... The last nasty message I got was for a Mac OS 7.6 CD that I outbid the high bidder by 1 cent to win.
I have had a single instance of winning by one cent, and one in which I won by zero cents, but bid the winning amount two seconds earlier within the last 5sec.
What did £#@% me off was eBay's disallowing my winning bid within the last 10sec on one occasion. The 'reason'? It wasn't their ordained increment above the second-highest. How the hell does one know the second-highest bid under the bums-rush conditions of the last half-minute? That action takes pride of place in eBay's pettifogging. Highest bid is highest bid is highest bid, by any rational standard. That stupidity can only give rise to automated sniping, supposing that software can be written to 'read' pre-existing bids from the selling page.
In a live auction everyone present knows the current highest bid, and a standard increment can be understood as a convention of the auction, but it makes no sense on-line.
de
