YIFU IS AUCTIONNING?

[ProfMac]

I was outbit but I still haven't see the 2BTC's either return to my Tradehill account or to my wallet. Is there something that I am missing?

Their withdrawal page states:

Transfers from Tradehill will require one business day to process.

so maybe the same is true with failed bid refunds as well.

Lagged out in the final minutes, couldn't even rebid. Very frustrating.

That's the risk you take when you try to snipe. Since I had a feeling their site wouldn't handle the last minute sniping I put up my max bid 30 minutes before end of auction to be safe and got 3 units for 2.29BTC ea. Curious if Yufi is happy with the results considering the previous minimum bid was 6BTC...

I did not try to snipe.  I was consistently ahead of several hundred bidders and my bid seemed safe.  I monitored the auction on an ongoing basis.  Their site failed to respond with several minutes remaining.  I did not find a mechanism to increase my bid, only to cancel and re-open.  

I was not able to express my intent to bid on their auction site.  I am sure that this was true of others as well.  Not only that, the site does not show the bidding results anymore, they were taken down when the auction was over.  I think that an essential aspect of an auction is transparency, and the final results are not transparent.

I think there is a wide open field for anyone else to compete at auctioneering.

[zerocode20]

Now a new problem, how to run 8600W of Avalons... thank goodness its winter!

Long, long time ago I used 6000W electric heater to successfully heat 3-room apartment in continental climate. Good luck with cooling all that equipment.

Easy, crack a window

You can vent the hot air back into your HVAC return register to brings some free warm air into the house. You can get a 300CFM inline 6" duct blower on eBay for less than $100. We used to do this to some of the network racks at my old job years ago. (small office)

[Tehfiend]

I did not try to snipe.  I was consistently ahead of several hundred bidders and my bid seemed safe.  I monitored the auction on an ongoing basis.  Their site failed to respond with several minutes remaining.  I did not find a mechanism to increase my bid, only to cancel and re-open.  

I was not able to express my intent to bid on their auction site.  I am sure that this was true of others as well.  Not only that, the site does not show the bidding results anymore, they were taken down when the auction was over.  I think that an essential aspect of an auction is transparency, and the final results are not transparent.

I think there is a wide open field for anyone else to compete at auctioneering.

Yeah unfortunately you could not increase a bid. You had to cancel your existing bid and make a new one. What browser where you using because in Chrome the page dynamically updated for me (no need to refresh) which was nice. Right up to the end I saw the minimum price creeping up towards my bid amount and I believe it ended at 2.21BTC. Their site does leave much to be desired but I'd still give it a B+.

[therustytrombone]

I did not try to snipe.  I was consistently ahead of several hundred bidders and my bid seemed safe.  I monitored the auction on an ongoing basis.  Their site failed to respond with several minutes remaining.  I did not find a mechanism to increase my bid, only to cancel and re-open.  

I was not able to express my intent to bid on their auction site.  I am sure that this was true of others as well.  Not only that, the site does not show the bidding results anymore, they were taken down when the auction was over.  I think that an essential aspect of an auction is transparency, and the final results are not transparent.

I think there is a wide open field for anyone else to compete at auctioneering.

Yeah unfortunately you could not increase a bid. You had to cancel your existing bid and make a new one. What browser where you using because in Chrome the page dynamically updated for me (no need to refresh) which was nice. Right up to the end I saw the minimum price creeping up towards my bid amount and I believe it ended at 2.21BTC. Their site does leave much to be desired but I'd still give it a B+.

No transparency and losing bid bitcoins NOT returned.  F-

[itod]

Anything over 6-7kw is a lot for even a house.  I am not sure if your house will be able to handle 8600 watts in the circuits.

Confirmed, my 6kw heater needed special three-phase installation just for it self, with enhanced fuses on each phase. I suggest anyone ordered that amount of Avalons call's an electrician before plugging all that in the wall, otherwise some interesting side-effects may occur  

[ProfMac]

I did not try to snipe.  I was consistently ahead of several hundred bidders and my bid seemed safe.  I monitored the auction on an ongoing basis.  Their site failed to respond with several minutes remaining.  I did not find a mechanism to increase my bid, only to cancel and re-open.  

I was not able to express my intent to bid on their auction site.  I am sure that this was true of others as well.  Not only that, the site does not show the bidding results anymore, they were taken down when the auction was over.  I think that an essential aspect of an auction is transparency, and the final results are not transparent.

I think there is a wide open field for anyone else to compete at auctioneering.

And Furthermore ...

Some of you may remember that I held an auction on the blockchain.  It was a multi winner auction, and it ended at a certain block number.  All bids included in or before that block were valid.  I have had an interest in auctions for a very long time.  It was trivial to increase a bid.  It was less trivial to see standings during the auction, but that is an opportunity for someone to develop software to interpret a known auction address on the blockchain.

What is missing from my auction, and from this auction, is a mechanism similar to eBay where a maximum bid can be entered and the little bump bids are made automatically.  That is also a feature that an auction companion could implement on the individual bitcoiner's machine.


In contrast to this auction, my auction results are still visible, as the bids and refunds are in the blockchain.  The entirety of "approvals" to move payments within the TradeHill system seems to be a pointless labor cost to me.  I need help to see the motivation or utility of it.

[ProfMac]

I did not try to snipe.  I was consistently ahead of several hundred bidders and my bid seemed safe.  I monitored the auction on an ongoing basis.  Their site failed to respond with several minutes remaining.  I did not find a mechanism to increase my bid, only to cancel and re-open.  

I was not able to express my intent to bid on their auction site.  I am sure that this was true of others as well.  Not only that, the site does not show the bidding results anymore, they were taken down when the auction was over.  I think that an essential aspect of an auction is transparency, and the final results are not transparent.

I think there is a wide open field for anyone else to compete at auctioneering.

Yeah unfortunately you could not increase a bid. You had to cancel your existing bid and make a new one. What browser where you using because in Chrome the page dynamically updated for me (no need to refresh) which was nice. Right up to the end I saw the minimum price creeping up towards my bid amount and I believe it ended at 2.21BTC. Their site does leave much to be desired but I'd still give it a B+.

There is supposed to be some additional benefit for bidders following the auction.  I don't really understand the announcement, but if I am locked out of that because I had to cancel then re-bid, I will view it as a source of frustration.

I feel a growing enthusiasm about working on auction software...

(I was using Chrome.  I should have made some screenshots)

[Loredo]

Now a new problem, how to run 8600W of Avalons... thank goodness its winter!

Long, long time ago I used 6000W electric heater to successfully heat 3-room apartment in continental climate. Good luck with cooling all that equipment.

Easy, crack a window

It's not just what to do with all the heat, though, right?  The typical standard for US single family homes is 100 amp service, and less for apartments.  With those machines running 24/7, it should leave around 25 amps for all the rest of the appliances and environmental uses in the house.  

[ProfMac]

Now a new problem, how to run 8600W of Avalons... thank goodness its winter!

Long, long time ago I used 6000W electric heater to successfully heat 3-room apartment in continental climate. Good luck with cooling all that equipment.

Easy, crack a window

It's not just what to do with all the heat, though, right?  The typical standard for US single family homes is 100 amp service, and less for apartments.  With those machines running 24/7, it should leave around 25 amps for all the rest of the appliances and environmental uses in the house.  

My plan in Minnesota was to distribute them to the nearby apartments of students and elderly, and pay for the increased electricity.

[Loredo]

My plan in Minnesota was to distribute them to the nearby apartments of students and elderly, and pay for the increased electricity.

I suspect that would have worked, and would have been good on a number of levels.

[itod]

I did not try to snipe.  I was consistently ahead of several hundred bidders and my bid seemed safe.  I monitored the auction on an ongoing basis.  Their site failed to respond with several minutes remaining.  I did not find a mechanism to increase my bid, only to cancel and re-open.  

I was not able to express my intent to bid on their auction site.  I am sure that this was true of others as well.  Not only that, the site does not show the bidding results anymore, they were taken down when the auction was over.  I think that an essential aspect of an auction is transparency, and the final results are not transparent.

I think there is a wide open field for anyone else to compete at auctioneering.

And Furthermore ...

Some of you may remember that I held an auction on the blockchain.  It was a multi winner auction, and it ended at a certain block number.  All bids included in or before that block were valid.  I have had an interest in auctions for a very long time.  It was trivial to increase a bid.  It was less trivial to see standings during the auction, but that is an opportunity for someone to develop software to interpret a known auction address on the blockchain.

What is missing from my auction, and from this auction, is a mechanism similar to eBay where a maximum bid can be entered and the little bump bids are made automatically.  That is also a feature that an auction companion could implement on the individual bitcoiner's machine.


In contrast to this auction, my auction results are still visible, as the bids and refunds are in the blockchain.  The entirety of "approvals" to move payments within the TradeHill system seems to be a pointless labor cost to me.  I need help to see the motivation or utility of it.

I have also considered developing such a service, had a very similar idea like yours, but there are two problems I don't know how to solve:

1) block finding times can oscillate for serious amount of minutes, so there can not be fixed ending time of auction, feature people like and may be essential for successful auction

2) some bids may fail to be included in the current block because:
a) it depends on which nodes broadcasted individual transaction (bid),
b) it is discretionary to the mining pool which finds the block if it will include any individual transaction or not, especially the ones close to the actual block finding time.

If you have any ideas how to solve these two issues I would very much like to hear them.

[Tehfiend]

No transparency and losing bid bitcoins NOT returned.  F-

The auction has been over for a little over an hour. I'm sure they will return your BTC and I'll bet they publish the auction results eventually...

And Furthermore ...

Some of you may remember that I held an auction on the blockchain.  It was a multi winner auction, and it ended at a certain block number.  All bids included in or before that block were valid.  I have had an interest in auctions for a very long time.  It was trivial to increase a bid.  It was less trivial to see standings during the auction, but that is an opportunity for someone to develop software to interpret a known auction address on the blockchain.

What is missing from my auction, and from this auction, is a mechanism similar to eBay where a maximum bid can be entered and the little bump bids are made automatically.  That is also a feature that an auction companion could implement on the individual bitcoiner's machine.


In contrast to this auction, my auction results are still visible, as the bids and refunds are in the blockchain.  The entirety of "approvals" to move payments within the TradeHill system seems to be a pointless labor cost to me.  I need help to see the motivation or utility of it.

That really would be an amazing auction system IMO.

There is supposed to be some additional benefit for bidders following the auction.  I don't really understand the announcement, but if I am locked out of that because I had to cancel then re-bid, I will view it as a source of frustration.

I feel a growing enthusiasm about working on auction software...

(I was using Chrome.  I should have made some screenshots)

It sounds like you tried to change your bid in the final minutes which I personally consider "sniping" since you are withholding your true "max bid" until the very end. I do agree that a properly done auction should support sniping but I personally didn't feel safe attempting that on Tradehill. Your idea of using the blockchain would solve that problem perfectly...

[zerocode20]

Anything over 6-7kw is a lot for even a house.  I am not sure if your house will be able to handle 8600 watts in the circuits.

Confirmed, my 6kw heater needed special three-phase installation just for it self, with enhanced fuses on each phase. I suggest anyone ordered that amount of Avalons call's an electrician before plugging all that in the wall, otherwise some interesting side-effects may occur  

Yep, I take 2 legs off a 3-phase bus at work, running though independent AB breakers

[FeedbackLoop]

1) block finding times can oscillate for serious amount of minutes, so there can not be fixed ending time of auction, feature people like and may be essential for successful auction

If you have any ideas how to solve these two issues I would very much like to hear them.

I think people mainly want the rules to be the same for everyone. So fixed number of blocks might be better than fixed time.

It only goes against sniping but, in my view, that's a huge plus!
 

[Tehfiend]

Now a new problem, how to run 8600W of Avalons... thank goodness its winter!

Long, long time ago I used 6000W electric heater to successfully heat 3-room apartment in continental climate. Good luck with cooling all that equipment.

Easy, crack a window

It's not just what to do with all the heat, though, right?  The typical standard for US single family homes is 100 amp service, and less for apartments.  With those machines running 24/7, it should leave around 25 amps for all the rest of the appliances and environmental uses in the house.  

Yes that is true but I was only replying to his statement "Good luck with cooling all that equipment". Having the power to run them all is definitely the real problem

I have also considered developing such a service, had a very similar idea like yours, but there are two problems I don't know how to solve:

1) block finding times can oscillate for serious amount of minutes, so there can not be fixed ending time of auction, feature people like and may be essential for successful auction

2) some bids may fail to be included in the current block because:
a) it depends on which nodes broadcasted individual transaction (bid),
b) it is discretionary to the mining pool which finds the block if it will include any individual transaction or not, especially the ones close to the actual block finding time.

If you have any ideas how to solve these two issues I would very much like to hear them.

I personally like the ambiguity that this system would introduce. A good auction system would produce a winning bid as close to "true market value" as possible and IMO sniping undermines that goal. This "blockchain" system would have a lot of unknowns that would be hard to game and thus encourage people to place their "max bid" well before the end of the auction.

Also, in many auctions there is no "end time". The auction continues until nobody is willing to beat the highest bid (aka "going once going twice SOLD!!!"). Perhaps another option would be to end the auction after X blocks have passed since the last highest bid?

[Loredo]

I personally like the ambiguity that this system would introduce. A good auction system would produce a winning bid as close to "true market value" as possible and IMO sniping undermines that goal. This "blockchain" system would have a lot of unknowns that would be hard to game and thus encourage people to place their "max bid" well before the end of the auction.

Also, in many auctions there is no "end time". The auction continues until nobody is willing to beat the highest bid (aka "going once going twice SOLD!!!"). Perhaps another option would be to end the auction after X blocks have passed since the last highest bid?

That's an excellent point.  The timed auction is the source of sniping in the first place.  

In a live auction, the highest rate of bid arrival is at the beginning as the true floor value is being set.  It ends only when, in the auctioneer's opinion (or in the signals of the last active bidders), there are no more bids.

[itod]

1) block finding times can oscillate for serious amount of minutes, so there can not be fixed ending time of auction, feature people like and may be essential for successful auction

If you have any ideas how to solve these two issues I would very much like to hear them.

I think people mainly want the rules to be the same for everyone. So fixed number of blocks might be better than fixed time.

It only goes against sniping but, in my view, that's a huge plus!

So, you would be interested in auction that may and in 5 mins or 20 mins, and nobody knows when? My hunch is that sellers would not like this, they love when bids jump high in the last seconds of the auction. Deny them that profit and they would not want to bring their goods to such an auction system.

[itod]

Also, in many auctions there is no "end time". The auction continues until nobody is willing to beat the highest bid (aka "going once going twice SOLD!!!"). Perhaps another option would be to end the auction after X blocks have passed since the last highest bid?

This is a nice idea. For instance: Auction lasts as long there are blocks with higher bids than the previous high. This may also solve "bids to close to the wire to be included" problem. In your opinion, should the system show the bids from the current (Edit: unsolved) block or publish them after the block is found?

[ProfMac]

I did not try to snipe.  I was consistently ahead of several hundred bidders and my bid seemed safe.  I monitored the auction on an ongoing basis.  Their site failed to respond with several minutes remaining.  I did not find a mechanism to increase my bid, only to cancel and re-open.  

I was not able to express my intent to bid on their auction site.  I am sure that this was true of others as well.  Not only that, the site does not show the bidding results anymore, they were taken down when the auction was over.  I think that an essential aspect of an auction is transparency, and the final results are not transparent.

I think there is a wide open field for anyone else to compete at auctioneering.

And Furthermore ...

Some of you may remember that I held an auction on the blockchain.  It was a multi winner auction, and it ended at a certain block number.  All bids included in or before that block were valid.  I have had an interest in auctions for a very long time.  It was trivial to increase a bid.  It was less trivial to see standings during the auction, but that is an opportunity for someone to develop software to interpret a known auction address on the blockchain.

What is missing from my auction, and from this auction, is a mechanism similar to eBay where a maximum bid can be entered and the little bump bids are made automatically.  That is also a feature that an auction companion could implement on the individual bitcoiner's machine.


In contrast to this auction, my auction results are still visible, as the bids and refunds are in the blockchain.  The entirety of "approvals" to move payments within the TradeHill system seems to be a pointless labor cost to me.  I need help to see the motivation or utility of it.

I have also considered developing such a service, had a very similar idea like yours, but there are two problems I don't know how to solve:

1) block finding times can oscillate for serious amount of minutes, so there can not be fixed ending time of auction, feature people like and may be essential for successful auction

2) some bids may fail to be included in the current block because:
a) it depends on which nodes broadcasted individual transaction (bid),
b) it is discretionary to the mining pool which finds the block if it will include any individual transaction or not, especially the ones close to the actual block finding time.

If you have any ideas how to solve these two issues I would very much like to hear them.

1.  I saw disagreements in many auctions over the exact ending time.  The use of block inclusion does not reduce the uncertainty of when to bid, but it does make after the fact auditing completely transparent.
I also had an extension mechanism, when a valid bid transaction was confirmed, the auction was auto-extended 10 more blocks past that block.  I think any software would want to let this be an auctioneer decided option.

2.  My instructions to bidders was to bid early, or pay a premium miner's fee.  Many of my rules are a philosophically antagonistic toward sniping.  In the event that many people bid at the last minute, the bid extension also helps mitigate any odd behavior from the miners.

I think that a good auction client would pay attention to any unconfirmed transactions paid to the auction's bid address.  This would give notice of bids that could be included in the blocks.  It should be possible for the auction client to pre-fill the auction amount to a winning value plus a safety amount, and the bidder could  either click "Bid" or edit the value.

[dogie]

Now a new problem, how to run 8600W of Avalons... thank goodness its winter!

Long, long time ago I used 6000W electric heater to successfully heat 3-room apartment in continental climate. Good luck with cooling all that equipment.

Easy, crack a window

It's not just what to do with all the heat, though, right?  The typical standard for US single family homes is 100 amp service, and less for apartments.  With those machines running 24/7, it should leave around 25 amps for all the rest of the appliances and environmental uses in the house.  

Isn't 'house heating' what he wanted though?