I don't like hibid..... good user experience, but the auctions around here that I've followed have had what I can only describe as shill bidding.....
Hibid lets you see the bidding history, and although they obfuscate the ids, they don't obfuscate randomly, you still see the same 'encoded' value. So although you might be "Jim" in real life, and "*****Xyl" when you bid, the *****Xyl will continue to show up.
Pattern:
Auction opens...... one or two ids bid on 95% of the items for 1 - 2 dollars. Big ticket items get larger lure bids, and then over the period of a week it increases and the bids kick in, but very strategically -- same two or three ids. My buddy consigned items for a hibid auction and they asked him what he was looking to 'get' for it, and auto-magically his items get bid up..... just reserve bidding.
My pet peeve is that if you are going to have a reserve, just say so and put the value down. I would respect that more. There are some great arcticles online about the shill bidding, and about hibid in particular. They've been called out for sending 'max' bids to the auctioneer.
Does this stop me from bidding. No. If you know what your limit is, and can get it for 'less', then it is still a productive event. Using a 'max' bid is pretty much a guarantee to pay your max bid imho as i'm pretty sure they are monitoring it.
or maybe this is all in my head....... I'd welcome a socially distance beer with
@Tom Kitta to discuss more.