David,
I don't think sniping stops shilling, but I think it can lessen the effect on the buyer to a degree.
Snipe shilling can certainly happen, but in your example it didn't cost you any money. They shiller bought his own item for $99. You didn't win the card because of shilling, but no money was taken out of your pocket. I believe the legal phrase that is used is that you are still "whole." (I'm not a lawyer, but I did stay at a Holiday Inn last night!). Additionally, if you're pissed about losing the item at $99, because you would've paid $100 for it, why bid only $95?
I do wholeheartedly agree that it would be more ethical to just start the items at the minimum you're willing to accept and go with it. It's just that many start with low bids trying to capture the feeding frenzy mentality of the buyers and then panic if it's not up where they want it. Unfortunately, until buyers, sellers, and ebay are each held accountable for their roles in the
game, it will continue.
Best,
Mark

Uh, the only thing in my pockets are cards. No money, but some cards.....I am as broke as the next guy :). But hey, I am having fun....

and to add, all of these retractions and shill bidding are just plain wrong. There is no excuse and no way to justify it. And I am not saying I know for sure it's being done, but it doesn't look good.

Since the majority of the problem lies with the bid-and-retract Schiller, why not do something about it? Make a large bid early and watch the Schiller go above then retract to below your bid. Then you retract right before the 12-hours left mark. The shiller will get stuck paying around 15% commission and fees on an overinflated price. A few of those will stop them.

OK, what would you guys think:

I post my baseball autos during baseball season, so I'm just back to ebay after a long cold winter. My first batch of auto'd BB are closing today. (All cheapies, nothing big.)

This morning I wake up to see two things that I think should bother me:

1) One guy was high bidder on two balls last night retracted both bids -- 5 days after placing them -- because "entered wrong bid amount."

2) But then I notice a different bidder put 14 bids on my Lou Brock ball, with the highest being 10 bucks! He just kept bidding 50 cent increments until he beat out the higher bidder. If I were the other guy, I'd bail on my auctions because it looks like I'm shill bidding!!

Should I block either of these yahoos??

Ken

I don't know about the first scenario but the second just sounds like a guy who placed a max bid.

No, it shows up in my bid list as 14 individual bids, 50 cents each.

I rarely use eBay but don't they still have the tap were it automatically raised your bid every time you click on it? I know I have used it before.

First guy I would block. Second guy is a normal small increment bidder. Pretty common since the beginning of Ebay. Nothing suspicious IMO.

Doesn't that then make YOU the shiller?

Retractions are a bane on ebay, and they should be outlawed with very few exceptions or strict limitations.

Wouldn't it show up that way if he had a max bid? Each time he was outbid an automatic bid would be made so long as it didn't exceed his max. In either case I don't see anything wrong with it unless he doesn't pay for the card.