I think they are, and I'll tell you why:
(please read this entire post before responding, tyia)
Yesterday, several times I found myself bidding versus myself for domains that were far out of reach of what I was willing to pay. Anyone who was there will recall this occurring more than a couple of times:
jehnidiah: $600
moderator: too low
jehnidiah: $700
moderator: too low
jehnidiah: $900
...
jehnidiah: $1400
moderator: still $xxxx off
jehnidiah: nevermind then
This wasted the time of both me and 129 other people, all for the end-result of nothing. You'll recall that I purchased 64 LLLL .coms, bid up several other domains, but after winning the LLLL's I was so annoyed at having to bid against myself that I left the auction and decided not to participate anymore. This, unfortunately, led to me missing out on a good deal on a set of coding domains I had my eyes on before the auction.
Now, I'm not saying reserves are useless, but:
During a pre-auction/pre-bid phases, reserves make sense. Reserves can help the person auctioning off their domain to gauge interest while protecting their assets by insuring they don't have to sell a $xxxxx domain for low $xx. Makes sense, naturally.
However, during a LIVE auction, when everyone is looking/watching, and the attention is on only ONE domain, it doesn't make sense to have a secret reserve. Many minutes were wasted yesterday -- minutes during which peoples' lungs breathed, heart beated, stomach grumbled -- all for the sake of watching me (or whomever else) bid versus myself, completely in vain.
Once again, reserves can be useful:
The reason reserves work in places like eBay is because there are several auctions occurring at the same time. Participants in the eBay marketplace can say "ehh, not interested in this domain, I'll take my life/attention and focus it over here on this other auction." This is basically the equivalent of the NP pre-bid, because people can bid bid bid, walk away, bid some more, come back, bid on some different things, and all the while know whether they're winning or not winning particular auctions. The key difference here is that other people don't have to watch this occur in vain; that is, other people are free to put their attention elsewhere simultaneously. In a live auction, the end should lead to somewhere in every case; this is impossible with reserves that are within the reach or interest of no one participating, and (importantly) the potential success of the sells should be somewhat evident by the pre-bidding.
Therefore, my proposal:
While discussing this matter in the NP chatroom, Jay08 recommended that an auction not be able to go to the live auction unless it has its reserve met during the pre-bid phase. I agree with this idea, or a slight modification as such:
"If an item has not reached or is not within 10% of its reserve, it shall not enter the live auction until others which have reached their reserve or are within 10% of doing so have been presented."
I want to stress that I feel enormously gracious that the Namepros staff are willing to hold these almost commission-free auctions for the sake simply of building community and strengthening NP as a whole. This is something I and others appreciate very much, as it both helps us and it helps the site. However, I similarly hope that constructive criticism can be considered, and as such thought it to be worth my own heart-beating, air-breathing time to post this. So, any dissenting or concurring opinions would be greatly appreciated.
(please read this entire post before responding, tyia)
Yesterday, several times I found myself bidding versus myself for domains that were far out of reach of what I was willing to pay. Anyone who was there will recall this occurring more than a couple of times:
jehnidiah: $600
moderator: too low
jehnidiah: $700
moderator: too low
jehnidiah: $900
...
jehnidiah: $1400
moderator: still $xxxx off
jehnidiah: nevermind then
This wasted the time of both me and 129 other people, all for the end-result of nothing. You'll recall that I purchased 64 LLLL .coms, bid up several other domains, but after winning the LLLL's I was so annoyed at having to bid against myself that I left the auction and decided not to participate anymore. This, unfortunately, led to me missing out on a good deal on a set of coding domains I had my eyes on before the auction.
Now, I'm not saying reserves are useless, but:
During a pre-auction/pre-bid phases, reserves make sense. Reserves can help the person auctioning off their domain to gauge interest while protecting their assets by insuring they don't have to sell a $xxxxx domain for low $xx. Makes sense, naturally.
However, during a LIVE auction, when everyone is looking/watching, and the attention is on only ONE domain, it doesn't make sense to have a secret reserve. Many minutes were wasted yesterday -- minutes during which peoples' lungs breathed, heart beated, stomach grumbled -- all for the sake of watching me (or whomever else) bid versus myself, completely in vain.
Once again, reserves can be useful:
The reason reserves work in places like eBay is because there are several auctions occurring at the same time. Participants in the eBay marketplace can say "ehh, not interested in this domain, I'll take my life/attention and focus it over here on this other auction." This is basically the equivalent of the NP pre-bid, because people can bid bid bid, walk away, bid some more, come back, bid on some different things, and all the while know whether they're winning or not winning particular auctions. The key difference here is that other people don't have to watch this occur in vain; that is, other people are free to put their attention elsewhere simultaneously. In a live auction, the end should lead to somewhere in every case; this is impossible with reserves that are within the reach or interest of no one participating, and (importantly) the potential success of the sells should be somewhat evident by the pre-bidding.
Therefore, my proposal:
While discussing this matter in the NP chatroom, Jay08 recommended that an auction not be able to go to the live auction unless it has its reserve met during the pre-bid phase. I agree with this idea, or a slight modification as such:
"If an item has not reached or is not within 10% of its reserve, it shall not enter the live auction until others which have reached their reserve or are within 10% of doing so have been presented."
I want to stress that I feel enormously gracious that the Namepros staff are willing to hold these almost commission-free auctions for the sake simply of building community and strengthening NP as a whole. This is something I and others appreciate very much, as it both helps us and it helps the site. However, I similarly hope that constructive criticism can be considered, and as such thought it to be worth my own heart-beating, air-breathing time to post this.
So, any dissenting or concurring opinions would be greatly appreciated.
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