> ..hostile to sellers
I think it depends on the seller's approach (to some extent). Its rather 'friendly' to serious seller IMHO.
The obscuring of bider's IDs benefits sellers, as it allows them to place phantom bids to artificially
raise the bid prices. Because the IDs are hidden and 'unique' to each item, one can never 'prove'
that the bids are artificially inflated ... but given the number of times one looses by 1$ or 1£ ...
well ...
Then there is the prevalence of 'private' sellers listing scores of items. No not individual postage
stamps, or POGs, but tens, dozens, or scores of laptops, or keyboards, or cameras.
Of course we all have score of working laptops stashed at home, alongside that huge
pile of camers, and all those keyboards ... ;-)
And why masquerade as a private seller ? Because then bid IDs are hidden ...
SD