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Except the bidding is not sealed. In a sealed-bid auction, one would not know if they are the highest bidder. The fact that you have no information about other bids is what defines the nature of a sealed-bid system. Ebay is a "going, going, gone" style auction with a time limit.


I don't think that is entirely the case.

On eBay, you do not know what the high bid is, you only know who made the bid. That is not particularly useful information. And in a bid sniping situation, you don't even get the chance to find out if you are the highest bidder until it is too late to do anything about it if you are not.

Sure, Joe Bidder is sitting there as high man on the totem pole with his $85 bid, but that only means he has out-bid the next highest bidder. His actual bid is most likely higher than that, possibly much higher than that. Thus the dangers of bid sniping. You think you're safe bidding $100 with 15 seconds to go, only to find out (too late) that Joe's bid was higher than you expected.

tanstaafl.
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