audio recording on IC -help wanted

[Watson A.Name - \"Watt Su]

"Michael A. Covington" <look@ai.uga.edu.for.address> wrote in message
news:4124c543$1@mustang.speedfactory.net...

"Watson A.Name - "Watt Sun, the Dark Remover"" <NOSPAM@dslextreme.com
wrote
in message news:10i91nnhd8thocc@corp.supernews.com...

Mike, I see you're trying to make a point, but what is this supposed
to
do? Is it supposed to take away buyers' advantages and give them to
the
seller? Or is it supposed to take away the sniper's advantages and
give
them to the other buyers? What is this 'wrong' that you're trying
to
right?

Simply this: Sniping is an inefficient way of doing what it does.
Proxy
bidding by sealed bids would accomplish the same thing (concealing
everyone's bids until the last minute) with a lot less work for
everybody,
and with complete assurance that everyone's bid actually does get
considered.

In a typical eBay auction today, you have 3 things that I think are
either a
waste of effort or a source of economic inefficiency:
(1) The bids that are displayed do not reflect the bids that are
actually
going to take place, because most bidding (not all) is withheld until
the
last minute;
(2) People who want to snipe have no assurance they will actually
get
their bids in. A slight computer delay, or a slight miscalculation of
the
time, and *poof* -- they're out.
(3) People can't tell which kind of auction they're in, so they
don't know
whether to conclude anything from the published bids. The published
bids
are useful information only if the snipers haven't lined up.

So if you think sniping is good, sealed-bid proxy auctions (where all
bids
are concealed and the second highest bid determines the selling price)
are a
better way of doing the same thing.

And if you think sniping is bad, auctions ought to be snipe-proof
somehow,
such as by automatically extending the time as long as bids are
rising.

I wish eBay would offer both of these as options (alongside the
various
kinds of auctions they offer now) and see what people actually like.

In short -- We're not finished inventing the online auction. eBay
isn't
perfect, just as UNIX isn't perfect, even though each has a large
crowd who
think it is.

Whew, I finally made it thru the flood of followups to this point. I
guess my attitude is that I'm neither sniping-is-good, nor
sniping-is-bad, I'm indifferent. I'm kind of getting like that in my
old age. I used to be severely anti-spammer, now I see that the email
system is not perfect, and that allowed the spammers to do what they
did. But as time has gone on, the 'net has mitigated the spam problem
by developing and deploying filters to the point where the spammers are
now losing profits and have had to crank up their voilume tremendously
to get enough spam thru the filters to make money.

In other words, electronically, there has always been a noise floor, and
we've all had to live with it. The net has adapted to spammers by
filtering, and electronically, filtering has reduced the bandwidth so
that the signals get thru the noise.

Ebay has such a noise, and the snipers may be just one part of it, a
minor part IMHO. One other part is the seller who doesn't violate the
Ebay policy but sells items with excessive shipping charges, which Ebay
says is not their problem, the buyer has to beware. And Another noise
on Ebay is the keyword spammer who puts in added words into the subject
to get more search hits. This is against Ebay policy, but it isn't
enforced enough because not many people report violations to Ebay, so
many sellers get away with doing it.

As I pointed out in my original post that started this thread, Ebay has
added a search option that lets the buyer filter out clueless,
inconsiderate sellers who continually flood the listings with dreck,
making it harder for the buyer to find what he wants. I consider this
another filter to help reduce the noise.

I try to do my share and complain to Ebay about violations I see, and if
more people complained, it would be a better place. I think Ebay and
the users in general have accepted sniping as a very minor problem, and
have more important things as I've mentioned above that need their
attention.

 

[Michael A. Covington]

"Watson A.Name - "Watt Sun, the Dark Remover"" <NOSPAM@dslextreme.com> wrote
in message news:10ibd2vpkgmcs3d@corp.supernews.com...

Speaking of ham rigs. I found that Ebay has restrictions on selling
such things as transmitters, because the FCC requires buyers to be
licensed. In Ebay's case, anyone could buy one; if no one reports the
violation to the Ebay people, the auctino will very likely go on, even
tho it's in violation of their rules.

Last time I looked, a license was not needed to buy a ham transmitter, only
to use one.

eBay has no restrictions on ham rigs (see
http://pages.ebay.com/help/policies/electronics.html). They restrict
certain other kinds of transmitters that are not legal to use even with a
ham license.

VY 73
N4TMI

 

[Michael A. Covington]

"Watson A.Name - "Watt Sun, the Dark Remover"" <NOSPAM@dslextreme.com> wrote
in message news:10ibfclbn5oumf7@corp.supernews.com...

Why should they have to "change over"? Why not make it an option that
the seller can choose?

That's what I advocate. We are in vehement agreement on this point

I would like to see eBay offer sealed-bid proxy auctions (i.e., no bids are
displayed -- essentially eBay does the same thing for you that sniping
would, but with more reliability and less trouble) and also "snipe-proof"
auctions that are automatically extended as long as the bids are going up.

My point is, if you like sniping, a sealed-bid proxy auction does the same
job better. And if you don't like sniping, it can be prevented. The seller
should be able to choose these. The current practice doesn't have the
advantages of either one.

 

[Dave Platt]

In article <10ibd2vpkgmcs3d@corp.supernews.com>,
Watson A.Name - \"Watt Sun, the Dark Remover\" <alondra101@hotmail.com> wrote:

Speaking of ham rigs. I found that Ebay has restrictions on selling
such things as transmitters, because the FCC requires buyers to be
licensed. In Ebay's case, anyone could buy one; if no one reports the
violation to the Ebay people, the auctino will very likely go on, even
tho it's in violation of their rules.

I question this, on a couple of grounds.

I've seen boatloads and boatloads of ham transceivers sold on eBay.
In fact, they have a whole section for CB and ham radio.

The FCC does *not* require that buyers of transmitters be licensed.
There is no such rule or regulation, to the best of my knowledge.
It's perfectly legal for almost anyone to purchase a ham transmitter,
regardless of whether they hold a current license or not.

The FCC does require that a person be properly licensed, in order to
_transmit_ with such a device (independent of whether they own it, are
borrowing it, or are using someone else's station).

Now, the FCC does have regulations against the manufacture, sale,
advertising, and use of non-certificated transmitters intended for the
11-meter (CB) band. They also currently have regulations against the
manufacture/advertising/sale of amplifiers which can amplify 11-meter
(CB) signals, or which can be easily modified to do so. Ham
amplifiers which cover the 10- and 12-meter band must include
difficult-to-defeat circuitry to prevent their being used on the
11-meter band.

The FCC is proposing to eliminate this regulation, as it causes a lot
of hassle for equipment manufacturers, doesn't seem to be deterring
the flood of illegal CB amplifiers, and since the use of such
amplifiers is already forbidden by other FCC regulations.

I suspect that the auctions you've seen shut down, are for broadband
HF amplifiers which don't meet the current "must not be able to
amplify 27 MHz signals" rule, or non-certificated CB radios, or
transmitters which can operate on both CB and ham bands (these latter
are specifically forbidden by FCC rules, which don't allow such radios
to be certificated at all).

--
Dave Platt <dplatt@radagast.org> AE6EO
Hosting the Jade Warrior home page: http://www.radagast.org/jade-warrior
I do _not_ wish to receive unsolicited commercial email, and I will
boycott any company which has the gall to send me such ads!

 

[Dave Platt]

In article <10ibg85oflg7k9a@corp.supernews.com>,
Watson A.Name - \"Watt Sun, the Dark Remover\" <alondra101@hotmail.com> wrote:

My own personal feeling is that you (and others) are engaged in a
somewhat quixotic quest here. You're trying to persuade eBay (or some
other site) that there is One True Right And Best Way to run auctions,
based on your own (subjective) analysis of the situation. I don't
believe that the object of your desire exists... there _is_ no single
auction system which you can conclusively prove is "best". All you
can say is that various sets of auction rules exist, and that each of
them has certain advantages and disadvantages for the various parties
who participate in the auctions. You can only argue superiority vs.
inferiority based on a starting set of axioms about what's "best", and
these axioms can't be proven.

No, axioms are regarded as self-evident truths. You mean _theories_.
The theories can't be proven.

No, I mean axioms.

You prove theories, based on axioms and various rules of logic.

You can't prove the axioms... you can only accept them as starting
points. Godel demonstrated that any logical system which allows you
to prove your axioms, also allows you to prove contradictions.

My point, I guess, is that you have to decide in advance what you
consider to be the true goal of an auction system... this decision
defines your axioms. You can then evaluate how well any given set of
rules meets this goal that you have defined. Possibly, by some method
of logic or mathematical weighting, you can prove (or "prove" in the
subjective sense) that one particular set of auction rules is the
"best" at meeting your goals. People have tried to do this for
various sorts of real-world vote-scoring systems, for instance.

You cannot, however, prove that your goals are the "best goals".

A "sealed bid, winner pays second-highest bid plus minimum increment
at that level" would certainly have some advantages for some parties.
It would add the sort of sense-of-fairness that you seem to desire,
and it would (as you note) eliminate the advantages of sniping over
non-sniping. That might be good.

Good for whom? The buyer? The seller? Level the playing field for the
sellers? Good for whom?

That's rather my point. You have to define (and accept/agree upon)
what constitutes a good set of goals.

On the other hand, it would eliminate feeding-frenzy bidding wars,
which would probably be good for buyers as a group, bad for sellers,
and bad for eBay (all for the same reason: it'd lower the average
winning bid by some amount). It'd also remove the sense of
gambling-excitement which some customers seem to feel (or crave?) and
might reduce eBay's attractiveness to people who go in for gambling.

Why do you call it gambling? There's a big difference between betting
and bidding.

I call it "gambling excitement" because it seems to me that some
people seem to be deriving the same kind of competitive thrill from
bidding in an auction, that gamblers get from rolling dice on a craps
table or when playing poker. They follow the auction progress
closely, they up their bids manually in real time (sometimes
repeatedly, by just enough to edge out the previously-winning bidder),
they get caught up in back-and-forth bidding with one or more other
bidders, and they get really incensed if they are outbid at the last
moment.

I don't think that there's all that much difference between this
particular style of bidding, and the sort of bidding which takes place
in certain card and table games in Reno (the ones that are a mix of
chance, skill, strategy, and psychology).

This is, of course, only one style of auction bidding. It's pretty
much the opposite of the strategy I use, since my ultimate goal is to
simply buy the product that I want, at the lowest price I can pay, up
to some maximum which I determine well in advance. I don't let myself
get caught up in minute-to-minute bidding wars, as I believe that this
can lead to a "win at any price" effect which ultimately costs me
money. I decide how much I'm willing to pay (at most), and I bid that
much - once - at the point at which I believe my bid gives me the best
chance of winning the auction. That's usually a late bid (one which
won't push any other bidder into a counter-bidding frenzy), and so I
usually snipe.

Someone else suggested that sniping works against the sniper, because
the sniper has no chance to re-bid if the snipe isn't high enough to
win the auction. That's true, I suppose, but it's irrelevant for me,
as when I snipe I've *already* decided what my highest bid is, and
used that as the value of my snipe. If my snipe loses, then it simply
means that someone else was willing to pay more than my limit, and
there's no need for me to re-bid.

Some or all of these changes could be optional.

Sure. It'd definitely be interesting to see how many sellers would
take advantage of an "automatic extension of an active auction"
feature (either for free or for a nominal charge).


--
Dave Platt <dplatt@radagast.org> AE6EO
Hosting the Jade Warrior home page: http://www.radagast.org/jade-warrior
I do _not_ wish to receive unsolicited commercial email, and I will
boycott any company which has the gall to send me such ads!

 

[Dave Platt]

In article <10ibe6age34vhf9@corp.supernews.com>,
Watson A.Name - \"Watt Sun, the Dark Remover\" <alondra101@hotmail.com> wrote:

What happens in this scenario? The item is going for $5 up until a few
seconds before the end. You're willing to pay ten. You snipe ten a few
seconds before the end, but it's already at 11, and Ebay won't let you
enter an amount less than that. What happens? Software says snipe
failed?

Yup. Exactly. Happens to me from time to time.

Anyway. my contention is that sniping doesn't give the sniper any
significant advantage.

In some cases, that's true. Snipng doesn't give you any advantage IF
all of the other bidders are bidding in what I think is a sensible
fashion. If every other bidder is either [1] sniping, or [2] making a
true determination in advance of what their maximum bid is, and then
entering that bid and depending on eBay's automatic proxy, then
sniping provides no advantage whatsoever. It can even work to your
disadvantage, as network interruptions can easily prevent an
otherwise-winning snipe from getting posted, and an earlier bidder of
exactly the same amount of your snipe will win out over your snipe.

I think we're in violent agreement about this, so far.

My point, though, is that sniping *does* give you an advantage, much
of the time, because in many auctions some of your competitors will
*not* be bidding "sensibly" - that is, they aren't applying the
"figure out your maximum in advance, bid this much, and allow eBay's
automatic proxy bidder to work on your behalf" rule. Against
competitors who choose to enter a series of increasing bids, manually,
sniping gives you a definite advantage because you'll often beat their
most recent bid at the last moment and they won't have a chance to
react.

And you the sniper still have to sit back and
watch a bidding war that's going over the maximum you're willing to pay.

True enough.

Sniping is not a guarantee of a win. Never said that it was.

Sniping can help you win, *if* your opponent fails to tell eBay's
system what his/her true maximum bid actually is. In these cases, you
can gain advantage in two ways:

[1] You can win some auctions that you would otherwise lose.

[2] When you win, you sometimes pay less. You end up paying "one
increment more than the previous high bid entered into the
system", rather than "one increment more than the previous high
bidder was really (but secretly) willing to pay."

Against skilled-and-knowledgeable competitors, sniping is useless.
Against those with less skill and knowledge (or against those who
simply prefer real-time manual bidding), it gives one a significant
edge, in my opinion.

--
Dave Platt <dplatt@radagast.org> AE6EO
Hosting the Jade Warrior home page: http://www.radagast.org/jade-warrior
I do _not_ wish to receive unsolicited commercial email, and I will
boycott any company which has the gall to send me such ads!

 

[Norm Dresner]

"Dave Platt" <dplatt@radagast.org> wrote in message
news:10icj9fr768g650@corp.supernews.com...

Against skilled-and-knowledgeable competitors, sniping is useless.
Against those with less skill and knowledge (or against those who
simply prefer real-time manual bidding), it gives one a significant
edge, in my opinion.

Bidding the most gives on a significant advantage, regardless of when that
bid is placed. If you bid your maximum and are "sniped" it's because the
sniper was willing to bid more than you were.

BTW, I just beat a sniper -- he bid with 4 seconds to go but my proxy bid
held.

Norm

 

[Michael A. Covington]

"Norm Dresner" <ndrez@att.net> wrote in message
news:3MwVc.486586$Gx4.91056@bgtnsc04-news.ops.worldnet.att.net...

"Dave Platt" <dplatt@radagast.org> wrote in message
news:10icj9fr768g650@corp.supernews.com...

Against skilled-and-knowledgeable competitors, sniping is useless.
Against those with less skill and knowledge (or against those who
simply prefer real-time manual bidding), it gives one a significant
edge, in my opinion.

Bidding the most gives on a significant advantage, regardless of when that
bid is placed. If you bid your maximum and are "sniped" it's because the
sniper was willing to bid more than you were.

And my point is, if the person with the highest maximum bid always wins, why
bother with the sniping game at all? Just have a sealed-bid auction (with
proxy bidding the usual way).

 

[John Miller]

Michael A. Covington wrote:

And my point is, if the person with the highest maximum bid always wins,
why
bother with the sniping game at all?

Becauase people sometimes get caught up in the (conventional or proxy
bidding) game, and keep upping their bid over what they had originally
intended to be their maximum. Unlike conventional bidding, sniping does
nothing to encourage ill-advised bidding wars, which so many people regret
the morning after. You could think of sniping as a public service.

--
John Miller
Email address: domain, n4vu.com; username, jsm

Syntactic sugar causes cancer of the semicolon.
-Epigrams in Programming, ACM SIGPLAN Sept. 1982

 

[Peter A Forbes]

On Fri, 20 Aug 2004 21:11:28 -0400, "Michael A. Covington"
<look@ai.uga.edu.for.address> wrote:

And my point is, if the person with the highest maximum bid always wins, why
bother with the sniping game at all? Just have a sealed-bid auction (with
proxy bidding the usual way).

Because:

1) An earlier bid just sets up for people to chip away at it and raise the
eventual price you will pay.

2) It alerts others (who can look at your bidding at any time) that you are
after a particular item. There are plenty of folks who will look at what you are
bidding for if you are are a known collector of certain items.

3) Showing interest in an item and bidding early is bad news generally IMO.

Peter

--
Peter & Rita Forbes
diesel@easynet.co.uk
Engine pages for preservation info:
http://www.oldengine.org/members/diesel

 

[Ross Herbert]

On Sat, 21 Aug 2004 18:43:52 -0400, "Michael A. Covington"
<look@ai.uga.edu.for.address> wrote:

|> While the ingredients in WD-40 are secret,
|
|Actually, they have to disclose quite a bit in the MSDS:
|http://www.wd40.com/Brands/msds_usa.html
|

And there is even more info in the Australian MSDS
http://www.wd40.com.au/msds/ChemWatch%20MSDS%20WD-40_Aerosol.pdf

The most significant ingredient (CAS 64742-88-7) is a white naptha
mineral spirit. You can read the full toxicology report on this
chemical here
http://ntp-server.niehs.nih.gov/htdocs/LT-studies/tr519.html where it
also gives the main uses in the 1st para. This ingredient is obviously
the solvent/cleanser in WD40.

Note the 2nd most significant ingredient (CAS 64742-65-0) is the same
as that which makes up 100% of FisherBrand 19 Mechanical Pump Oil.
https://fscimage.fishersci.com/msds/11406.htm This is obviously the
lubricant/protectant (along with the unidentified corrosion inhibitor)
in WD40 which is left behind after the solvent has evaporated.

Ross H

 

[Watson A.Name - \"Watt Su]

"Michael A. Covington" <look@ai.uga.edu.for.address> wrote in message
news:4124c580$1@mustang.speedfactory.net...

"Watson A.Name - "Watt Sun, the Dark Remover"" <NOSPAM@dslextreme.com
wrote
in message news:10i92fpmkpbic65@corp.supernews.com...

"John Miller" <me@privacy.net> wrote in message
news:cg07iv$q64$1@n4vu.com...

There's no sincerer eBay purchaser than me, and I've discovered
through
hard-won experience that the practical way to be successful in eBay
auctions is to snipe.

What's the advantage?

Sniping or not, You bid low, You Lose.

See how little consensus there is about the real effect of sniping? I
think
this is because sniping is an unreliable and inefficient way of doing
what
it does. Sealed bids would do the job reliably.

But you contradict yourself. You keep on saying that sniping is no good
in one way or the other, but you never say who it favors or disfavors.
And you want to change it, but you don't convince hardly anyone that
it's worth the effort, especially the one you really need to convince,
Ebay. We the bidders don't seem to share your concerns, and we just
live with it, and do what we have to do, assess the auction in an
appropriate way, and whether or not sniping goes on, we win or lose and
if we lose we move on to the next auction for the same item. No big
deal. Yet if the sniping was such a problem, you would see more bidders
leaving Ebay and going to other auctions where it has been 'fixed'. But
they're not. Ebay is as popular as ever.

So now what??? Will you stop "preaching to the choir" and go preach to
the
ones who really make a difference? It's not doing anything to change my
mind! I'm not going to Astrowhatever, I'm still bidding on ebay.

 

[Watson A.Name - \"Watt Su]

"Don James" <stop_spaam@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:1dcff9aa.0408190746.2dc4a1be@posting.google.com...

"Michael A. Covington" <look@ai.uga.edu.for.address> wrote in message
news:<4123efda$1@mustang.speedfactory.net>...
"Don Bruder" <dakidd@sonic.net> wrote in message
news:LbNUc.8416$54.122899@typhoon.sonic.net...
And that's the long and short of it: You anti-sniping folks are
crying
because you got something taken away from you by someone who knew
what
they wanted, knew what it was worth to them, and wanted it worse
than
you did. Get over it.

Er... Can't we say the same to YOU? If you know what you're willing
to pay,
why do you snipe? Why don't you do what you're telling us to do?

Michael, there are many advantages to bidding very late besides
possibly getting a lower price:

1) I'm less likely to be shilled (yes, shill bidding happens on eBay,
and it costs buyers a lot of money)

Not if the buyer knows what the item is worth, and his maximum bid
reflects that.

2) I don't have to wait for the auction to be over before I bid on
another similar item (remember, even if you're outbid on eBay, a
retraction or cancellation can make you the winner; if you don't want
two of something, you have to wait for the auction to end once you've
bid)

Then why are you bidding on two different items?

3) I don't become someone's "personal shopper" (someone who bids early
on a lot of items, allowing others to find things by scanning his
bidding history)

How does scanning one's bidding history help others?

4) I'm less likely to get "auction fever" and bid more than I can
afford; I get one shot, and have to decide how much an item is really
worth to me.

That's not true. You can still change your bid up to the last moment.

There are others, but the point is that sniping isn't done just to
take advantage of the uninformed bidder. It would be fine with me if
eBay restricted people to one bid per item (as you suggested), but I
think they like the bidding wars.

After you get into a bidding frenzy, you learn how unproductive it is
when you find that others are paying a lot less for the same items
because they didn't get the fever. So you should have learned that
early on. Just hope you make your mistakes on low cost items in tbe
beginning.

Automatic extensions may be OK for some sites, but I doubt they'd be
well-received in a global, 24/7 environment like eBay. You're
proposing a system that would virtually require users to be at their
computers when an auction is ending, in order to defend their bids

If you're defending your bid, then you're getting into a bidding war or
frenzy. And that's a big mistake that no bidder should make, no matter
what the auction.

(I wouldn't expect eBay's proxy bidding system to survive if other
bidders could nibble away at the proxy for as long as they wanted;
that would be paradise for shill-bidders and "win at all costs"
bidders).

Don't you think you're saying paradise for the wrong people? The
paradise would be for the seller. Win at all costs bidders can already
get whatever they want by overbidding at the beginning. They're fools
whose money will soon be parted. Shill bidders won't change a prudent
bidder's maximum bid. He knows what the item is worth.

That gives me a one-hour time window; if an auction for
something I want doesn't end in that window, I won't be bidding. That
doesn't sound like an effective system to me.

BTW, Yahoo Auctions offers extensions as an option. It's rarely used.
If eBay offered it, I'd expect the same level of success.

 

[Michael A. Covington]

this is because sniping is an unreliable and inefficient way of doing
what
it does. Sealed bids would do the job reliably.

But you contradict yourself. You keep on saying that sniping is no good
in one way or the other, but you never say who it favors or disfavors.

Everyone! If you want people to be able to bid without letting others know
they're bidding, why not just have a sealed-bid auction? Why bring
third-party autosniping services into it, just making more work and removing
reliability?

So now what??? Will you stop "preaching to the choir" and go preach to
the
ones who really make a difference? It's not doing anything to change my
mind! I'm not going to Astrowhatever, I'm still bidding on ebay.

Will you stop replying 10 messages to every 1 message I post? I don't have
time on my hand to repeat things I've already said just because someone
claims not to understand them.

Nobody is trying to compel you to do anything.

 

[Watson A.Name - \"Watt Su]

"Michael A. Covington" <look@ai.uga.edu.for.address> wrote in message
news:4128f98f$1@mustang.speedfactory.net...

this is because sniping is an unreliable and inefficient way of
doing
what
it does. Sealed bids would do the job reliably.

But you contradict yourself. You keep on saying that sniping is no
good
in one way or the other, but you never say who it favors or
disfavors.

Everyone! If you want people to be able to bid without letting others
know
they're bidding, why not just have a sealed-bid auction? Why bring
third-party autosniping services into it, just making more work and
removing
reliability?

So now what??? Will you stop "preaching to the choir" and go preach
to
the
ones who really make a difference? It's not doing anything to
change my
mind! I'm not going to Astrowhatever, I'm still bidding on ebay.

Will you stop replying 10 messages to every 1 message I post? I don't
have
time on my hand to repeat things I've already said just because
someone
claims not to understand them.

I'm only trying to get an answer to the Qs I asked. You claim it adds
more work and makes things unreliable, but I'm wondering why does it
lower reliability.

Nobody is trying to compel you to do anything.

I'm saying that I haven't found sniping to be a problem, and I don't
think I would be willing to switch to get rid of it. Another followup
said that extending the bidding end would add other problems such as
shill bidding. But it looks to me like extending would give an
advantage to the seller, not help the buyers. But I'm not a seller.

I'm just trying to get to the bottom of these claims everyone is making,
whether or not they're real and whom they affect, and in what way. So
far I can't get anything much but hearsay and no hard evidence from
anyone.

Thanks, but I hope I don't seem to be a pest, I'm just trying to get to
the bottom of this. So far it seems to be a bottomless discussion. :-(

 

[Watson A.Name - \"Watt Su]

"Michael A. Covington" <look@ai.uga.edu.for.address> wrote in message
news:4128f98f$1@mustang.speedfactory.net...

this is because sniping is an unreliable and inefficient way of
doing
what
it does. Sealed bids would do the job reliably.

But you contradict yourself. You keep on saying that sniping is no
good
in one way or the other, but you never say who it favors or
disfavors.

Everyone! If you want people to be able to bid without letting others
know
they're bidding, why not just have a sealed-bid auction? Why bring
third-party autosniping services into it, just making more work and
removing
reliability?

So now what??? Will you stop "preaching to the choir" and go preach
to
the
ones who really make a difference? It's not doing anything to
change my
mind! I'm not going to Astrowhatever, I'm still bidding on ebay.

Will you stop replying 10 messages to every 1 message I post? I don't
have
time on my hand to repeat things I've already said just because
someone
claims not to understand them.

Nobody is trying to compel you to do anything.

BTW, I added Golden O to exclude from my search, and the hits went from
206 down to 150. Fully 1/4 of the search for "transistors" on Ebay was
from thie one turkey seller. Wasting my, and everyone else's time.

 

[Michael A. Covington]

"Watson A.Name - "Watt Sun, the Dark Remover"" <NOSPAM@dslextreme.com> wrote
in message news:10ii8r4bpdra863@corp.supernews.com...

I'm only trying to get an answer to the Qs I asked. You claim it adds
more work and makes things unreliable, but I'm wondering why does it
[autosniping]
lower reliability.

Because there's no assurance that you can actually get a message from a
third-party server to Ebay during the last second. Net propagation delays
are unpredictable to a degree that affects not just autosniping, but also
manual sniping. You can easily hit a 5-second delay at any unpredictable
time.

Hence my suggestion that eBay itself should achieve the effect of sniping,
without half the trouble, by simply letting people accept sealed bids.

I'm saying that I haven't found sniping to be a problem, and I don't
think I would be willing to switch to get rid of it. Another followup
said that extending the bidding end would add other problems such as
shill bidding. But it looks to me like extending would give an
advantage to the seller, not help the buyers. But I'm not a seller.

Economics is complicated! My point was simply that *whatever* sniping
accomplishes (if anything!), there's a simpler and more efficient way to
achieve it. And some people find sniping annoying, so there should be an
auction format in which it isn't possible.

 

[Don James]

"Watson A.Name - \"Watt Sun, the Dark Remover\"" <NOSPAM@dslextreme.com> wrote in message news:<10ihsvejefoth01@corp.supernews.com>...

"Don James" <stop_spaam@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:1dcff9aa.0408190746.2dc4a1be@posting.google.com...
1) I'm less likely to be shilled (yes, shill bidding happens on eBay,
and it costs buyers a lot of money)

Not if the buyer knows what the item is worth, and his maximum bid
reflects that.

Perhaps you should look up the definition of shill bidding. If I'm the
only legitimate bidder, and the seller illegally bids against me, it
costs me money. Bidding what an item is worth to me is logical; having
to pay my max because a seller commits a crime (shilling is a crime in
most states) is something altogether different. Sniping doesn't give
the seller a bid to shill against.

2) I don't have to wait for the auction to be over before I bid on
another similar item (remember, even if you're outbid on eBay, a
retraction or cancellation can make you the winner; if you don't want
two of something, you have to wait for the auction to end once you've
bid)

Then why are you bidding on two different items?

If I'm sniping, I'm not; that's the point. An early bidder has
committed his money to the first auction; if a better item, or a
"Buy-It-Now" auction, or an auction with a shorter duration is listed,
I can safely snipe it. The early bidder is stuck unless he wants to
risk winning both.

3) I don't become someone's "personal shopper" (someone who bids early
on a lot of items, allowing others to find things by scanning his
bidding history)

How does scanning one's bidding history help others?

My best bargains on eBay have come on items where the seller has done
a poor job describing the item (mis-identification, misspelled words,
important information omitted, wrong category), and they don't show up
in any normal search for the item. The people whose history I check
seem to look through a huge amount of auctions, uncovering items I'm
interested in but wouldn't turn up in my searches. When they bid
early, they leave a trail for other bidders to find and win an item
they wouldn't have seen otherwise. A sniper's bid history is of no use
to anyone, because the auction is over ten seconds after the bid is
placed.

4) I'm less likely to get "auction fever" and bid more than I can
afford; I get one shot, and have to decide how much an item is really
worth to me.

That's not true. You can still change your bid up to the last moment.

I'm a sniper; I make my first and only bid at the "last moment". By
bidding late enough to prevent others from reacting to my bid, I also
give up the opportunity to change my bid because time will have run
out. My max has to be my real max.

There are others, but the point is that sniping isn't done just to
take advantage of the uninformed bidder. It would be fine with me if
eBay restricted people to one bid per item (as you suggested), but I
think they like the bidding wars.

After you get into a bidding frenzy, you learn how unproductive it is
when you find that others are paying a lot less for the same items
because they didn't get the fever. So you should have learned that
early on. Just hope you make your mistakes on low cost items in tbe
beginning.

Some people learn more quickly than others.

Automatic extensions may be OK for some sites, but I doubt they'd be
well-received in a global, 24/7 environment like eBay. You're
proposing a system that would virtually require users to be at their
computers when an auction is ending, in order to defend their bids

If you're defending your bid, then you're getting into a bidding war or
frenzy. And that's a big mistake that no bidder should make, no matter
what the auction.

In an eBay auction, with no extensions, you'd be right. But I'm
referring to auctions that get extended. Smart bidders still wouldn't
exceed their max, but they'd bid in small increments instead of
throwing out a proxy bid that could be chewed up with no fixed end
time. The only way to do that is to be at the computer at the end
time.

(I wouldn't expect eBay's proxy bidding system to survive if other
bidders could nibble away at the proxy for as long as they wanted;
that would be paradise for shill-bidders and "win at all costs"
bidders).

Don't you think you're saying paradise for the wrong people? The
paradise would be for the seller. Win at all costs bidders can already
get whatever they want by overbidding at the beginning. They're fools
whose money will soon be parted. Shill bidders won't change a prudent
bidder's maximum bid. He knows what the item is worth.

Again, paying the full amount of my proxy because there was another
legitimate bidder is fine; paying my max because the seller was gaming
me is the problem. Extensions will give sellers more opportunity to
illegally manipulate the price.

That gives me a one-hour time window; if an auction for
something I want doesn't end in that window, I won't be bidding. That
doesn't sound like an effective system to me.

BTW, Yahoo Auctions offers extensions as an option. It's rarely used.
If eBay offered it, I'd expect the same level of success.

No comment? I'd be interested to hear your explanation for the lack of
acceptance of this feature. I'm sure eBay has taken note of its
failure; perhaps you should do the same.

 

[Watson A.Name - \"Watt Su]

"Michael A. Covington" <look@ai.uga.edu.for.address> wrote in message
news:41294bfe$1@mustang.speedfactory.net...

"Watson A.Name - "Watt Sun, the Dark Remover"" <NOSPAM@dslextreme.com
wrote
in message news:10ii8r4bpdra863@corp.supernews.com...

I'm only trying to get an answer to the Qs I asked. You claim it
adds
more work and makes things unreliable, but I'm wondering why does it
[autosniping]
lower reliability.

Because there's no assurance that you can actually get a message from
a
third-party server to Ebay during the last second. Net propagation
delays
are unpredictable to a degree that affects not just autosniping, but
also
manual sniping. You can easily hit a 5-second delay at any
unpredictable
time.

I kind of like that iffyness. Makes the sniper think twice about using
it. Seems that nowadays with the script kiddies and their armies of
zombies doing DDOS attacks, delays are even more unpredictable.

Hence my suggestion that eBay itself should achieve the effect of
sniping,
without half the trouble, by simply letting people accept sealed bids.

So your recommendation would help the snipers. Or maybe I should say,
it turns everyone into snipers. Or maybe I should say, it takes away
the difference between sniping and regular Ebay bidding. It would
destroy a whole bunch of autosniping software vendors that have sprung
up around this 'industry'.

I'm saying that I haven't found sniping to be a problem, and I don't
think I would be willing to switch to get rid of it. Another
followup
said that extending the bidding end would add other problems such as
shill bidding. But it looks to me like extending would give an
advantage to the seller, not help the buyers. But I'm not a seller.

Economics is complicated! My point was simply that *whatever* sniping
accomplishes (if anything!), there's a simpler and more efficient way
to
achieve it. And some people find sniping annoying, so there should be
an
auction format in which it isn't possible.

Someone else mentioned that this option was available on Yahoo, but was
seldom used.

 

[Watson A.Name - \"Watt Su]

"Don James" <stop_spaam@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:1dcff9aa.0408221754.63564800@posting.google.com...

"Watson A.Name - \"Watt Sun, the Dark Remover\""
NOSPAM@dslextreme.com> wrote in message

news:<10ihsvejefoth01@corp.supernews.com>...

"Don James" <stop_spaam@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:1dcff9aa.0408190746.2dc4a1be@posting.google.com...

[snip]

4) I'm less likely to get "auction fever" and bid more than I can
afford; I get one shot, and have to decide how much an item is
really
worth to me.

That's not true. You can still change your bid up to the last
moment.

I'm a sniper; I make my first and only bid at the "last moment". By
bidding late enough to prevent others from reacting to my bid, I also
give up the opportunity to change my bid because time will have run
out. My max has to be my real max.

I don't use sniping software, but if it didn't allow me to change my
mind up until it submits the bid, i would delete it from my PC. Or else
never install it to begin with.

Say you set your sniping prog to bid $10 and by the time the sniping
prog gets to bidding, the item is already $11. Then what does it do?
It can't bid because Ebay will just tell it that the bid has to be
higher than $11.


[snip]