest proxy bid and react.  It doesn't matter how close to zero it
is, because any sufficiently fast machine could do it.  Sealed bid auctions
do not have this duration.  A person or machine would require time travel in
order to react to a bid.  Not even an infinitely fast machine could do it.

-- 
Jeffrey Sharp

---

From: Vintage Computer Festival <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon Apr 28 11:21:01 2003

> order to react to a bid.  Not even an infinitely fast machine could do it.

Superman could win any sealed-bid auction he wanted to.

--

---

From: "Mike" <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon Apr 28 11:33:00 2003

> It doesn't matter how close to
> zero it is, because any sufficiently fast machine could do it.  Sealed
> bid auctions do not have this duration.  A person or machine would
> require time travel in order to react to a bid.  Not even an infinitely
> fast machine could do it.
>
> --
> Jeffrey Sharp

Not true!  I can bid at 1 to 2 seconds left and no proxy bidding software
is going to have time to see my bid posted, download the new web page,
process the data, calculate a new bid and upload the new data, all withing
1 second.

But aside from that, NO software works that way.  They work by simply
placing their bid, one time, just at the end.  None look for a bid and
make a change.  And no person can react in that amount of time.  Upload
and download times are far slower than the fastest machine.  Machine speed
is irrelevant.

I would bet monet that no person ever sees a bid placed with 2 or 3
seconds left that has time to react and change their bid.

---

From: "Mike" <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon Apr 28 11:47:01 2003

Here is another interesting thing about sniping.  I hear people all the
time saying that sniping hurts sellers.

However, I have never seen a seller that doesn't like sniping.  It's
always a bidder that complains and never the experienced seller.

---

From: "Deano Calver" <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon Apr 28 12:37:00 2003

> Superman could win any sealed-bid auction he wanted to.

Didn't know Superman collecting old computer but if so....

<Lex Luther>
All I have to do is find a PDP-1, hide small peices of Kyptonite in it and
then let Superman use his powers to win it.

Once he has it and is examining it, the Kyptonite will kill/disable him and
I shall rule the world
<Evil Laugh> Ha Ha Ha </Evil Laugh>
</Lex Luther>

Bye,
    Deano

---

From: Vintage Computer Festival <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon Apr 28 13:01:00 2003

> seconds left that has time to react and change their bid.

How much monet?

--

---

From: John Lawson <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon Apr 28 13:07:01 2003

> How much monet?

  I'll see your Monet and raise you two Gaugins and a Grandma Moses...

;{}

John

---

From: Adrian Vickers <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon Apr 28 13:28:01 2003

>always a bidder that complains and never the experienced seller.

I'm extremely tempted to agree with you on this (although I should point 
out that I don't really give a monkeys about sniping/not sniping - all of 
the auctions I've not won, I wouldn't have paid the final price even if I'd 
known it in advance).

The only thing I'd say, which may or may not be seen as a disagreement, is 
that we don't /know/ that the eBay fixed end-time model does - or does not 
- hurt sellers. Sure, sniping ups the ante in the last few seconds much of 
the time - but would it have gone higher with an extending auction? Until 
(if) eBay try it, we will never know...

---

From: Jeffrey Sharp <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon Apr 28 13:33:00 2003

> process the data, calculate a new bid and upload the new data, all withing

See, you're talking practical.  I was talking theoretical -- it's easier to
argue my point when computers are infinitely fast. :-)

-- 
Jeffrey Sharp

---

From: "John Allain" <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon Apr 28 14:15:00 2003

No criticism to any individual intended - it's to this stupid 
thread.   On and on about sniping.

> I would bet monet that no person ever sees a bid placed
> with 2 or 3 seconds left that has time to react and change
> their bid.

I would bet that many persons have tried things like this - I 
have.  The adrenaline rush for many must be comparable
to day trading or casino gambling, both activities that don't
seem to me to be anything to be proud of, and need I say
that they both tend to set up their practictioners for greater
and greater losses.

Perhaps the popularity of this thread just attests to the thrill
of the eBay adrenaline rush.  Realize what activities are
mindless, and curb them.

What I do: Know your limit, Bid your limit, Win or Lose,
and be done with it.

John A.

---

From: Vintage Computer Festival <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon Apr 28 23:08:00 2003

> (if) eBay try it, we will never know...

In my experience running automatically extended auctions, no.  It tends to
temper the bidding.  Bidders know that they don't have any advantage
waiting until the last minute to bid.  There may be a psychological factor
in waiting it out to see if the bidding goes higher than what you were
willing to pay before you submit your first bid, but for the most part it
tends to result in a more, what I would call, realistic market value.

Where sniping really jacks up the price is if the high bidder put in a
really high maximum in order to secure their win.  So say the item is at
$1,000 up until the last 4 seconds, but the high bidder has a maximum bid
of $5,000 and some sniper comes in with a bid of $2,999, the price will
all of a sudden shoot up $2,000.

--

---

From: "Wayne M. Smith" <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue Apr 29 00:14:00 2003

> -----Original Message-----
> From: [email-masked] 
> [mailto:[email-masked]] On Behalf Of Vintage 
> Computer Festival
> Sent: Monday, April 28, 2003 10:57 AM
> To: [email-masked]

One clod.

---

From: John Lawson <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue Apr 29 00:29:00 2003

> One clod.

That was very,very,very,very BAD! Damn! that was baaaad!

  Took me a couple of seconds. Undoubtedly one of the most wickedly
creative multi-puns ever seen on this List.

  My ear is off to you, sir.

Cheerz

Joghn