ebay finds that PWCC engaged in shill bidding?

[BobC]

Originally Posted by Peter_Spaeth

If I understand your point, I think the answer is no. People pay based on what other people are bidding and what a card has sold for. Take a single auction. I own ten other examples of the card being offered, which has sold before for 100 max. I hope to push up the price so as to unload some of mine, so I bid 125, hoping a "legitimate" buyer thinks it's a real bid and that the card is going up, and tops me at 130. Odds are I will hook at least one such buyer. I do this gradually over time with 5 more examples and eventually the price of the card gets to 200. I would call that a manipulated price, not a new true one. And I haven't won any.

Peter, don't disagree with you at all, but at the end of the day, if all those people went ahead and ended up bidding more for those cards than you, then isn't that in fact what they ended up being willing to pay for them, which to me is the definition of true FMV? No one twisted their arms to pay that much, did they? The fact that you put in higher bids yourself, tell me, had you ended up winning one of those auctions wouldn't you have paid for the card? I'm sure you would, and probably stopped there and quit bidding any more on that card, right? Now, while you had helped to raise what people would pay for that card, you did nothing wrong or illegal either. Plus, there's no guarantee that you'll profit all that much when you go to sell because all those buyers now had the card they had wanted so chances are they wouldn't be out there bidding on more of them, and you wouldn't still be bidding your own cards up in price. The demand may have dried up some, but at least you actions showed what others are willing to pay for that card, which is a truer indicator of that card's FMV, at least at that point in time.

And isn't manipulating consumers to feel that the perceived value of an item is more than it really is a major, accepted part of business and marketing? Just look at how much more brand name items usually sell for over generic/house brands, yet in many cases they may all be produced by the same manufacturer. Or from the sports side, are the basketball shoes endorsed by a particular superstar really that much better than, and therefore worth so much more than, another pair of BB shoes that doesn't have to pay a superstar to advertise them?

Not saying it may not seem morally deficient to some to try and manipulate prices like you suggested, but it happens everyday in the marketplace. So I hate to say it, but it is up to consumers to educate themselves and determine their own value for things and what they are willing to pay for them. As it says on the BST forum, caveat emptor.