John,
I did not mean to impugn anyone's reputation that uses a reserve. If anyone took my comments in that way, I apologise. It certainly is true that you can find very few auctions off-line that do not have a reserve to protect the seller. Additionally, many charge a fee for using a reserve, in that if the item does not reach the reserve, the seller must pay some percentage to the auctioneer.
It was my understanding that Ebay's relatively new policy of charging for using a Reserve on an auction was due to what I described. I thought that Ebay started charging for the Reserve because Ebay would lose out on the commission and Ebay would only receive the insertion fee where a seller did not intend to sell the item, but intended to only receive a list of possible buyers. Perhaps the discussions that I read when Ebay was considering this charge were incorrect.
Thanks--Alan.