Should GoDaddy Auctions display bidder handles?

[Arca]

NameJet, SnapNames, DropCatch and Pheenix show bidder handles in auctions, so that you know who you are bidding against, while GoDaddy only shows Bidder 1, Bidder 2, Bidder 3, Bidder 4, Bidder 5 etc.

What are the pros and cons of showing bidder handles? Do you want GoDaddy to introduce bidder handles? Or would you prefer NameJet, SnapName, DropCatch and Pheenix to switch to only showing Bidder 1, Bidder 2, Bidder 3, instead?

 

[tonyk2000]

The solution we are looking at now will still mask bidderIDs during the auction but will expose them after the fact so that people will be able to research who was bidding against them if they choose

It is not a real solution. I can imagine a number of wrong things still be allowed to "come through" as the result, and "community intelligence" would be unable to detect it, thanks to a partial solution GD is trying to invent

 

[tonyk2000]

All GoDaddy entities are held to the same standards as our employees, no bidding in auctions.

BIN inventory is available to be purchased by our employees

So, any GoDaddy employee, or his controlled "external" legal entity, or official GoDaddy-owned legal entity, may (theoretically speaking) do the following:

1. Check if a particular domain belongs to a watchlist of 1 (2, 3, etc) customers

2. Check that there were no bidding activity, or, in other words, all "watchers" were either simply curious or were looking to pay closeout price

3. IF AND ONLY IF no bidding occured - then purchase the domain(s) in question, making purchase decision based on an internal access to watchlists database.

I'm not saying that the above scenario really happens. I am simply analyzing the public statements...

?

 

[tonyk2000]

The solution we are looking at now will

In https://www.namepros.com/threads/godaddy-warning-lying-and-stealing-expired-domains.1086952/ poll,
only 25% are "absolutely" trusting GoDaddy. This number is low for such a big and public company. So, adding real transparency (and not a _partial_ transparency) is something GD should work on. Imho.

 

[Paul Nicks]

So, any GoDaddy employee, or his controlled "external" legal entity, or official GoDaddy-owned legal entity, may (theoretically speaking) do the following:

1. Check if a particular domain belongs to a watchlist of 1 (2, 3, etc) customers

2. Check that there were no bidding activity, or, in other words, all "watchers" were either simply curious or were looking to pay closeout price

3. IF AND ONLY IF no bidding occured - then purchase the domain(s) in question, making purchase decision based on an internal access to watchlists database.

I'm not saying that the above scenario really happens. I am simply analyzing the public statements...

?

1) No, employees don't have access to see what's on a customer's bidding or watch list or what any of their proxy bid amounts

2) I don't understand this one, but again employees cannot see anything that is unavailable to the public on auctions

3) No.

 

[AbdulBasit.com]

There is a reason, and we've articulated it in the past. Having bidderIDs during an auction will allow some to copy the strategies of others and potentially promote malicious behavior. Example, if a bidder is known to win a majority of their auctions at $125, then what's to stop someone with an axe to grind from bidding that person up to $120 on every auction they see them in.

The solution we are looking at now will still mask bidderIDs during the auction but will expose them after the fact so that people will be able to research who was bidding against them if they choose.

I haven't come across any single person who is simply using the same pattern of bidding $125 or any fixed given amount in auctions. It all depends on the person's budget, domain name, knowledge of that person, other bidders, timings, etc. Your example is baseless for covering up the hiding of bidder IDs.

Most if not all will agree that they feel more comfortable bidding at NameJet, SnapNames and DropCatch by having bidder IDs open.

If I've understood correctly, the solution you're proposing is nothing different than current scenario where the highest bidder wins the auction, makes payment and after 7 days gets the name deliver to his account and his identity is public in WHOIS if contacts not behind privacy.

Or if you're saying to expose the bidder after non-payment for any reason, it's of no use because it's actually done and dusted for all participants once the auction gets over.

 

[Joe Styler]

I did not think corporate bought them Paul, my point with that quick quip was that I started talking about handles years ago and I felt there was a bit of arrogance in Joe's reply and without transparency things can happen. Also many people do consider employees the company until that employee is fired. I would never imply you or Joe would condone anything illegal.

Glad to hear you are working on looking at bidder id's.

It was certainly not my intent to sound arrogant. I apologize if it came across that way.

 

[alcy]

This is not a "whoops". GoDaddy is not bidding on auctions, we caught an employee who bid on names and terminated their employment. None of the 50 names they won ended up in any GoDaddy corporate account.

I'm doing my best to address questions on the DNW and domaininvesting blog posts.

As far as bidderIDs, I have instructed the product team to scope adding these after the end of an auction, visible to all participants in that auction.

congrats on the catch.. but this has to imply that there are or may be those whom you do not catch also.

 

[wwwweb]

1) No, employees don't have access to see what's on a customer's bidding or watch list or what any of their proxy bid amounts

2) I don't understand this one, but again employees cannot see anything that is unavailable to the public on auctions

3) No.

Can you do something to better the bidding experience, I don't have 3-5 hours a day to go back, and forth with an automated bidding bot who waits down a 5 minute timer, to place a $5/$10/$25 min. bid. When you opened up the platform to these connections, it was ok for a bit, HugeNames did game the system a bit, and the backorder glitch where automated bot placed backorders as soon as a $12 auction closed to kill any chance of the preceeding closeout auction to come, causing people to sit by their computers for hours hitting refresh. The bidding process on Godaddy has become painful, it is a waste 1/2 working day trying to win an auction. You guys have to cut those connections out, make the playing field even for everyone.

 

[carob]

There is a reason, and we've articulated it in the past. Having bidderIDs during an auction will allow some to copy the strategies of others and potentially promote malicious behavior. Example, if a bidder is known to win a majority of their auctions at $125, then what's to stop someone with an axe to grind from bidding that person up to $120 on every auction they see them in.
.

So protecting the bidding strategy of one regular, possibly automated, bidder is more important than protecting the integrity of the auction?

Seriously, if you got to in person auctions your recognise regular bidders, who are probably traders, and you might form a sense of what they are willing to bid. Nothing wrong with that - you show your face at an auction, people size you up, you live with it.

Conversely, hiding bidder identities can, in your words, "promote malicious behavior" far more serious than that made possible by routine, conventional transparency. What do you want to protect here?

 

[tonyk2000]

What do you want to protect here?

I'd guess GD is trying to protect bots to begin with. Including "known" bots like hugedomains. And "unknown" bots like the one who is actively listing domains on afternic @ 2figures / low 3 figures range and under whois privacy, which unusual behaviour was discussed on NP some time ago.

And it is unfortunate that GD still does not equally allow api access:
George Orwell — 'All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others'.

 

[Kate]

Some animals get slaughtered too.

 

[offthehandle]

Seriously, if you got to in person auctions your recognise regular bidders, who are probably traders, and you might form a sense of what they are willing to bid. Nothing wrong with that - you show your face at an auction, people size you up, you live with it.

I question whether any digital platforms not just the subject one or their managers have any real live auction experience at all. They have TOS that state they are not Auctioneers, yet call these sales Auctions but do not subscribe to Auctioneer licensing or rules, probably have no training of seeing real time issues, spotting irregularities, little internal auditing, feel they are somehow not subject to best practices like such physical property auctions, etc.

Kinda sad really the largest domain company doesn’t lead the way in being self critical and applying 100 year+ Old line auction rules that have been industry accepted. Live auctions are transparent. Period. Every Professional dealer knows the other dealers, look them in the eye and they know and self police. Shills and irregularities are easily spotted. Hiding behind a platforms “digital one way mirrors” simply suck.

Even Sothebys is licensed for digital auctions, I pointed that out In 2017.

https://www.namepros.com/threads/bidding-on-your-own-names-at-namejet.1030874/page-54#post-6276069

And as pointed out by this poster public companies can have SEC intervention and subject to audit.

https://www.namepros.com/threads/bidding-on-your-own-names-at-namejet.1030874/page-54#post-6275645

And this good comment from a NP’s PRO investor:

“but its the greed for profitability and "economies of scale" that keep Nj and godaddy tid to this expiry auctions platform to try to be a marketplace, and the third party seller want their names to "look" like expireds.

so Web/tucows if yu want to be a marketplace, be a marketplace and stop asking 2008 expired names technology for insiders to be the front facing NYSe of domains”

https://www.namepros.com/threads/bidding-on-your-own-names-at-namejet.1030874/page-53#post-6274004

 

[billp3]

As far as bidderIDs, I have instructed the product team to scope adding these after the end of an auction, visible to all participants in that auction.

Paul, this is a pointless solution. Bidder ID's/aliases need to be visible during the auction for all the reasons you already know.

Bidders should know if they're bidding against a bot, a front-runner, an end user, etc.

Domain investing strategies aren't repeatable just by bidding the same way another investor bids.

 

[billp3]

There is a reason, and we've articulated it in the past. Having bidderIDs during an auction will allow some to copy the strategies of others and potentially promote malicious behavior. Example, if a bidder is known to win a majority of their auctions at $125, then what's to stop someone with an axe to grind from bidding that person up to $120 on every auction they see them in.

This is a weak argument. Bidding strategies are not static, bidders will adapt.

 

[Ategy]

There is a reason, and we've articulated it in the past. Having bidderIDs during an auction will allow some to copy the strategies of others and potentially promote malicious behavior. Example, if a bidder is known to win a majority of their auctions at $125, then what's to stop someone with an axe to grind from bidding that person up to $120 on every auction they see them in.

I haven't come across any single person who is simply using the same pattern of bidding $125 or any fixed given amount in auctions.

In all fairness .. I used to do this .. I'd have different tiers or use lucky numbers .. other strategies to help get lowest price possible. Definite patterns. That being said .. just by the fact of knowing my ID would be public would get my to be more random once ID's become public. So yes it's an important factor .. but in the end I don't think it should be a reason to block making IDs public.

Some animals get slaughtered too.

Like the Domainosaurs millions of years ago?

Can you do something to better the bidding experience, I don't have 3-5 hours a day to go back, and forth with an automated bidding bot who waits down a 5 minute timer, to place a $5/$10/$25 min. bid. When you opened up the platform to these connections, it was ok for a bit, HugeNames did game the system a bit, and the backorder glitch where automated bot placed backorders as soon as a $12 auction closed to kill any chance of the preceeding closeout auction to come, causing people to sit by their computers for hours hitting refresh. The bidding process on Godaddy has become painful, it is a waste 1/2 working day trying to win an auction. You guys have to cut those connections out, make the playing field even for everyone.

GoDaddy - For me personally I'm a pretty heavy user of GoDaddy auctions where the auction days are 5.5 hours long! I love the fact that unlike some other marketplaces GoDaddy spreads out it's auction day so that if you're targeting multiple domains you can focus on one or two at a time. But the 5.5 hours a day I find is just way too long and I'd love to see them shorten it to about half that time (no less than 2h and no more than 3h). I think that the only people who buy so many domains that such a change could affect them likely already are running bots or have some other system in place where it really wouldn't make much difference.

What really led me to thinking about this is that auction days are always 5.5 hours regardless of if there are 25,000 (expiring) domains or 60,000 (expiring) domains. 35 days after Christmas is when domains originally registered at Christmas go to auction. On that "Christmas+35" day a few weeks ago there were half the usual number of domains .. I was thinking how nice it would have been if GoDaddy also gave us a half day as it wouldn't have meant any difference of intensity or effort for bulk buyers (even if I'm sure it doesn't affect them .. aka their bots).

I think the majority of domainers do this part time, and as such 5.5 hours a day plus however much time you spend going through the lists each day adds up to too much of my day. But I also think the longer term benefit could be that more people actually participate in the overall entirety of their auctions as opposed to just going on for one or two specific auctions at specific times.

Sigh ... https://www.namepros.com/threads/could-domain-industry-benefit-from-better-auction-timing.1126321/
I would LOVE to see that change! Would literally be life-changing if they shortened their auction day!

The solution we are looking at now will still mask bidderIDs during the auction but will expose them after the fact so that people will be able to research who was bidding against them if they choose.

Pretty much exactly what I just wrote here before seeing what you wrote .. lol

...
I think the real problem is transparency vs privacy debate. There are legitimate positives and negatives on both sides of the public handle debate .. but at the end of the day the more transparent a platform is, the more we can trust it. But let's also be clear that simply adding user handles will not make much of a difference as people really want to get around it will create multiple accounts.

I think a big part of GD not showing information is indeed both privacy and reporting related. It would be great if they could simply make all auction information permanently public. But then would you want a potential buyer for a $4999 domain to know you got it at closeout for $5? lol .. Yes making everything public for the auctions of domains that go into the thousands of dollars would help the industry .. but at the end of the day I use GoDaddy auctions specifically because I can find some gems at closeout or with only a couple of other bids. Given my domaining strategy I'm really conflicted on what I think they should actually do .. because while ironically I share about 400 domains a day with everyone here and at NameCult, ultimately I do keep a select few to myself.

I think a good "quick" temporary compromise could be just a very minor tweak in having bidder user names continue to be hidden during auction, but then revealed to those who participated in the auction after the auction ends. The only problem with that is that it still makes fraud investigations by outsiders (effectively "us") difficult because of the very limited data set available to crosscheck .. ultimately it wouldn't really make things significantly more transparent .. but it's a step in the right direction until a better broader ultimate solution is found.

That being said .. I do think a longer term policy and solution needs to be looked at. I totally respect with with privacy and regulatory requirements it might not be as simple as some would think. Plus there most definitely are BOTH positives AND negatives on BOTH sides.

I think before rushing to ultimate judgement it would be good to know all the factors involved on GoDaddy's side. The "we just want domains to sell based on their own merit" argument defies any logical sense in my mind .. I'm thinking GoDaddy sticks to it because it's easier to explain than whatever the real (potentially very legitimate) reasons are.

@Paul Nicks and @Joe Styler .. what are the all actual tangible (legal/policy) issues that could come in to play that could prevent showing public ID's? Are there any? Or could making bidder IDs public during auction theoretically be done if GoDaddy ultimately chose to go that route?

Then what about those same questions, but with regards to making all auction information public (aka full results reporting open anyone .. or alternatively just to all auction members regardless if participating in the auction or not)?

Paul, this is a pointless solution. Bidder ID's/aliases need to be visible during the auction for all the reasons you already know. Bidders should know if they're bidding against a bot, a front-runner, an end user, etc. ...

Hmmmn .. maybe another short-term quick fix is to at least show the "type of bidder" DURING the auction. Like "Bidder 1 [Bot] (Auto)". While it might be difficult to technically ascertain if a bidder is a bot or not, it could be simpler in simply placing a "[Bot]" tag on all bids by all accounts that have API access. Then have specific bidder ID show up after the auction ends.