My highest praise - for Audiogon


All too often, we hear the negative. Of everything in life. But today, I wanted to put forth my story. One that is positive. Of excellent thinking, planning, and execution when it comes to customer service.

My highest praise. My deepest thanks and appreciation. For who, for what? For Audiogon auctions!

Last night, I was involved in an auction here on Audiogon, and put in my bid for about as high as I would go on the item. A pair of Manley SE/PP tube amps(fabulous amps, congratulations to their lucky new owner). It was bested close to the end of the auction. I decided to stand pat. I will probably go with a new Rogue Magnum instead. Just a judgement call, trying to use my head along with my heart. But, I did see a bit more activity, and wanted to see how things ended up. So, at the close of the auction, I tried to check the winning bid.

To my surprise, it went into OT. Cool!

It goes like this, if there is activity in the waning moments, it goes to OT. No sniping. The winner will be the true winner. The honest and fair winner.

I remember Audiogon's real time auctions back a couple of years ago. Very cool. My biggest complaint about auctions is how someone swoops in the last 5 or 10 seconds, and steals something I was set on. All's fair in love and war? BS. It's low down and cowardly. In fact, last year I lost a pair of black pearl earrings for my fiance on ebay. Believe me, if I ever come across the person who did this, I am still mad enough to tar and feather them. I honestly mean this. With all my fiber. They will pay...

Auctions should be where the person who wins is the one willing to pay the highest price. The highest bid. Auctions should not end precisely at a certain time, but should end once the highest bid has been submitted.

As I said, I did not end up with the amps, but I would have had I WANTED to. And, THAT is the only fair way to play.

THANK YOU Audiogon!!! You are doing it right!
trelja

Showing 5 responses by zaikesman

I don't even want to know what Aroc does for a living... Aroc, do realize that a "wallflower" is someone who chooses not to participate? That hardly describes a person who "just loves to bid and bid", as you put it...

No one here ever said that sniping wasn't *effective*, just that they are against rules that encourage it (I'm not too concerned one way or the other myself).

I am, however, delighted to learn that if I ever run into you in some mercenary-infested equatorial jungle, you will behave like the gentleman that you are, and surprise me off balance, slaying me with one elegant coup-de-grace, rather than engaging me in some anachronistic, drawn-out slugfest that would only highlight my clumsiness. And I thought chivalry was dead...
Agree with all praise of A-Gon, but must agree with Artemus, Driver, and Ryan about the invalidity, in my view, of the auction complaint. I don't understand just where the supposed foul is that Trelja and JC are so upset about, and I *really* don't understand the animosity generated toward people who, in their estimation, were apparently willing to "overpay" for an item. This is what a free market allows for. It may indeed suck that somebody was willing to pay more than you for an item you really wanted, but what of it? Let it go. It's happened to me many a time, and the best thing for it is to just pretend it's as if you never bid the item in the first place. What else can you do? I routinely go onto ebay and bid the minimum bid for records that I'm interested in, but don't absolutely have to have. Most of these I will lose, but every so often one slips by under the wire and I get a record for a better than reasonable price. Does this make me a crook because I paid less than the "book" - the mythical "fair market value"? No - because I *was* the "market"! Then there are the times when I really do want a record, but decide not to bid my highest bid first, because I don't want the proxy to quickly inflate the market to the level of my maximum, in the case of there being significant other interest. Doing this, however, tends to mean that one must be prepared to watch the auction like a hawk, and to bid again right up to and including the very end. This, of course, is a risky proposition; I might be able to win with a bid lower than if I had max'ed 'er right out of the gate, but the chances are also greater to lose if I generate a last-minute bidding war, or am too busy to finish what I started. There's a lot to said for discouraging your opposition earlier than this by letting them run up against a relentless proxy. In any case, this is the nature of an auction - they can be nerve-racking, anxiety-causing, and deeply disappointing - in other words, as JC learned about himself, they are not for everyone. But this doesn't mean that they are by nature unfair (absent any fraud, of course). The best way for anyone to approach an auction is to know your limit before you start bidding, to stick to it, and to consider the process itself as a form of entertainment, a lot like betting on the ballgame or buying a lottery ticket: You may win, you may lose, but you took your joyride just by participating.
BTW, I didn't mean to give the impression that I disapprove of the OT system that Audiogon has implemented (although I must admit that I didn't even know about it prior to reading this thread - thanks, Trelja!) - just that I don't agree with vilifying someone for taking advantage of the rules as they exist on eBay. eBay itself, and how they constuct their site, is another question entirely, and a perfectly legitimate one. I also have to admit that I do sometimes find myself bahaving in a strangely altruistic manner on eBay with regard to ends of auctions. If I place something on my "Watch" list that has one bid on it for the minimum, and no further activity takes place on it before the end of the auction, I could, if I'm looking at the auction just before it closes, decide to test the waters with the first bidder's proxy. But I don't believe I have ever done this. I usually start thinking to myself that I'd probably just wind up driving up their bid before dropping out anyway, so I leave it alone. Or even if I could win it by only bidding a small increment above the first bidder's price (unbeknown to me without trying, of course), I still feel some inhibition for probably ruining their day, and don't do it. So I suppose that, as it regards my own actions, this fact of my conduct does mean that I personally (if not universally in theory) side with Trelja on the morality (but not the ethics - they are different) of "sniping". Thinking about this brings to my attention the potentially significant fact that Audiogon does not incorporate a "Watch" feature one could use to tag auctions without actually bidding on them, and follow through "My Page". This is could be just as meaningful a gesture on Audiogon's part to discourage the practice Trelja abhors as the overtime feature itself. However, the presence of the somewhat similar-acting "Ending Auctions" button on this site, in conjunction with the OT, will probably tend to work in the seller's favor - as it undoubtedly should.
Right, Ivan, just like auctions are. And if it's too hard to display good "gamesmanship" when you lose, better stay off the field! :-)
...which is why baseball is still the game of games...it goes until somebody wins...a lot like this thread...