Surplus auctions and classic computers

[John Foust]

At 10:09 PM 5/18/2005, you wrote:
>I frequently attend surplus property auctions at some of the local (and not so local) colleges and Universities in and around Arizona, as they almost always have various classic computers at great prices (even next to nothing/free).

I see one of the presentations is by Tim Sell, one of the guys
who runs "SWAP", the state / UW surplus center in Madison, WI.  

It mentions the "USPA online auction / contract" software.  What's that?  

The SWAP's online auction software looks homegrown and I could
give them a long list of feature requests but in my experience
they don't really seem to care.  

https://mds.bussvc.wisc.edu/swap/home.asp

For example, there's no way to view the results of a finished auction.  
It counts down; the snipers often get in (manually) at the last 
second, you don't even know what something sold for.  All auctions
end at 10 p.m.

I've always had this nagging feeling that these sorts of governmental 
surplus agencies were ripe for corruption.  As the cloaca of large
and expensive organizations, a great deal of stuff arrives.

Where it all goes, who knows.  I seem to remember hearing rumors of
a RAM chip theft ring; small, easily stolen in pockets, 
once-expensive and easily fence-able. 

And SWAP was once located in the heart of the UW campus and state 
office downtown area, but then they moved it ten miles on the 
outskirts of town.  I can't help but imagine that all sorts of 
large, hard to move items (like a mainframe) wouldn't be dragged 
across town, and that the result was that more stuff ended up
in campus Dumpsters than ever before.

SWAP also has a policy that favors non-profits and governmental
agencies.  They're open on Thursdays for them; the public gets 
second dibs on Friday and Saturday.  They'd rather sell an item
for $2 on Thursday than for $100 on Friday.

On the other hand, they have a tough job, squeezing the last bit
of value from equipment bought with taxpayer dollars.  They can't
keep the stuff, they've got to move it out as best they can.

- John