Talk:English auction

merge w/ Candle auction
I suggest merging Candle auction into this article. It appears that a candle auction is an English auction with a random-time hard close rule (see ). It would fit here along with mentioning other variations and closing rules. Cretog8 (talk) 04:04, 17 June 2008 (UTC)
 * As you say, the candle auction is an English auction variant, although I would characterize it as fixed-time and not random close as a good-quality candle generally has an extremely predictable burn-time - any minor imprecision being essentially a technological limitation. I think that as a historical factoid it does appear to have sufficient notability for a stand-alone article, however I don't believe that there are currently sufficient sources available, despite a fair effort searching for them, to be able to say this with confidence. In the absence of further reliable sources I'd support the merger of the article if you think you can make some use of it here, otherwise I've kept a reference to it in the Auction article and a simple redirect to that article would be an acceptable alternative. Either way, this does not appear to be a controversial proposal so feel free to go ahead when you get a spare second or two. Debate   木  01:58, 25 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Done. -- Explodicle (T/C) 17:25, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Copy refs from Auction
The section on English auction at Auction is much better written and sourced than anything in this article. Could someone copy over the text into this article? Shreevatsa (talk) 17:44, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Get Set 2 Move
I added some text on Variants of the English Auction and it then disappeared. The information was about the Get Set 2 Move online real estate auction that I have seen on the web. The idea behind the auction is that bidders may cooperate before an auction by agreeing to appoint an independent lawyer and building surveyor/valuer. Only the winning bidder pays the cost of this work through a buyers premium and all bidders gain from improved information (the requirement of economic theory for perfect availability of information) and reduced costs.

John Forbes Nash suggested that bidders don't always compete but could cooperate in a positive way to improve a market for both buyers and sellers. I think this is quite an important development for auctions. Perhaps I could get some help with meeting Wikipedia standards of submission. Should I have left out the link to an external web site, should I have put in an internal link to John Nash? It may just be that I hadn't checked my email until this morning to confirm my address. But in any case I don't now have a copy of my original text. Joecowper (talk) 06:41, 23 April 2009 (UTC)


 * I'm going to pull it again, at least for now. What you've written does read somewhat like an advertisement. There's lots of material on variations of the English auction, but one variation running on one commercial web site doesn't necessarily qualify for inclusion in this article. My suggestion would be that you find an alternative source--preferably academic, maybe in the popular press--that deals with the kind of auction Get Set 2 Move runs, and then discuss it in more general terms. If you can point to such a source, then maybe others can help with the phrasing. C RETOG 8(t/c) 04:36, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

Please restore Candle auction
If you go by historical reference then a Candle auction would be a variant on an English auction. But if one evaluates the if the auctions are entirely different categories based on the strategies used to win, then they should be separate articles. Any one familiar with gaming theory can see that one leads to an equilibrium strategy since no player can benefit by changing his or her strategy during the auction, while the other does. Alternatively if you want to go by Google response then it should be merged under Timed auction since a Google search of "Timed Auction" will yield some 326,000 results. There are even papers published on the loss in decision-making quality that would arise from time-pressure. Based on both of the historical reference I would vote to include it as an article that lists it as a historical version of a Timed auction with a link to Timed Auction along with the link to the existing article to Auction sniping for which you can even by software for the online timed auctions. 68.98.137.71 (talk) 02:18, 16 August 2009 (UTC)


 * I'd suggest working any material you have into this article first, and then if a section gets big enough to warrant its own article, breaking it off. A candle auction is a timed auction, yes. In my experience, auctions tend to be categorized under general bidding rules first at the highest level (English auction, Sealed-bid auction, Clock auction), and then close rules second (hard close, soft close, random close). If my understanding is correct, then a candle auction would be primarily considered a variation of an English auction, with a particular kind of timing rule (we have disagreement on this discussion page about whether it's a random close or not), rather than a Timed auction with a particular kind of bidding/allocation rules. Paper references to candle auctions would be terrific additions. C RETOG 8(t/c) 04:01, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

Comparison with other types of auction
This seems to be a glaring omission from this page? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2A02:C7F:2246:5600:6DC3:796C:5717:1EC1 (talk) 10:02, 29 June 2022 (UTC)