[Jobu]

I disagree with all of the "ample time to bid" arguments. I think a fraction of people put in high ceiling bids and wait to see them chipped away. Most of us bid in the OT, and often as late as we can stomach staying up. I know I watched a Wajo rppc I liked in the last auction go from about $5k to about $15k over the last 30-45 minutes before close this spring. Last night I couldnt get the site to load for almost all of the time between 815 pm CST and midnight CST when I gave up.

There may have been some strong prices but REA always brings lots of strong prices bc people send them great stuff and the fact that some stuff sold strong does not mean that everything played out as it would have if the system worked properly. If bidders could only get to the site for a fraction of the last 4-5 hours, there is no arguing that this snafu didn't cost REA a lot of bids because people got pissed and gave up, as people have admitted, or kept trying to bid but couldn't and eventually had to go to bed. Many aren't willing to keep calling in bids - and how are people supposed to know they have been out bid and need to call in another bid if they can't check the site to see the price? I am sure tons of bidders don't come here to talk about what is going on either. If you don't like that you got bid up you should be happy that things didn't work right because I think it is highly likely that it would have been worse had the site been working.

I feel for what Brian is going to have to go through this week, and I know Brian is a good guy, but last night was a disaster.