Real time electronic commerce telecommunication system and method

Abstract

An auction system and method, which identifies at least one lot to be auctioned, having a plurality of units within the lot and associated auction parameters; transmits a remaining quantity of units within the lot from a central server to a plurality of remote locations; receives bid identifications for remaining units within the lot at the contemporaneous offering price from the plurality of remote locations; and decrements the offering price over time. The decrement may be adaptive to a bid activity pattern, and the bid activity pattern may be stored in a database. A local server may be provided to communicate between the central server and remote locations while changing the format of the information communicated. The packets preferably include compressed information, and preferably include quantity remaining information for a plurality of auction lot.

1 - 20 . (canceled) 
     
     
         21 . An auction method, comprising:
 (a) identifying auction parameters comprising at least one price rule and an auction end rule at an auction server system;   (b) transmitting an identification of the lot, a time signal derived from a server clock, and the auction parameters comprising at least one auction end time, from the auction server system to a plurality of bidders at remote locations through a packet switched computer network;   (c) automatically displaying a locally-generated count-down clock representing time remaining in the auction, on a user interface of a plurality of bidder computers at the remote locations, generated at the respective remote location of the respective bidder based on the transmitted time signal and the auction end time;   (d) receiving, by the auction server system, bids from the plurality of bidders at the remote locations through the user interface of the plurality of bidder computers, at the remote locations, through the packet switched computer network; and   (e) verifying compliance with the auction parameters, and determining a winning bidder based on at least the received bids and the server clock.