Super Auctions is still in business. They just had to take a little hiatus because their checks to the sellers were bouncing Apparently no longer an issue...

As for ghost bids, shill bids, whatever you want to call them...you guys need to realize that if these auctions were truly absolute/no reserve then you would only have junk appearing at them. After a few auctions of that, the auction house will have made no money and very few customers willing to come back. The only reason you see hundreds of working/valuable games at these auctions is because the sellers know they won't get totally hosed.

What difference does it really make if there is a reserve or the seller is bidding, other than extra work for the auction company? Generally, a seller has a price that they're willing to sell at, just as the buyer has a price they're willing to pay. The current system usually works in the buyer's favor anyways. Often times a seller has reasons for needing to sell machines, even if the price is lower than he wanted, so he'll get out earlier. Or, he may approach the bidder later and offer to sell for less (even though this screws the auction company). Or, as has happened to me many times, a seller won't pay attention to one of their machines being auctioned off, as it throws an error or is tampered with by an unscrupulous bidder. On the flip side, I can tell you that very few sellers at these auctions are bidding their own machines higher than what they originally wanted to try and get more from potential bidders/buyers -- the market for most games isn't that good.