My whole point is that Ebay prevents me from submitting a reconsidered bid after the seconds clock winds down ... where a live auction allows me to top the previous bid before the auctioneer's hammer goes down and has nothing to do with "understanding" how proxy bids are made.

This is the idea behind Yahoo's auctions. If a bid comes in within the last few seconds (could be up to a minute - don't know) the auction is automagically extended by 5 minutes.

This gives the outsted party a chance to make a new bid.

Unfortunately a high rake and few users make this board a poor alternative to