EBaying; howling after an auction

From: daniel <daniel_at_internet.look.ca>
Date: Sun Oct 17 19:57:37 1999

-----Original Message-----
From: CLASSICCMP_at_trailing-edge.com <CLASSICCMP_at_trailing-edge.com>
To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers
<classiccmp_at_u.washington.edu>
Date: Sunday, October 17, 1999 8:38 PM
Subject: Re: EBaying; howling after an auction


>>I've seen this, too. On one particular item that I wanted,
>>in viewing the "View Sellers Other Auctions", I noticed that
>>he had a number of them to sell. Spread out over a few days.
>>I would bid on one and someone would outbid me. I'd bid on
>>another and someone would outbid me. I finally just said forget
>>it, this is getting ridiculous. :-)
>
>Certainly, E-bay does provides tools for many "commodity" type items
>to compare one sale with past ones, so you know what a reasonable bid
>is. There are evidently folks who don't know how to use this, and
>it doesn't really bother me, I just feel kind-of-sorry for them.
>
>Other E-bay phenomena:
>
>1. Items (like HP C3010 2 Gbyte SCSI drives) that have been
>flooding the surplus market. These are available from liquidators
>like www.hitechcafe.com and www.compgeeks.com for $30-$35-$40, but
>I've seen them bid up into the $50-$60 range on E-bay very regularly.
>Same thing often happens for surplus PC-clone mainboards.
>
>2. What really amazes me is when a seller makes a reserve price auction,
>very plainly states the reserve price in the item description, and
>there are literally dozens of bids made *below* the stated reserve
>price. What the ???. Either the bidders think this is entirely a
>"bidding game", where the objective is to outbid the other guy with
>no real intention to buy, or they don't read the description at all, or
they
>haven't a clue period.
>

Easy, to track the auction and get an email with the info about the auction
(for future reference). Auction programs help you when you have a bid in.

>Tim.
>
Received on Sun Oct 17 1999 - 19:57:37 BST