How the Gap Auction works
Most auctions are won by whoever is willing to bid last. This one is won by opening a gap — being far enough ahead of everyone else that there is no argument about it. The gap you have to open shrinks every round, and so does the clock.
Nobody puts money down to play. If you win, you pay what you wrote. That only works because the rules below are taken seriously, so they are worth two minutes.
Who can bid
- E1You need one account from us that arrived and was not refunded. That is the whole requirement — no deposit, no card on file, nothing held.
- E2The first time you bid you pick a name. It is yours from then on and it cannot be changed, because the results and the ban list would mean nothing if it could.
- E3Anyone can watch. You only need to have bought once to join in.
- E4There is no door. Turn up in any round, including the last one.
How it runs
- F1Three rounds — 10 minutes, then 5 minutes, then 5 minutes. Twenty minutes end to end, twice a day.
- F2Every round is sealed. Nobody sees a single bid until the round closes — not other bidders, not spectators, not the page.
- F3When a round closes we read out three things: the top two amounts, whether the gap was met, and how many people bid. No names against amounts.
- F4Once a round has closed, the names of everyone who bid in it go up.
- F5When the auction ends, the full bid history goes up with names on it.
Bidding
- B1The smallest bid is $1.
- B2The most you can bid goes up each round: $20 in round one, $100 in round two, $150 in round three. Same three numbers every auction.
- B3Missing a round costs you that round and nothing else. Sit out round two and you can still bid in round three.
- B4Bids do not carry over. Each round is a fresh number and it can go up or down — your money, your call.
- B5One bid per round, and it is final. You get three rounds, and the amount can go up or down between them — but once a round has your number you wait like everyone else.
Winning
- W1Round one: the top bid wins only if it is at least 5 times the second-highest. $5 beats $1. $5 against $2 does not.
- W2Round two: at least 2.5 times the second-highest.
- W3Round three: highest bid wins, by any margin.
- W4Same number as someone else? It goes to whoever bid in more rounds. Still level, and it goes to whoever got there first.
- W5If a round closes and you are the only person who bid in it, you win there and then — whichever round it is. There is no gap to clear when nobody else turned up, so the auction ends rather than running out the remaining rounds to announce what the reveal already showed.
- W6If nobody bids in round three at all, the account goes back in the pool and runs again another day.
- W8A cheap win is a real win. If it goes for four dollars it goes for four dollars, and we will be delighted about it.
Paying — read this one
- P1You pay exactly what you bid. Nothing more, and no fees on top.
- P2You have 24 hours from the moment the auction ends.
- P3If you do not pay, the win still stands publicly under your name, marked unpaid. We do not quietly delete it.
- P4And you are banned from bidding, permanently. The ban is on your customer account, not your bidder name, so a new name will not lift it and neither will buying again.
- P5The account goes back in the pool and is auctioned again later. There is no runner-up and no second chance at it.
Why the gap, and not just the highest bid?
Because a normal auction rewards patience and a fast finger, and this one rewards nerve. Clearing five times the field in the first round is very hard and almost nobody manages it — which is the point. Most auctions go all the way to round three, and the fun is in watching how close somebody got.
We are not making money on these. A cheap win is a good outcome, and the results page keeps a record of the closest misses as well as the wins.