can you do me a favor?

[henz988]

Hi，evening!
Though the words following the four underlined expressions have given some explanations, I am still not sure what they are. Will you kindly tell me something about them? (hyperlinks will do)

Welcome to the eBay revolution. Auction sites are one of the hottest corners of cyberspace right now. Online bidders are eagerly competing for new ovens and used microscopes. There are ① service auctions, where lawyers can underbid one another for assignments to register patents, and ② reverse auctions, where buyers name their own price for a ticket to Hawaii and airlines decide if they will go that low. There are ③niche auctions for vintage surfboards, and movie memorabilia, ④express auctions that wrap up in an hour and auction sites where the proceeds go to charity. (fromTime, December27, 1999)

Thanks in advance.

[taniya]

i m taniya i m new here :)

[henz988]

nice to meet you

[bud]

Hi Henz,

A traditional auction is one where there is an auctioneer who is at the front of a room soliciting bids from an audience of potential buyers. He is auctioning material things: jewelry, art, cars, whatever. He asks for bids (offers), and once someone bids, he asks for a higher bid. When no is willing to bid higher, the thing is sold to the last bidder.

1. Instead of a material thing being auctioned, a "need for a service" is auctioned. For example, you might need the services of a lawyer. You auction that need and the "audience" then bids. This time, though, the object is to bid lower than the previous bidder. The lowest bidder gets the job.

2. This works just like #1. This time, your need is, say, an airline ticket. The audience is composed of airline companies, and they bid to give you the lowest price for that ticket. (this is the concept of priceline.com)

3. This is just like a traditional auction, except that the material thing has a very small, yet devoted, audience. Not many people would be interested in buying a vintage surfboard, yet a select few would be very interested. (In business, there is talk about niche markets. This is a little piece of the market that the big companies do not devote much effort to. So a little company might devote itself to that niche, and do very well for its size. For example, you could call Apple a niche personal computer maker. It only has about 6% - or so - of computer sales... That's the meaning of niche in this kind of auction.)

4. This is just a traditional auction, but with a time limit. When the time limit is reached, no more bids are accepted even if someone is willing to bid higher.

I hope that helps.

[henz988]

I've been looking forward to it.It's here at last.Thanks a million.

[bud]

My pleasure, Henz! :)