PDP-8 for sale

[tony duell]

> > There is definitely some interesting stuff up there right now, but the
> > prices are off the wall. Everything is overpriced.
> 
> As someone who works for a company that sells things on eBay ...
> 
> ... the key is to research "sold listings".  There can be a night-and-day
> difference between that and the "completed listings" :-)
> 
> e.g. you can *list* stuff for whatever.  The question is what someone will
> *pay* for it.  Looking at the listed-but-didn't-sell prices will give you
> an idea of how foolish some sellers are being.

But that isn't the whole story either..

Suppose I win an object for, say, $50. What you don't know is that my high bid limit was actually
$200 and that I would have been happy to pay $200 for it. It's the same in second-hand shops, 
collector's fairs and physical auctions too, of course. The other week I saw an object I was interested
in at a collectors fair. I asked the price, the seller replied, I paid and took the object. What I didn't say
was that I would have paid 4 times as much for it. And nor would anyone else have said that in the 
same position.

Then there's the issue (at auctions, physical and E-bay) of 2 people in a bidding war. An object is
listed, bids start at, say, $50. 2 people want it, and bid against each other. Finally one gets it for
$1000 as against the other's $990. So does that make it worth $1000? Well, if you now list another
one starting at $50, you may well find only one person (the loser of the previous auction) bids, so gets
it for the opening bid of $50.

-tony