Dispute.com sold at GoDaddy Auctions last week for $65,000.
The winning bidder did not pay.
GoDaddy offered the domain to the next highest bidder. If that buyer opts to not purchase the domain name, the opportunity goes to the next high bidder. This continues until a bidder accepts the price and purchases the domain name.
Highest bidder didn’t pay for dispute.com.
Second highest bidder didn’t pay.
Third highest bidder didn’t pay.
Fourth highest bidder didn’t pay.
Fifth higest bidder didn’t pay.
SIXTH highest bidder paid for the domain.
Eventually, the sixth highest bidder paid $38,000 to buy the domain. So they had to go through 5 bidders from $65,000 down to $38,000 to find a legitimate bidder willing to pay.
How can we believe that the highest bidders 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5 were legitimate if NONE of them were willing to pay for the domain?
If I was a legitimate bidder, and I could get the domain for the highest price I was willing to pay, I would jump on the opportunity to buy it. If I was not, I would not pay, like bidder 1, 2, 3, 4, 5.
So all bidding above $38,000 was basically fraudulent.
How is it even possible that the top 5 highest bidders in an auction did not intend to pay for the domain? And yet, GoDaddy insist that we should trust them and that we don’t need to see who we’re bidding against?
GoDaddy needs to introduce bidder handles so that we can protect ourselves from all these fraudulent bidders that bid without the intention of paying. When the top 5 highest bidders in an auction are not willing to pay, GoDaddy clearly does not have good enough precautions in place from preventing this sort of thing, and more transparency is needed so that we can look out for ourselves.
GoDaddy, please introduce bidder handles. NameJet/DropCatch/SnapNames/Pheenix already have them.