I know we all speak from our own perspective but yours,
Claude, is so much different from the average eBay user's
that it's essentially saying "do what's best for me, forget
about everyone else". As someone who isn't sufficient
wealthy to be able to buy any poster (or other item) I want, as
someone who only bids on items once in a while, not several
a day, as someone who has hated the snipers and their
snipe bids that cause eBay to not be an auction but a sneak
attack, I praise JR for this change. It's something I -- and
many many others -- have requested eBay do for years. Not
that they pay attention to what anyone wants.
Sniping is an unfair way to participate in an auction. It
perverts the auction form and says "let me sneak in a bid at
the last fraction of a second when other bidders won't have
any chance to respond." It was hated from the time it was
first discovered -- it certainly wasn't part of eBay's plan of
operation -- but eBay wouldn't do anything to discourage it.
That would take work, something they're quite loath to do.
They took a "let the marketplace sort it out" attitude and
sniping has since become engrained. To my mind it's like
people in South Central Los Angeles have gotten used to
living with occasional drive-by shootings. No one except
those who commit them have anything positive to say about
them. The average person doesn't like them but no one
seems able to stop them. Because it's part of the system
doesn't make it good. And it especially doesn't make it
sacrosanct.
I'm afraid I don't really care that someone is bidding on so
many things they can't keep track of all the closings. (And
your example, Bruce, has so many items listed each week
that while they do close about a minute apart, it's only really
a problem if you happen to be bidding on multiples *and*
they were listed by Bruce in close succession. Let's say
he's listed only 500 items -- far less than he usually does --
and they close every 30 seconds. And you want item 50
and item 250. That's 200 listings or 100 minutes apart. The
likelihood that item 50 will continue bidding for over an hour
and a half is extremely small. Even items 20 listings apart
will close 10 minutes apart. Most items won't extend or will
only extend a little bit. Even 10 minutes should be sufficient.
And if they're not, my heart bleeds. You'll just have to place
a sufficiently high bid on the first item (something the people
who love sniping tell us folks who don't all the time) before
going on to the second or you'll have to decide which item
you want more. I'm afraid I don't have a lot of sympathy for
people who can't buy every single thing they want.
You say you're afraid people will know you're bidding and
will deliberately bid you up. Because, apparently, they know
(or at least believe) you'll pay any price for items you want.
Sometimes that's bad; sometimes that's good. I have a
friend who is a multi-millionaire. We both like some of the
same artwork that comes up at auctions. There are people
who object to the fact that he has money and who have tried
to bid him up deliberately, knowing that with his large
fortune, he'll keep bidding things up. This has, at times, cost
my friend extra. At the same time, some people, once they
know he's interested in a piece, stop bidding. They figure
they have no hope of outbidding him so he sometimes gets
pieces cheap because the competition drops out early. I'm
sure if your reputation as a buyer is as well known as you
suggest, you've benefited from this, too. Knowing my friend
as I do, I've sometimes bid against him and been able to
outbid him even though I have only a fraction of his
resources. Because I know that, while he can afford
essentially any price, he knows how much he wants to pay
for a piece and won't bid higher than that. Once he reaches
that point, if "my" price is higher, I get it. The fact that my
friend has such a self-imposed limit in his head has cost
some of the people who tried bidding him up endlessly.
My advice to you is that you set limits on what you want to
pay for a given piece. Then you can even use your snipe
program, have it jump in just before scheduled closing, and
place it, just as you do now. If people want to extend the
auction and bid against you, for whichever reason, you don't
have to sit around and wait. Your already placed bid will, of
course, keep bidding up against them, no matter how long it
takes. And if they try nudging you past your pre-determined,
pre-set limit, then they get screwed. Which they deserve.
Somehow I see this as exactly what you have done in the
past with nearly the same liklihood you'll win every piece you
go after but also having a chance for us little guys to
occasionally win a piece *we* *really* *want* and not get
screwed by people who sneak in at the last half-second.
Craig.
At 07:14 AM 6/16/05 EDT, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
JR
Peter is right on target and you are definitely wrong here. You
must
acknowledge that besides a blindsided bid in the last few seconds,
sniping
does something for me that is an absolute must. That is the fact
that
it
keeps all persons from knowing that I want the poster (or statue
which
I
also collect).
There are certain bidders who are quite well known to have deep
pockets
and when they bid on certain genre posters you know they will go
high.
People all over the world know that I collect Charlie Chan posters
and
there are very few that I do not own. I was seeking the one sheet of
Charlie Chan in Honolulu for the last 15 years without even knowing
what it
looked like and lo and behold it popped up on ebay about two months
ago.
Toler made 22 films and I had 21 one sheets for the longest time.
There
are Charlie Chan posters on ebay daily but not what I need. If the
auction
did not end in the fashion you want I would have been in deep trouble
because if people saw me bidding they would know I wanted it badly
and
just
keep bidding me up. i placed a snipe bid well above the final price
of
$5250 and I can only imagine what would have occurred had my name
popped up
in the last few seconds to the other bidders. It happened to me
once
in
an auction and I vowed that it would never happen again which is why
I
only
bid in the last few seconds regardless of the cost of the poster.
I also collect statues and never bid on them except in the last few
seconds because there is a guy out on the coast whom I outbid on a
few
statues he wanted and now tries to bid me up on every rare statue. I
haven't even touched shill bidding which was well covered by Peter.
YOU DID NOT COVER A SUBJECT I MENTIONED IN MY LAST EMAIL AND I WOULD
LIKE
YOU TO COMMENT ON IT. I stated that in live auctions lots are placed
on
the bidding table one at a time and until the hammer comes down,
regardless
of how long the auction goes on, the next item for auction is not
placed on
the table. You are trying to simulate a live auction but items are
not
held up on ebay and doled out one at a time. Bruce Hershenson
places
about 1000 items a week and the end approximately 1 to 2 minutes
apart.
You can easily glide from one ending to another and track and bid on
posters in a smooth stream. Under your method these 1000 items could
be
kept alive and overlap each other with as many as 20 items being bid
on
simultaneously (by me) with 60 second endings depending on additional
bids
to keep them going. How will you prevent such chaos? How in the
world can
you equate a live auction process (one at a time) with thousands on
ebay?
I would like to read your reply.
Claude
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Craig Miller Wolfmill Entertainment [EMAIL PROTECTED]
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
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