Patent ID: 8214260

Claim:
An on-line sales method comprising: providing a website operated by at least one computer connected to the Internet; receiving, on the website, a user's submission of an amount for conducting a sales transaction; providing, on the website, a plurality of items available for the user to select from and to potentially purchase at the submitted amount, wherein each of the plurality of items is pre-classified at one of a plurality of ranks; providing a selection option of the user determined based on the submitted amount such that the larger the submitted amount, the more items at higher ranks the user can select from the plurality of items provided for selection; receiving, on the website, the user's selection of multiple ones among the plurality of items in accordance with the user's selection option; conducting a computerized lottery to select one out of the multiple items selected by the user, wherein the drawn item has a published price that is equal to or higher than the submitted amount; and processing to check out the lottery-selected item at the submitted amount without regard to the published price of the lottery-selected item.