legal SEDO auction shill bidding?

[Deleted member 5660]

I got an e-mail advertising a domain from the same email address as this:
http://acro.net/blog/domains/is-domcollectsedo-spamming-its-domain-portfolio/

It was an auction on SEDO. A Bidder bid $700. I outbid them and then they made of $3000 so I let it go. About an hour before the auction ended that person's $3000 bid disappeared but their $700 bit stayed intact. As the auction came to a close the same bidder bid $1500 to extend it 10 minutes. The auction eventually ended below reserve.

I don't see how it is possible to remove bids during an auction and then continue bidding after you removed your bid. Doesn't SEDO have to actually do that themselves?

 

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it could have been a mistaken bid and they called sedo to correct it... or a shill - may never know for sure

 

[Gerry]

I got an e-mail advertising a domain from the same email address as this:
http://acro.net/blog/domains/is-domcollectsedo-spamming-its-domain-portfolio/

It was an auction on SEDO. A Bidder bid $700. I outbid them and then they made of $3000 so I let it go. About an hour before the auction ended that person's $3000 bid disappeared but their $700 bit stayed intact. As the auction came to a close the same bidder bid $1500 to extend it 10 minutes. The auction eventually ended below reserve.

I don't see how it is possible to remove bids during an auction and then continue bidding after you removed your bid. Doesn't SEDO have to actually do that themselves?

It sounds like it might be shill bidding.

Since you (a legitimate bidder) made a bid - to me it seems the bid they placed was just at a point below the reserve. Most likely they were so hopeful that you would bid again (whatever the minimum increment was at the time) which would have met and surpassed the reserve.

The reason I speculate like this is personal knowledge of antiques dealers who were in cahoots with each other in falsely driving up bids on each other merchandise. The seller (dealer A) had an item he was auctioning with reserve that was made known to (dealer B). When dealer B bid on dealer A's item, dealer B would run the bidding up to meet the reserve and then suddenly stop bidding as other people became caught up in the bidding process. It became so damn obvious after a while seeing B ONLY bidding on merchandise belonging to bidder A.

 

[Deleted member 5660]

That is how it looked to me. The owner of the domain is a law professor that I met once years ago so I contacted him directly to find out what is going on.

 

[Deleted member 5660]

The domain owner did not send the e-mail but did have the domain for sale on SEDO.

I don't know for sure but it looks to me like SEDO sent out the e-mail and ran a fake auction with shill bids to try to get the price up to the sale price.