Every penny on that commercial you're talking about is actually a $1. It costs a $1 to bid one penny. So next time you watch it and they say... "hey, i got this laptop for only $48.02", or "hey, we got this 60" TV for only "66.58", they are actually saying the community of people paid $4802.00 for the laptop and $6658.00 for the TV. It's nothing but gambling. You keep sticking a dollar in the slot machine, but the machine reads one more penny for every dollar you put in.
I looked into this when i saw the commercial.
Yeah..just a huge ripoff really. Needing to buy the bids first JUST to place a bid. Easy way to lose a lot of money.