Well, it seems that Pete is handling this issue quite well. Just let me insert a few ideas:

1. "Real" auctions. Did you know that more money changes hands in "sealed bid" (fixed ending time) auctions than all other forms of auctions combined? Let's not confuse "gavel" auctions with "real" auctions, because there are many forms of "real" auctions, and gavel auctions are far from the most common form.

2. At a gavel auction, when was the last time you saw a bid call last 3,5,7, or 10 days, with bids coming in from all 24 time zones? Comparing eBay to a gavel auction, without allowing for the fundamental differences in formats, is a mistake.

3. "Auto Extension" online auctions, like Yahoo and several other failed sites offered, does not work. What good does a 5 minute extension do if you're asleep in bed when the auction ends, or at work, or out to dinner, or whatever? Even if you're home and online, you'd have to have your email program set to check once every minute to pick up the Outbid Notice in time to react.

4. The only thing the Proxy Bidding system can't do for you that you can do for yourself is to change your mind, in the heat of battle, about what you are willing to pay.

If you were at a gavel auction with your wife, and nature called urgently just as your item was coming up to bid, you would tell her to bid for you, up to $xx.xx. If you came back and you had won, you would be happy. If you came back and you had lost by one increment, you may get angry at her, and ask why she didn't bid one more time, and you know exactly what she'd say...... And she'd be right!

Plus, even when you lose by only one increment, you still don't know how far the other bidder would have gone, do you? A lot of people get upset at losing by one increment, but for all they know, the winning bidder's bid was $1,000.00 higher than the final price.

If you want to play games (and I don't mean that in a bad way), and you relish the "back and forth until one man is left standing" of a live gavel auction, then go to live gavel auctions. I love them myself! But, it's not realistic, or fair, IMHO, to come to eBay and expect that it will or should work the same way as your Friday Night Auction Barn event. It can't work that way, it's a different breed entirely.

When I spoke at the National Auctioneers Association Cenvention last year, on the topic of Online Auctions, not one of the hundreds of "professional" auctioneers I spoke to had any problem understanding how online auctions work, especially when it came to Proxy Bidding and the Fixed Ending Time format. They were able to recognize the "hybrid" approach to auctions that eBay has taken, taking aspects from Gavel auctions, Sealed bid auctions, "Silent" auctions, and combining them in ways that work best for a 24/7 global marketplace.

It seems it's just folks who have gone to a lot of gavel auctions that insist eBay mimic the auction format they are most familiar with.

Finally, as a high volume seller, I can say that no sniper has ever lowered an item price. In fact,every single one either raised the price, or left it unchanged.
It is true that in some cases, a "back and forth" bidding war might mean a higher price to me, but just as often, I get bids from folks who would never think of getting into a bidding war. Like Archie says, most buyers like to get what they perceive as a "bargain", and sniping offers them that.