Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire So, what's the problem with "shills"?

Damn right.


You want to see the prices at an auction plummet?

Make it known that the owner is bidding you up.

Place on item on an online auction, creat a few sock puppets, let unsuspecting schmucks (like yourself) start bidding, run your emotional dumb ass up and hopefully you get unassed of your max figure. If they ‘get hung’ they have lost nothing, they pay no fees, they get banned(woo that’ll teach em) no loss after all it was a sock puppet. And mostly created by the seller under a different email.

You have to be a real moron to be so naive as to not know how easy it is. So, that’s WTF sock puppets have do with it.

There are several Auctions up here that use shills to bid up items.If I catch one doing it I start yelling rigged auction and point the shills out.Nothing pisses people off more then a rigged auction.Most folks will leave when they hear those magic words.

Farm auctions... who really is “the proxy bidder on the phone” ?

I've personally witnessed an auctioneer apparently in cahoots with a bidder allow the bidder to pull off some real shady stuff once. Box full of assorted quality American Indian artifacts that had been laid out open for inspection on table before auction started mysteriously disappeared as auction started.

Eventually found it again hidden down inside of another box of wore out household junk with household junk piled on top of artifacts. Told auctioneer assistant about it but was basically ignored. Shortly after I watched a man pull the same assistant aside and quietly talk with him for a minute or two then the assistant did the same with auctioneer.

As that box came up for auction bidding started real low as one would expect and as usually done for boxes of common assorted miscellaneous odds and ends. Bidding stayed low but that same man that had talked with the auction assistant earlier kept ahead by raising the minimum bid each time. After what few that were bidding on that box quit bidding I jumped in and bid it up so high that he was obviously very pissed-off at me.

I let him win the bidding but he paid a whole lot more for it than what he planed on and also aroused the curiosity of others there as to why he would pay so much for what was basically a box of odds and end junk that normally would have only brought a couple of dollars at most.

If that works, the buyer must be a retard.

A lot of Auctioneers were law students who dropped out of law school. GW

There are more ways to screw over an auction than you can shake a stick at.

Auctioneers screw sellers and buyer, sometimes both.


I have seen many auctioneers buying while they auction,
And it's very bad practice. I would really not want to do it in their shoes.

At one time, the seller hired and paid for the auctioneer,
today they add buyers fees also. That makes the auctioneer an employed
aren't of both parties.

Conflict of interest?

If the auctioneer is buying, can you be sure he going to recognize
all bidders running up the price on "his" item? Or might he be inclined
to not acknowledge some?

If both parties are paying him, is it ethical to artificially affect
the price in anyway?

People like to get in the front of the crowd at auctions, they can see
better and are in the action.

I like the back. It's interesting to see if all bids are being acknowledged,
And if all bids taken actually happen. Auctioneers love the mystique
Of these real subtle bids people think are so cool. It makes their
unethical game so much easier. If they don't want to see a bid, they
have an excuse. If they are creating bids, people assume they just
missed seeing a subtle gesture.



Bet I have been accused of shilling at some auctions.
No patience for idiots or wasting my time, I often open bidding
Or jump in and push prices when people are gaming.

When a $700 gun isn't getting bids at $300 and they are dropping,
I jump in. Do these idiots really think that everyone is going to let
It drop to $50 and they will get it there? [bleep] no! Why waste time.
Never have I done that and ended up with the item for opening price.
It usually launches like a rocket.