Question on eBay bidding

wrote

Brain?

I stand corrected.

You seem to have a habit of attributing to me the very behaviors I've described as what I disagree with.

Ya think?

Yawn. You confuse "disagrees with" and "stupid". How....original.

All true.

It's not quite a normal sealed-bid auction when you bid at the very end. As D. Lancaster has pointed out, it's effectively a "Vickerey Auction" (sealed bids and the high bidder gets the item, but pays the SECOND-highest price). The advantage of this is claimed to be that the optimal strategy for the bidder is to bid just what the item is worth to them.

Best regards, Spehro Pefhany

And you're a prig.

(look it up)

Steve

"Dave Hinz" wrote

Is the concept alien to you?

Steve

No, I'm comfortable with you being wrong. Bye, SteveB.

It is not, as any observant fool can see at rush hour in the bay area or la basin. The idiots that MUST rush to the very end of the lane, and then suddenly try to merge regardless of space (or more often continue down the shoulder for a ways as well), cause backups and accidents, all the damn time. jk

Oooh Snideness, but no. What I frequently drive takes enough space that I don't wait for the last minute to do any thing. And actually, where I live now, I cant think of any merge lanes in the area.

I don't. I just don't think snipeing is dishonest or "shady"

jk

If everyone stayed in their lane until the merge, there would be no way for them to rush, would there? They'd have to move along with the normal flow of traffic.

Wrong. IF the people who don't snipe are at any disadvantage, it is because they put THEMSELVES at a disadvantage, either by not understanding the rules of the game (proxy bidding and a time limit) or by choosing to play by a different set of rules than the official rules used by everyone else.

And even without using sniping, you CANNOT be "disadvantaged" if you make an honest assessment of the maximum the item is worth to you and then bid that amount. For some reason, that concept seems to be too difficult for you to comprehend.

So in your world view, given the existing rules of eBay, where is the line that determines whether placing my proxy bid is "cheating" or not? Ten minutes before auction end? Thirty minutes? Two days?

And if someone outbids me in the last minute, can I attempt to outbid him, or would you consider that to be "cheating" because I would then be denying others the opportunity to outbid both of us?

News flash: The "auction is set up" to allow sniping; both the sniper and the newbie are playing by the rules. It's not a matter of "stooping"; it's a matter of understanding the rules.

I think I've identified a couple of your ethical notions. Tell me if I've got these right:

1) You as a seller have a moral entitlement to take advantage of those who have no notion what an item is really worth, those who bid irrationally in the heat of a bidding war, and newbies who don't yet understand the rules; there is nothing ethically wrong with pitting two or more of these rubes against each other to extract the maximum price for your item, even if it's well above the fair market value. 2) Any bidder who acts in a way that might limit your ability to capitalize on the ignorance or irrationality of other bidders is cheating and acting unethically, even though they haven't violated any rules of the game. 3) [A generalization of 2] Anyone who doesn't play by YOUR rules is behaving unethically, even if they're playing within the bounds of the official rules of the activity in question.

Do those sound about right?

I'm curious: There are other ways in which eBay rules differ from the rules of traditional auctions, but you don't seem bothered with those. Why is that? For instance, in an eBay auction, a bidder is limited to the smallest bid increment; i.e., the bid shown reflects the smallest winning margin, even if he placed a higher (proxy) bid. In a traditional auction, a bidder is not limited to the smallest bid increment; he can bid significantly higher than the current bid in an attempt to intimidate other bidders into giving up. Without the intimidation of a large bid, the other bidders may get caught up in a nickel-and-dime bidding war and end up bidding well beyond the point where the large bid would have fallen. Why do you not complain about the inability to post a large (non-proxy) bid? Could it be because that inability works to your advantage as a seller?

They are still free to up their bid at any point during the auction. If they rationally determined a maximum amount they would pay for the item and then bid less than that amount, then either it was an ignorant bid due to not understanding the rules, or they were trying to somehow manipulate the bidding. On the other hand, if their maximum was based simply on what others bid rather than being based on how they valued the item on their own, then it was an irrational bid.

How did you arrive at the notion that you, as a seller, have a moral right to take advantage of their irrationality (in the second case) to get the best possible price for yourself, but I, as a bidder, have no moral right to take advantage of their ignorance or their unsuccessful conniving (in the first case) to get the best possible price for myself?

Well, at a merge, one lane usually dies. And those who can see drive ahead and think, "Gee, this lane ends up here. I better get over."

Not so with idiots.

They see the open lane, at least for a ways, and think, "Gee, here is a place to get a few car lengths ahead of the commoners. I'll just drive like

90 to get there and then swerve in to the moving lane. ALL COMMONERS MAKE WAY FOR THE KING!"

Steve

The funny thing is, merges like that work best when all the lanes are used up to the last moment. And when the lane that stays, realizes the merge has to happen at the last minute and leaves a gap for the incoming cars. At this point you see a zipper effect - basically the follow distance simply decreases by one car length. As long as it was more than two to start with, it works fine.

The most obvious example of this difference is when you have construction sites with merges, that have been in effect for a long time, and the commuters on the road know about it.

Traffic can flow unimpeded at, say, 40 mph because everyone knows about the effect. But put some weekend drivers on the road who are unfamiliar with the layout, and it jams up tight.

Jim