(EMAILWIRE.COM, January 28, 2006 ) Columbus, OH -- In March, 1792, twenty-four of New York City’s leading merchants met secretly to discuss ways to bring order to the securities business and wrest it from their competitors, the auctioneers. On May 17, 1792, these merchants signed a document called the Buttonwood Agreement. It was named after their traditional meeting place – a buttonwood tree.

Two hundred years later, a company called eBay further challenged the auctioneers by creating a novel way for bidders to acquire items via the computer, rather than through auction attendance. By 2006, this new bidding platform has become a billion dollar business with over 75 million customers.

Further, given the momentum of on-line auctions, the impact on the live auction industry is openly discussed. With the addition of bidding templates for live auctions, examples being that of eBayLive Auctions and Proxibid, a typical auctioneer may see a heartening number of registrations, but disappointing numbers of active online bidders.

Clearly, the 75 million bidders registered on eBay obviously prefer the eBay timed auction model instead of the eBayLive Auctions model. Reversing the trend and driving online bidders to participate in live auctions is the mission of the Online Auctioneers Association.

The newly formed Online Auctioneers Association has sent out petitions to address these issues with eBayLive Auctions with auctioneer Mike Brandly, CAI, AARE as the acting Chairperson. If this is successful it could greatly improve the online bidder attendance of live auctions run by auctioneers.

Mike Brandly stated that “Auctioneers want to lower their overall costs and reach out to more bidders with improved up-to-date technology which will increase the bottom-line prices. Auctioneers are now deciding to be proactive and work closely with IT groups like CBTechlive and eBayLive Auctions to create the technology needed to stay competitive. With a $250 billion dollar market at stake, it would be a shame to lose any additional ground to “timed auctions” which entered the marketplace in 1995.”

More information about this petition and the auctioneers’ agenda can be found at:
http://www.cbtechlive.com/checkout/openletter.html

CBTechlive.com is a developer with, but not directly associated with eBay.com or eBayLive Auctions
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This press release was posted by the following PR Firm (AS Marketing) A Division of AuctionServices.com, Inc.

Contact Information:
Mike Brandly, Auctioneer, CAI, AARE
Mike Brandly
Tel:
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