:INFO [valign:v_center] ⭐️ Get Your Lots Now! ⭐️ The Neptunian Gaussian Auctions are open, and ready to go. Come bid on daily items from our special Neptunian storage. ONLY ONE ITEM PER DAY DUE TO THEIR EXTREME VALUE. Sold to the gentlenian that is closest to the median, as Neptunian auctions goes. | :GALLERY [displaystyle:grid] | :THREAD | :NOTE Terms, Conditions, and Inevitabilities of Sale Revision 47.2 — as ratified by the Standards Committee, whereabouts unknown PREAMBLE. Welcome, bidder. By opening this document, scrolling past this document, or existing within 4.5 billion kilometers of this document, you agree to be bound by its terms. This is standard. Do not be alarmed. Alarm does not affect the median. 1. DEFINITIONS. "The House" refers to Neptunian Gaussian Auctions, together with its subsidiaries, its orbital platforms, its fulfillment troposphere, and the entity in the sub-basement that we have agreed, in writing, not to name in writing. "Item" or "Lot" refers to any object, organism, concept, or regret offered for sale, including but not limited to Category I (Intergalactic Artifacts) through Category V (Alien Cultural Collectibles). Category III remains under seal pending litigation, and the House thanks you in advance for not asking. "You" refers to the bidder, together with the bidder's heirs, clones, echoes, past selves, future selves, and any parallel-universe instances of the bidder, all of whom are jointly and severally liable and none of whom were consulted. "The Median" refers to The Median. The House does not define The Median. The Median defines the House. "Gaussian" is used throughout in the statistical sense, and not in reference to Carl Friedrich Gauss personally, whose estate has asked us — twice now — to stop. 2. ELIGIBILITY. Bidders must be of legal bidding age in their jurisdiction of origin. For reference: Earth, eighteen (18) years; Neptune, one (1) full orbit, being 164.8 Earth years, so please plan ahead; hatchlings of the Triton Brood, upon completion of the Third Molting and not one second before, Kevin. Carbon-based, silicon-based, plasma-based, and vibes-based lifeforms are all welcome. The House prides itself on inclusivity, and on not asking follow-up questions. Employees of the House, their immediate families, and any hive-mind of which they are a constituent node may not participate. If you are unsure whether you belong to a hive-mind, you do. That is how they work. 3. BIDDING PROCEDURE. All bids are sealed. This is not a metaphor. Each bid is placed in a probability envelope, folded along the axis of what might have been, and stored in a vault whose location is best described as "adjacent." All bids are final. Bids submitted "as a joke," "just to see what happens," or "because Greg dared me" are considered extra final. Greg knows what he did. The winning bid is the bid closest to the median of all bids received on the lot. Read that again. The House does not reward boldness. The House does not reward caution. The House rewards consensus — the ability to think exactly as much as everyone else is thinking, no more, no less. Some bidders find this philosophically upsetting. The Median finds your feelings statistically insignificant. You may not bid infinity. You may not bid negative infinity. You may not bid "one more than whatever wins." You may not bid in currencies that have yet to be invented, in feelings, or in Greg's name. Greg has enough problems. 4. THE MEDIAN. The Median is calculated at the close of each lot by methods the House is legally required to describe as "math." Do not attempt to influence the Median. The Median cannot be influenced. The Median has already accounted for your attempt to influence it, including this one, including the next one, including the clever one you have not thought of yet. The Median thought of that one in 1846, shortly after being discovered. In the event of a tie, the lot is awarded to whichever bidder blinked most recently. Species without eyelids resolve ties by seniority of home star. Species without home stars are asked to wait in the lobby, which is lovely this time of orbit. 5. LOT DESCRIPTIONS AND IMAGERY. All lot images are renderings. The item you receive may differ from its image in color, size, texture, number of dimensions, and willingness to be perceived. Photographic conditions on Neptune are poor. Everything is blue. We have tried. Lot descriptions are prepared by cataloguers working under significant atmospheric pressure, in every sense. Phrases such as "museum quality," "ceremonial use only," and "dormant" reflect the cataloguer's best understanding at time of writing and may not survive contact with the item. Where a lot description contradicts the item itself, the item prevails. It usually insists. 6. PAYMENT. The House accepts Galactic Standard Credits, most Earth currencies (at an exchange rate best described as "a lesson"), refined starlight, and exact change. The House does not accept exposure. Several bidders have offered literal exposure to Neptune's atmosphere. The House already has the atmosphere. The atmosphere is the problem. A buyer's premium of twelve percent (12%) applies to all winning bids, plus a three percent (3%) Void Surcharge, which the House will not explain, has never explained, and — per the settlement — is no longer required to explain. Payment is due within five (5) business days of lot close. Please note that a Neptunian business day lasts 16.1 Earth hours, except during Great Dark Spot season, when time becomes more of a mood. 7. SHIPPING AND DELIVERY. Items ship from our fulfillment center in the upper troposphere, where wind speeds exceed 2,000 kilometers per hour. If your item arrives slightly before you ordered it, this is normal, and frankly a courtesy. Perishable lots ship in full stasis fields. Do not open a stasis field indoors. Do not open a stasis field outdoors. The correct number of times to open a stasis field is a number the House keeps in a drawer. The House is not responsible for items lost in transit through customs, wormholes, or the gap between what you bid and what you meant. Tracking numbers are provided as gestures. 8. RETURNS AND REFUNDS. All sales are final. See Section 3. See also: the concept of finality, generally. Exception: should your item achieve sentience within thirty (30) days of delivery and independently express a preference to return, the House will honor the item's wishes. Not yours. The item's. Return shipping will be billed to you, and the item is entitled to a window seat. Items that were already sentient at time of sale were sold with their full and documented consent. If you doubt this, ask them. They love talking about it. 9. PROVENANCE AND AUTHENTICITY. Every lot ships with a Certificate of Authenticity, itself authenticated by a second certificate, which is self-authenticating and declines to discuss its methods. "Intergalactic Artifact" is a category designation, not a warranty. Some artifacts are merely galactic. Some are local. One, the House regrets to disclose, is from Ohio, and its provenance file simply reads "long story." The House makes no representations regarding cursed status. Statistically, across a catalog of sufficient size, some lots are cursed. Statistically, so are some bidders. In the House's experience, these tend to find each other, and everyone is happier. 10. DATA, PRIVACY, AND THE CROWD. Your bid data is shared with the crowd, because that is the game; with regulators, because that is the law; and with a presence in the outer dark, because it was here first and the lease is airtight. The House does not sell your data. Your data is bartered, which our counsel assures us is different. You are responsible for the security of your account. "Password" is not an acceptable password. Neither is "themedian." Nice try, forty percent of you. Historical medians for past lots are published for transparency and are entirely useless. Past mediocrity is no guarantee of future mediocrity, though between us, it is a strong signal. 11. PROHIBITED CONDUCT. Telepathic collusion is strictly forbidden. The House can hear you. The House could always hear you. The remark about the soup was uncalled for. Temporal arbitrage — traveling forward to learn a lot's final median, then returning to bid it — voids the bid, the account, and in aggravated cases, the timeline. The House has unwound a timeline before and did not enjoy it. It says here that the House did not enjoy it. Shill bidding through your own clones is prohibited. Clones may register independent accounts upon demonstrating at least one (1) opinion not held by their originator. Strong feelings about Category V cheeses do not qualify. Everyone has those. 12. LIMITATION OF LIABILITY. The House shall not be liable for: existential dread induced by lot descriptions; envy of another bidder's proximity to the Median; items that hum; items that stop humming; or the specific quality of the silence after an item stops humming. In no event shall the House's total liability exceed the amount of your winning bid, or one (1) sincere apology, whichever the House finds easier to produce that day. Nothing in this section limits liability that cannot be limited by law, by treaty, or by the thing in the sub-basement, whose jurisdiction is, regrettably, expanding. 13. FORCE MAJEURE. The House shall be excused from performance in the event of solar flares, orbital resonance, methane rain of unusual sincerity, auditors, or the awakening of anything, scheduled or otherwise. During such events, all active lots are frozen at their current median, which several physicists have asked us to stop saying, as it "isn't how anything works." The physicists are welcome to bid like everyone else. 14. DISPUTE RESOLUTION. All disputes shall be settled by binding arbitration in orbit of Triton, conducted in Neptunian Legal Standard, a language with forty distinct words for "liability" and none for "refund." Translators are available, and unhelpful. You waive your right to class action, collective action, individual action, and interpretive dance. Especially interpretive dance. Arbitration Panel 7 is still recovering. Judgments are enforceable across all signatory systems, most non-signatory systems, and Ohio, per the artifact incident. 15. MISCELLANEOUS AND FINAL PROVISIONS. If any clause herein is found unenforceable, it shall be replaced by a clause of equal or greater unenforceability, drawn from the reserve clauses the House maintains for exactly this purpose. These terms are governed by the laws of Neptune, the lesser statutes of the Kuiper Belt, applicable interstellar treaty, and vibes. The House reserves the right to amend these terms at any time, retroactively, and without notice — though as a courtesy, amended sections will hum. By reading this far, you have agreed to everything herein, including the parts you skimmed. Especially the parts you skimmed. Thank you for bidding with Neptunian Gaussian Auctions. Bid wisely. Bid averagely. The Median sees you. The Median has always seen you. :LINK https://neptunian-gaussian-auctions.com/