Document 72 Hours

Faces Behind an Online Auction

From a second-hand ambulance to someone who will visit a grave for you, almost every imaginable item and service is sold and bought on online auctions. Since these sites were launched in Japan around 20 years ago, they have developed into a huge market, where more than 100 million transactions are made each year. Some people sell items to rustle up some extra money, while others earn enough to make a comfortable living. What kind of people use online auctions to sell things? For 3 days, we traveled around Japan to meet real-world people selling unusual things through the Internet.