[Nettime-bold] Re: <nettime> dot com auction

[josh zeidner <jjzeidner@yahoo.com>]

 For me, the ultimate culmination of 90s excess was
the internet "surviellance art" project, "We Live In
Public".  The premise of the site(
www.weliveinpublic.com ), was that a couple, and thier
friends would have all aspects of thier lives(
fucking, shitting, entertaining guests ) broadcast
over the net.  It was almost comical, these people
were so exagerratedly self-absorbed.  The girl
believed this would launch her "independent film
career", she later had some kind of mental breakdown
and had to leave the project.  The guy was dot-com
millionaire who thought he was Andy Warhol( although
his understanding of warhol was comparable to his
penis size :} ).  I dont know if you can still watch
any of the footage, if you are a 90s critic, I would
check it out.

 -thanks for the post!

 -josh



> 
> Our newspaper, the San Jose Mercury News, has a
> sizable business and
> technology section, even after layoffs within the
> publishing industry.
> Of course, these days the news is not good.
> Yesterday, it was noted that
> the U.S. stock market had lost more than $1.3
> trillion since the 9.11
> attacks.  Tonight it was reported that the attackers
> probably spent no
> more than $300,000 on all the planning, tickets, box
> cutters, and flight
> training.  I guess that's why the term
> "asymmetrical" is being used to
> describe the terrorism.
> 
> While I have been glued to TV and computer screens
> for a couple of
> weeks, and with a couple of conferences cancelled, I
> needed to get out
> of the house.  Also, the chair at my computer is
> about 20 years old and
> falling apart.  The business section, besides
> carrying stock prices, bad
> news, and press releases, also advertises auctions. 
> Since the Internet
> crash and the subsequent problems in the
> telecommunications industry,
> there have been about one a month.  Friends reported
> there was so much
> extra furniture that it was left on the street in
> the south of Market
> area in San Francisco.  Auction houses have shipped
> gear to other
> western towns because this area is so saturated. 
> However, I saw an ad
> for an equipment auction where there was no entry
> fee to view over 2000
> items in a warehouse  in Santa Clara.
> 
> I drove up yesterday and arrived at a parking lot
> full of other bargain
> hunters curious about the stuff for sale.  I picked
> up a thick catalog
> with double columns of terse descriptions and the
> terms of sale (as is,
> no warranties, etc) and rules for bidding.  There
> were hundreds of
> laptops, lids open and on each a sticker that listed
> the RAM and hard
> drive size. Even more rack-mount servers, desktop
> machines and thousands
> of square meters of large monitors. There were
> pallets of older
> machines, printers, and broken monitors.
> 
> It was overwhelming to see the evidence of the
> failure of these
> companies (about 15 were represented here) and what
> was left of them.
> The furniture included rosewood tables (rolling),
> dozens of filing
> cabinets, and at least 150 office chairs, primarily
> the Herman Miller
> Aeron chair which retails for about $600.  A handful
> of projectors, tubs
> of assorted hardware and software, and some
> networking gear.
> 
> I left, having marked a couple of items I'd be
> willing to buy, if the
> price were right. I would find out at the auction. 
> It took place today
> at the Santa Clara Convention Center, usually home
> to dozens of high
> tech conferences each year. Now it was quiet, and
> with few people flying
> the adjacent hotel was almost empty except for two
> small meetings for
> local high tech firms.   I walked to the auditorium,
> filled in my name
> and email, received a "paddle" with my number, and
> took a seat.
> 
> The auction started at 11 a.m., and the room had
> filled almost to
> capacity--at least 500 people, mainly guys between
> 30 and 60. Very few
> women.  One baby cried somewhere in the audience. 
> After a few jokes the
> auctioneer, a huge young man in a tight blue suit,
> repeated the rules
> and launched into the first item, a label maker. It
> went fo $25.  He
> quickly sized up the interest in a product, the
> right price point to
> start the bidding, and then his assistants stood at
> the edge of the
> stage and pointed at the current high bidder for
> each piece. They moved
> through two items a minute, on the average, yet with
> over 2000 they
> expected to finish by that evening.
> 
> It was actually exciting to see what people were
> willing to pay for
> untested gear, but everyone seemed blase about the
> purchases, partly
> because there is so much equipment on the market.
> The laptops ranged
> from $300 to $1000 depending on the configuration.
> Projectors went from
> $1000 to $1800, and monitors brought $100 to $400.
> The few Macintoshes
> sprinkled through the program were bought by the
> same man from India who
> probably paid too much.  Most of the stuff brought
> 20% to 30% of the
> retail value, sometimes less.  After two hours I
> realized the charis
> that itnerested me would not be up for bid until the
> evening, so I gave
> up and headed home, knowing that it will be repeated
> next month with a
> new load from the latest firms to liquidate the
> assets or fail
> completely.
> 
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