Fubar

Although I thoroughly enjoyed my two visits to New Zealand many years ago, claiming the title of Middle Earth as they do may lead to a fight from those of us who live in The Shire.

At our local auction house live internet bidding is monitored both by the auctioneer and a porter who will remind the auctioneer of bids and enters the bid increment he is using so that the internet knows what the next bid value will be. The porter finalises the sale if the internet is the winner and gives the auctioneer the bidder number for entry on the sale sheets. There is usually a slight pause at the end to give internet bidders a chance but only normally if the internet has placed bids during that lot's sale. This interest will be registered by the porter monitoring the internet. If the internet goes down there is normally a pause while the situation is resolved so that no internet bids are lost. What you see on the television programmes is the auctioneer's screen that only gives him the current bid value and where it came from. A bit like an electronic bidder in the room. As with all internet connections the speed depends on a multitude of factors and we have had internet bidders complaining that there were long delays updating their screens. This is normally down to individual connection speed. Although it's nice to see the auctioneer on your screen and hear his voice this can get quite confusing since the bid increment and sale completion can occur before the voice catches up. It's a matter of speed of your own connection and what you feel comfortable with. I used to monitor the auction from home before having to be there and it varied from sale to sale. During live internet auctions our sale rate drops to around 100 per hour and get quite slower if lots are generating a great deal of interest. "Normal" auctions are usually 120 to 130 lots per hour. Packing is normally done by a porter after the item has been paid for and postage/delivery costs agreed. I normally do the packing but more and more is being picked up by companies such as Mailbox or specialist couriers. This is principally because of insurance concerns. It's difficult to get cover for ceramic and high value items through the post. It's in the purchaser's own interest and responsibility to ensure that his item(s) arrive safely. Payment is also becoming more difficult. Because of past problems our local auction house will not accept card details over the phone so attendance in person is required if card payment is requested. BACS is the only way to pay remotely and cheques are no longer accepted. Bidding on a live internet auction is different because they handle the money and will accept cards but only after they have been authorised. The bidder list shown to the auction house lists all registered bidders and whether they have been verified or not. Unverified registered bidders are not allowed to bid. Normal commission bidders who have won lots normally get an invoice posted by the auction house a couple of working days after the sale but most of those will be local and normally ring up to find what they've been successful bidding for and then pay in person. Internet bidders are handled by the internet sale room and the money credited to the auction house once their commission has been deducted. The target is to complete the auction and pay out vendors before the next sale. In our case this is every fortnight.

As far as I know it doesn't apply so much to online shopping. The big problem is for online forums where instant membership gives the spammers chance to download whatever they please. Usually filling up posts with pornography or promoting medicines such as viagra, mobile phones or themselves. Hiding links in text under innocuous words is a favourite. Having a way of contacting the site to protest one's innocence is a must as far as I'm concerned. Lack of the facility is just shooting yourself in the foot. I'm in the process of removing an applicant from the site I administer who has an email address of @yahoo.co.uk despite being in the Ukraine and having been reported for spamming 24,953 times. You wouldn't have any links by any chance Sorry I'm getting way too old to bother with such things.

As far as I know it doesn't apply so much to online shopping. The big problem is for online forums where instant membership gives the spammers chance to download whatever they please. Usually filling up posts with pornography or promoting medicines such as viagra, mobile phones or themselves. Hiding links in text under innocuous words is a favourite. Having a way of contacting the site to protest one's innocence is a must as far as I'm concerned. Lack of the facility is just shooting yourself in the foot. I'm in the process of removing an applicant from the site I administer who has an email address of @yahoo.co.uk despite being in the Ukraine and having been reported for spamming 24,953 times.

Never used one so I wouldn't know the correct term for it. I suppose webmail is the more correct unless you can use them via POP. Since the email boxes you get from your IP are part of the package along with webspace etc., they're not exactly free.

As a PS to the above. There is also a big problem with compromised PCs. There are an awful lot of people who don't realise that their PC is being controlled by someone else to send spam. Or their email address has been hacked. A person who is perfectly innocent can find themselves excluded from sites such as ours because their IP has been used by spambots and is recorded on sites such as Stop Forum Spam.

As administrator of a website I can say that freemail addresses such as gmail are a pain in the butt. The spammers are now using yahoo.co.uk so all those addresses are suspect. A lot of sites are banning their use to save time sorting the wheat from the chaff although I must admit that it is more normal to have the option to email the site asking for entry. We used to spend an awful lot of time deleting spammers until we went for direct approval of all registrations. This removes spambots access altogether since registration has to be manual. An email is sent out to new registrants telling them to verify by visiting a link. False emails are immediately bounced except for people like gmail who tend to just lose them in cyberspace. The gmail email addresses among other free ones are particularly annoying because the presence of a full stop anywhere in the address name is not recognised as different by them but it is by the receiving site. Which means you can't exclude a particular email address unless you exclude it complete with all combinations of full stops. The easiest option is to ban all @xyzmail.com addresses. A quick check of the IP of those that manually get through to moderator approval for records of spam and they're gone if they're bad. Persistence is rewarded by having the IP excluded so they can't see the site at all. Anyone from China, Russia or the Ukraine are immediately rejected. They can appeal if they so desire. Site membership rejection is usually left to me so that I can track repeat offenders. Approval is done by any one of three administrators so that new applicants are not waiting too long. Makes for an easier life.

There is a really very, very old joke that runs something along the lines of - Question - "What would you do if Jesus Christ came to Liverpool?" Answer - "Move Ian St. John to outside left!" Apologies.

I don't know whether it's my imagination or not, but to me, stylus on vinyl sounds better than a CD, or downloaded track played through a PC. Deeper richer & more lifelike tones My collection pieces other than coins, are decorative plates. They're plastered on every wall all over the house. It's only a small house, so I'm running out of room. Not your imagination - I have a subscription to MOJO and each month their featured interview asks "L.P., CD, or MP3?" - nine times out of ten the answer is LP. The most hated format is CD by a nose. The vinyl must be played through valves rather than hissing transistors.

Aka porn? That would be naughticalia and we have regular customers for that.

Anything that passes my way. Working in an auction house has its drawbacks come pay day. Currently mostly nauticalia.

Rather than the maximum postal bid it will be one increment above the second highest absentee bid at which the auctioneer has to start. If there is no bidding in the room then the item will be sold to the highest absentee bidder at that price. If there are bids in the room then the auctioneer will use the absentee bid to bid against the room until he reaches the maximum at which point the room will take over unless the maximum absentee bid is not reached. Normal increments are £2 (2, 5, 8) up to £50, then £5 up to £100 and £10 up to £200. These vary quite a lot between auction houses and you will see some starting at £10 and going up in £10s with maybe a reduction to £5 if he/she is trying to coax more out of the room. It sounds a bit complicated but so are the rules governing auctions. Getting the best result for the vendor is the main aim. It used to be that the lots were sold in guineas and the vendor was paid in pounds. The shilling difference being the auction house commission. There are no auction houses that I know of (excluding internet based ones) that charge vendors if the item remains unsold. So all the time researching, valuing and lotting those unsold lots is not chargeable. A lotting fee is only applied to sold lots. I've been going to auctions for 35 years (which is why my house is full of unfinished collections/junk) and I now do some part time work valuing, lotting and portering for our local one. Having got behind the scenes I am constantly amazed at the time it takes to assemble a specialist sale or even a Victorian and later household general one every two weeks. Usually around 500 lots each time. Auctioneers themselves all have their own style and speed. Buyers are just as likely to complain about the speed of an auction (normally about 120 lots per hour) as they are about losing a bid. A fascinating subject and, although it may seem a bit frustrating at times, the rules make them honest and there are avenues of complaint. Caveat emptor doesn't even apply any more because faulty or "not as described" items can normally be returned.

Three to four inches (75 to 100mm) here in the Capital of the Yorkshire Wolds this morning. Temperature is rising and the sun is shining. Not sure if we'll get any more. The pressure is rising again (now 1023mb) and there's no wind so it's in the balance.

I have a similair forgery but it's a foreign coin. Seems to be an iron core with a pressed outer coating of silver. A bit like the Christmas tree chocolate coins.

Certainly isn't. Shill bidding is the practice of bidding up your own item or getting someone to do it for you. It's very difficult to find a definition on the net because of all the fleabay news. http://definitions.dictionary.net/shill Nothing to do with the auctioneer. The practice of "ringing" is more common at live auctions where bidders (usually dealers)get together and agree not to bid against each other. Quite the opposite to "shill" bidding.

I do some work portering at our local auction house. When we take bids left by viewers on viewing days or the office takes bids over the phone then the time and date are always noted. The earlier gets precedent. If several bids are left on the same lot then the auctioneer is allowed to start at the amount left by the underbidder. If two bidders have left the same amount then the auctioneer will use the earlier timed one to carry on from the underbidder's price. The rules governing "bids against the wall" or "bidding up" an item are quite clear and the maximum number of "false" bids the auctioneer may use are regulated. This should only be used in order to get a lot started or if the first bid is too low. Reserves are never published to buyers so no-one should know what the minimum acceptable selling price is. The auctioneer is allowed to work it up to reserve price if he thinks there is interest in the room. Most can tell straight away if something is going to reach the reserve or not. Selling to house is another allowable practice if the price is too low. It must not be forgotten that the auction house has a prime responsibility to the vendor to get the best price available. Most vendors have an inflated idea of what price an item will achieve at auction. We regularly warn people that something will not sell or will not reach the figure they are expecting. Most valuations for auction are at most 50% of retail value or less. I'm currently valuing and lotting a library of very expensive specialist books and I'm having to estimate lot value at about 25% of retail value because of the current depression in the book market. Kindle is largely to blame. Coins are slightly different in that a fair estimate is put on such things as silver and gold coins and they invariably reach or exceed valuation at present. The number of bids recently by people who cannot pay or will not pay is increasing. Most auction houses do not require proof of an ability to pay prior to bidding although some do ask for a deposit for the buyer's number issued. The only thing the auction house can do is re-offer the items at the next auction. Apart from working as a porter I've been attending, and bidding at, auctions for coming up for 35 years. Which is why our house is so full of junk. I've always found that I'd rather be there than leave a bid but even after such a long time I can still get a bit carried away. If I'm not working an auction now I tend to leave a bid with a fellow porter knowing he won't go mad on my behalf. Kris

Some of them are a bit like those phone in sex lines we've all heard about. There is a human presence but apparently one never knows what their age or real sex is. A site where I am part of the administration team has a strict vetting policy requiring a reply to an email sent to a prospective member which puts the prospective member in an administration queue for final approval. The system automatically rejects applications with false email addresses where the email bounces. We've found that about half are automatic and usually involve false email addresses, the other half having some human involvement. I used to keep a log in order to try to find repeat offenders but there were not enough repetitions to warrant the time taken. IP addresses are changed too easily and there are dedicated spam servers out there with their own series of IP address and 255 x 255 is an awful lot. I have a fluid list of excluded IP and email addresses that prevents those on the list from seeing the site at all. These are all fairly obvious repeat offenders who try on a daily basis. They seem to be spreading like a rash across t'internet and, unfortunately, we just have to learn to live with them and try to reduce the annoyance as much as possible. Kris

Try emptying your browser cache or forcing your browser to reload the page. In IE that's the two green arrows circling each other at the top. It may be that your browser is being lazy and loading the old page instead of looking for a new one so it will show your old avatar. Regards Kris

Scunny We're playing Bristols Titty Another one that falls foul of that sort of AR censorship software is Marseilles. That infamous port in southern France.

I too spend a lot of money on old cars because I have to drive one every day. I continue to hover in the background sticking in my two ha'pence worth whether its wanted or not. Nice to see the boss about again. Having had the experience over the past few years of doing up houses the one we currently live in (27 years) will never be finished because SWMBO will immediately want to move again. Our other properties are currently fully let which is good considering the amount of work I put into them. Some say that the house market will take a long time to recover so more people are renting than buying. Its a toss up as to whether investment in property to let is worth it or not at the moment. We bought ours just before the market collapsed. Oh joy!

Nah - a good fish'nchip supper swilled down with a few oysters, is more her scene (and if she was a true Essex Girl, a few whelks and jellied eels wouldn't go amiss) Essex girls are great. They may not always be the sharpest knives in the drawer, but their hearts are usually in the right place Yes - behind a skimpy leopard print top and a Big Badge saying "I'm Sharon - my sister is Tracy" Mine loves Italian. Hates Oysters. Loves Yorkshire fish & chips. Won't eat whelks or jellied eels. She was a college lecturer & her heart is definitely in the right place. Never seen her in a leopard skin top. Her name isn't Sharon and her sister isn't called Tracy. Romford girls rule. I suppose you could say she's been a Yorkshire lass for 36 years but she was only 50% Essex anyway, having a Scottish half. And he was an eastend policeman at that.

Our local auction house does a live feed for their antiques and fine arts sales. I've always found that the audio and video feeds are a waste of time and that it's best to follow it with just the picture of the current lot displayed. The delays on the other feeds are such that the hammer has fallen before the audio or video registers it. It can get extremely confusing, especially if your broadband decides to slow down because of local demand. Best not bother if your local school is having an internet based lesson.

You would think that Man U would have learned from playing them in the past. Obviously not. Chalk and cheese comes to mind. Well deserved by Barca.

Aaah! Perhaps The lamp apart I think the rig for photographing coins looks worthy of a try. Maybe an experiment in the sunshine with a reflector in place of the lamp/light source might work. I don't have too many to photograph and if I need to I find the scanner gives satisfactory results. Most of the objects I photograph are more three dimensional and require more angled shots. Not that I'm saying coins are in any way two dimensional as such (grovel) Cheers Kris

You seem to have latched on to my EMP remark even though all I said was - "I'm still not too sure it wasn't causing some sort of EMP (Electro-Magnetic Pulse) as well." Having been a radio, electronics, computer and electrical engineer over the last 50 years I never discount any explanation that could generate a satisfactory explanation. My main point was that the lamp caused computers to lock up in the vicinity. Remove the lamp and the problem went away. Not all lamps of this type produce this effect but the two I know of did. Probably wouldn't have the same effect on a laptop because of the nature of the switched mode power supply. Unless it caused problems with the WiFi of course. Cheers Kris