ebay grizzle

[G. Warrener]

Hello (how TOCH has changed......;-) )

I am not usually a BAD loser - but I would like to grizzle a little about EBAY developments. It will make me feel better, and stop me from kicking the cat!

Like many others, I have often bid for - and less often won - photographic prints taken by (mainly) German military personnel during WW2.

The value in cash of such prints - is intrinsic - my own ebay 'area of interest' is mainly in photographs of French aircraft or tanks in varying states of distress during the 1939-1940 period.

It is hard to place a cash value on such prints. Recently however I have lost many auctions to a Canadian bidder (S?d?k-13) who seemingly has limitless finances -as well as a very efficient software program enabling last-minute killer bids. If I estimate his financial outlay over the last months - it is clear that he is a seller's dream.

Discrete enquiries suggest he may be buying on behalf of US publishers. If so - then I must anticipate a massive work on the Blitzkrieg from the USA sometime in the future.

Earlier this evening, this bidder won an auction for a 6 x 9 cm print of a very derelict Koolhoven FK 58. The skeletal remains of the plane had no markings enabling a positive identification - beyond a/c type - as well as suggesting that it had been destroyed on the ground. When I bid - seconds before the auction closed - the price was in the region of 15 Euros - my bid was rejected by ebay - and it was evident that the winner had paid Euro 249 for this print.

The same bidder has - I am informed - paid Euro 600 for a photo of a completely nondescript German Pz Kpfw. IV tank.

My own knowledge of his purchases shows that he is buying up almost anything- at such grossly inflated prices.

I cannot top his prices. One side of me says: forget ebay photos - the other side says - keep bidding and make him pay more for his pleasures.

This bidder is of course saving me a lot of money - but I do hope (despite the evidence to hand) that all these photographs will end up eventually in print......

Graham