Ken Steiglitz

Snipers, Shills, and Sharks (eBook, ePUB)

eBay and Human Behavior

• Format: ePub

Produktbeschreibung

Every day on eBay, millions of people buy and sell a vast array of goods, from rare collectibles and antiques to used cars and celebrity memorabilia. The internet auction site is remarkably easy to use, which accounts in part for its huge popularity. But how does eBay really work, and how does it compare to other kinds of auctions? These are questions that led Ken Steiglitz--computer scientist, collector of ancient coins, and a regular eBay user--to examine the site through the revealing lens of auction theory.

The result is this book, in which Steiglitz shows us how human behaviors in open markets like eBay can be substantially more complex than those predicted by standard economic theory. In these pages we meet the sniper who outbids you in an auction's closing seconds, the early bidder who treats eBay as if it were an old-fashioned outcry auction, the shill who bids in league with the seller to artificially inflate the price--and other characters as well. Steiglitz guides readers through the fascinating history of auctions, how they functioned in the past and how they work today in online venues like eBay. Drawing on cutting-edge economics as well as his own stories from eBay, he reveals practical auction strategies and introduces readers to the fundamentals of auction theory and the mathematics behind eBay.

Complete with exercises and a detailed appendix, this book is a must for sophisticated users of online auctions, and essential reading for students seeking an accessible introduction to the study of auction theory.

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Produktdetails

• Verlag: Princeton University Press
• Erscheinungstermin: 10. August 2021
• Englisch
• ISBN-13: 9780691233864
• Artikelnr.: 61858600

Autorenporträt

Ken Steiglitz is Professor of Computer Science at Princeton University. He is the author of A Digital Signal Processing Primer and the coauthor of Combinatorial Optimization: Algorithms and Complexity.

Inhaltsangabe

Preface xiii
To the general reader xiii
To students and course instructors xiv
Synopsis xv
Acknowledgments xix
Chapter One: English and Vickrey Auctions 1
1.1 Auctions 1
1.2 A Brief History 5
1.3 English Auctions 8
1.4 Variations on the English Theme 10
1.5 Truthful Bidding is Dominant in (Japanese Button) English Auctions 12
1.6 Sealed-bid Second-Price (Vickrey) Auctions 14
1.7 Mail-bid Auctions 16
1.8 Weak Strategic Equivalence of (Japanese button) English and Vickrey
Auctions 17
1.9 The Four Standard Auctions and Why They Are Two Pairs 18
1.10 Disincentives to truthful bidding 21
1.11 Questions 22
Chapter Two: From Vickrey to eBay 25
2.1 eBay as an Evolutionary Product of Vickrey: The California Auction 25
2.2 Other Online Auction Rules 28
2.3 eBay ? Vickrey 30
2.4 Summary 32
2.5 Questions 32
Chapter Three: eBay Strategies Observed 34
3.1 Some Bidding Histories 34
3.1.1 Start and End Clustering, Snipers 34
3.1.2 A Bidding War 36
3.1.3 An Early Bidder and Her Fate 38
3.2 "Enter Your Maximum, Then Sit Back and Watch!" 39
3.3 Good Reasons to Snipe 40
3.4 Other (Generally Good) Reasons to Snipe 43
3.4.1 Bidding Wars, Response to Incremental Bidding 43
3.4.2 Implicit Collusion 44
3.4.3 Nonstrategic Reasons to Bid Late 45
3.5 Some (Questionable) Reasons to Bid Early 46
3.5.1 Uncertain Values and the Cost of Discovery 46
3.5.2 Scaring Away Competition 47
3.5.3 Nonstrategic Reasons to Bid Early 50
3.6 On Balance, Snipe 51
3.7 Seller Choices 51
3.7.1 Opening Bid 52
3.7.2 Use of a Secret Reserve 54
3.7.3 Use of the Buy-It-Now Option 56
3.7.4 Other Seller Choices 57
3.8 The Next Three Chapters 60
3.9 Questions 61
Chapter Four: What If eBay Were First-Price? 65
4.1 First-Price Is the More Natural Assumption 65
4.2 The Sealed-Bid First-Price Auction 66
4.3 The Simplest of All Worlds 67
4.3.1 The Independent Private Values (IPV) model 67
4.4 How to Shade 71
4.5 Revenue: The Bottom Line 73
4.6 A First-Price eBay Would Discourage Early Bidding 74
4.7 First-Price Is More Work for the Bidder 75
4.8 Further Theory Disappoints 76
4.9 Conclusion 77
4.10 Questions 78
Chapter Five: The Signals that Sellers Send 79
5.1 Reserves 79
5.2 Price Estimates and Related Revelations 81
5.3 Virtue Rewarded, in Theory 83
5.4 Art, Silver, and Jewelry Auctions: Empirical Observations of Seller
Price Estimates 86
5.5 The Complexity of the Seller's Signaling 88
5.6 What Theory Has To Say About Reserves 90
5.6.1 The Tradeoff in Second-Price Auctions 91
5.6.2 The Tradeoff in First-Price Auctions 91
5.6.3 The Optimal Reserve 92
5.6.4 The New Equilibrium 92
5.6.5 Practical Implications 94
5.7 Field Experiments 95
5.8 A Field Comparison of Public vs. Secret Reserves on eBay 99
5.9 Lucking-Reiley's Magic Window in Time 100
5.9.1 Field Confirmation of Some First-Price Theory 101
5.10 Flatness of Revenue vs. Reserve Curves 102
5.11 The Importance of the Extra Bidder 104
5.12 Extracting Some Advice for the eBay Seller 105
5.13 Questions 107
Chapter Six: Prices! 108
6.1 Appraising the Scaffolding 108
6.1.1 Valuations 109
6.1.2 Equilibrium 111
6.1.3 Homo economicus 111
6.2 Overbidding: Some Classroom Experiments 112
6.2.1 Experiment 1: First-price with Uniformly Distributed Valuations 113
6.2.2 Experiment 2: First-Price with Less Competition 114
6.3 Feedback and Learning 116
6.3.1 Feedback in First-Price Auctions 117
6.3.2 Feedback in Second-Price and English Auctions 117
6.4 Overbidding: Jars of Nickels 118
6.5 Results from the Field: Tests of Revenue Equivalence 120
6.5.1 Magic on the Internet: A Surprise 121
6.5.2 Music CDs and Xboxes on eBay 123
6.6 Reconciliations 125
6.7 Equilibrium Regained 125
6.7.1 Risk Aversion 126
6.7.2 Spite: An Alternative Theory 130
6.8 The Theoretically Informed (and Human) eBay Bidder 134
6.8.1 Simply a Mistake: Bidding Untruthfully in Vickrey's Setting 135
6.8.2 The Winner's Curse 135
6.8.3 Lessons from the Failures of Revenue Equivalence 137
6.8.4 Spiteful Behavior 138
6.8.5 Wars, Frenzies, and Bubbles 140
6.9 Questions 147
Chapter Seven: Transgressions 150
7.1 Shills 150
7.1.1 Shill Bidding and Theory 155
7.1.2 Mock Auctions: The More Important Diamond 157
7.2 Bidder Rings: 84 Charing Cross Road 158
7.3 Ethics 162
7.3.1 The Twinge of Guilt: The Buyer Withholds Information 162
7.3.2 Conversely: The Seller Withholds Information 163
7.3.3 Sniping 164
7.3.4 Shadowing Bidders 164
7.3.5 The Ethics of Feedback 165
7.3.6 Exporting and Importing Ancient Artifacts 166
7.4 A Note on Downright Fraud 168
7.5 Fakes 169
7.6 Questions 173
Chapter Eight: Epilogue 174
8.1 Looking Back 174
8.2 Looking Ahead 176
Appendix A: Vickrey's Genesis 179
A.1 Introduction 179
A.2 A Preview of Revenue Equivalence 180
A.3* Quick Review of Some Probability Theory 183
A.4* Order Statistics 185
A.5 Revenue of Second-Price Auctions 188
A.6 First-Price Auctions and Nash Equilibria 189
A.7 Revenue Equivalence of First- and Second-Price Auctions with Uniformly
Distributed Values 190
A.8 A Nash Equilibrium for First-Price Sealed-Bid Auctions 192
A.9 Revenue of First-Price Auctions 197
A.10* Conditional Expectation 198
A.11 An Interpretation of First-Price Equilibrium Bidding Strategy 200
A.12 Stronger Revenue Equivalence 200
A.13 Dutch Auctions and Strategic Equivalence 202
A.14 Another Kind of Auction--the All-Pay Auction 203
A.15 Questions 205
* Note: Sections providing mathematical background are indicated with an
asterisk.
Appendix B: Riley and Samuelson's Optimal Auctions 207
B.1 Definition of Riley and Samuelson's Class 207
B.2 Revenue 208
B.3 Optimal Reserve Price 211
B.3.1 Example: First-Price Auction with Reserve 213
B.3.2 Example: Second-Price Auction with Reserve 215
B.4 Sad Losers and Santa Claus 216
B.4.1 The Sad-Loser Auction 217
B.4.2 The Santa Claus Auction 219
B.5 The All-Pay Auction Revisited 222
B.6 Risk Aversion 224
Skim these sections if you don't need the review. B.7 Point of Departure
227
B.8 Questions 227
Appendix C: Myerson's Optimal Mechanisms 230
C.1 Directions 230
C.2 Interdependent Values 231
C.3 Asymmetric Bidders 235
C.4 Efficiency 236
C.5 Myerson's Optimal Mechanism in the Asymmetric-Bidder Case 239
C.5.1 Interlude: Revenue Equivalence Revisited in the Asymmetric-Bidder
Case 242
C.5.2 The Optimal Allocation Rule 244
C.5.3 The Payment Rule 247
C.5.4 A Wrinkle 248
C.5.5 Is This Practical? 248
C.6 Optimal Riley and Samuelson Auctions Are Optimal Mechanisms 249
C.7 Auctions vs. Negotiations 249
C.8 Summary 252
C.9 Questions 253
Appendix D: Laboratory Evidence: A Summary 254
D.1 Introduction 254
D.2 Laboratory Experiments 255
D.3 Experimental Results for the IPV Model 256
D.4 Experimental Results for the Common-Value Model 259
References 263
Index 271