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eBay Developer Important Security Update - Oh Please!

eBay Developer Important Security Update - Oh Please!
10 August 2009
EventHorizon1984

 

In the article "Passwords compromised for eBay developers," Chris Dawson of TameBay wrote:

• "eBay have identified a possible security flaw and are requiring all developers update their passwords."
• "The developer blog reports that eBay have recently identified a means by which someone could have" "gained access to eBay Developers Program account information."

We're not surprised this happened.  The surprise is eBay in public admitting a "security flaw".

The equivalent of code monkey felgercarb can be found in this security announcement from the eBay Developers Program blog, regarding the "possible security flaw":

Important Security Update: developer.ebay.com
Posted by Laurel Kline in Critical Notes from Tech Support, Business News & Developer Website
Monday, Aug.10.2009, 3:06 PM PT

This is Kumar Kandaswamy, and I manage the eBay Developers Program. I'd like you to read this important message about account safety.

The safety and security of the eBay Developers Program is a top priority. While we believe that people are basically good, we also must live with the reality that there are fraudsters out there who have made it their illicit "profession" to find ways to exploit others on the Internet.

Occasionally, fraudsters attempt to gain unauthorized access to the eBay Developers Program. eBay has recently identified a means by which someone could gain access to eBay Developers Program account information. This type of access DOES NOT allow the capture of financial or other sensitive information, such as credit card or bank account information or Social Security numbers.  Fortunately, we have not detected any unusual activity with any Developer account.

Out of an abundance of caution and to help ensure the security of the eBay Developers Program, we are requiring that all developers take the following steps:

• Take advantage of our new, stricter password standards and change your eBay Developers Program (developer.ebay.com) passwords. It is not necessary to change eBay (www.ebay.com) passwords.

If you believe you or your customers have been the victim of fraudulent activity, contact us immediately at developer-relations@ebay.com.

Sincerely,
Kumar Kandaswamy

There's much unintentional eBay humor with the statement from Kumar Kandaswamy that "safety and security of the eBay Developers Program is a top priority."  Because historically that has not been the case.

Follow us.

Once upon a time Sergiu Daniel Popa was brought to the attention of the public by Dan Browning of the Star Tribune.  As reported in his article "Suspect in 'phishing' scheme indicted":

• "A Romanian immigrant was indicted Tuesday in federal court in Minneapolis on charges that he operated a computerized "phishing" scheme for several years that raked in financial records and personal identification from thousands of individuals"
• "Sergiu Daniel Popa, 20, of Shelby Township, Mich., was indicted on three counts"

Days later there would be a post about the article on the eBay Stores Forum. This was followed quickly by eBay user ID spopa2006 stating, "Listen guys. I am Sergiu D. Popa. I am that horrible guy!" and "I will make your life a hell."  And much much more.

When this activity and background was reported to eBay, their reponse was to delete the spopa2006 posts.  He was able to keep his eBay account active.  If you look quickly, you can view his Feedback Profile as of 11 August 2009 01:07 GMT.

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

This all would be rather uninteresting save for the fact that spopa2006 was a poster on the eBay Developer forums:

• "Hey there. I wrote a similar project in C++ by using pointers. However, the implemented network interface i used in C++ is no longer supported and I am not a C# guru as I am in c++. Tell me whether or not you got your solution. You can email me at gam30v3r2007@yahoo.com"

The activities of a registered eBay Developer.  You know the ones who work on the software that eBay buyers and sellers use.

Feeling that "safety and security" yet?

Oh, and did we forget to mention that this took place in 2007?  For those interested we kept the details in a June 2007 article, Sergiu D. Popa Response To Dan Browning Star Tribune Article.

Well there is innocent unless proven guilty.

BAMM!!  But wait, there's more.

In October 2008 Dan Goodin followed up with "Romanian national cops to $700,000 phishing trip":

• "Who's your underworld Popa?"
• "22-year-old Romanian national has admitted he participated in a US-based phishing operation that raked in some $700,000 over a three-year period."
• "Sergiu Daniel Popa, who for the past seven years has lived in New York and Michigan, pleaded guilty in federal court in Minneapolis to two felonies related to the scheme. He faces a maximum of 10 years in federal prison and a fine of $500,000."
• "FBI agents began their investigation of Popa in early 2005."

Kumar Kandaswamy is crowing about protection from "fraudsters attempt to gain unauthorized access to the eBay Developers Program", but described here is a convicted hacker who eBay gave Developer Program access?

With spopa2006's regular eBay account active, you have to wonder if his Developer Program access remains active.  And if he gave others access to his account, during his extended absence.

Kumar Kandaswamy said, "we have not detected any unusual activity with any Developer account".

Oh, Please!

How many times does a warning have to be given to eBay before someone listens?

And given the lax vetting process, one really has to wonder if there are other "Popa's" signed up to the Developer Program?

.

"So, people hire you to break into their places... to make sure no one can break into their places?"
"It's a living."  Martin Bishop, Sneakers (1992)

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The eBay ideeli Diamond PowerSeller Feedback Affair

The eBay ideeli Diamond PowerSeller Feedback Affair
5 August 2009
EventHorizon1984

Being the curious* type we wondered what were the facts behind the comments on purported new eBay Diamond seller ideeli. 

Here's some of what we found.

On 7 May 2009 the ideeli eBay user ID quietly sprang into existence.

Here's how eBay seller ideeli describes themselves:

Ideeli offers privileged access to the most sought-after fashion, home and beauty products. Ideeli is a shopping community offering luxury brand-name products at 20%-80% off regular prices. All of our items are brand new, and authenticity is 100% guaranteed.

A month later came listings for fashion products, and ideeli's first positive feedback.

     

	Thrilled with my new bag! Extremely quick shipping! Thanks!	Buyer: emerald624523 ( 107)	Jun-25-09 17:19
	NEW Alexis Hudson Twinkle II (Ink) (#170346717957)	US $15.50	View Item

     

A new eBay seller had made their entrance.

Within a span of another month things got interesting.  This short article will cover the feedback portion of 'interesting'.

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"When you argue, I have this compulsive need to argue back."
Jack McCoy, Law & Order

...

The answer to the frequently asked question, 'was ideeli feedback removed?', is yes.  We did not find everything, but what was found does support the "yes" answer.

Why the feedback was removed is a question we'll leave to the readers.

This record covers the time period June 24 2009 20:08:30 through August 5 2009.

Except where attributed, screen shots were obtained from the Google cache.  The link to the cache is provided as reference material, but keep in mind a Google cache does not exist forever.  We anticipate that many of the links will be aged out by publication.

...

"I worry. I mean, little things bother me. I’m a worrier. I mean, little insignificant details – I lose my appetite. I can’t eat. My wife, she says to me, “you know, you can really be a pain.”‘"
LT Columbo, Columbo

...

The ideeli Feedback Chronology

June 24 2009  20:08:30 GMT

Feedback:  ideeli (0)

http://74.125.155.132/search?q=cache:okuM6wdJnIMJ:feedback.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll%3FViewFeedback%26userid%3Dideeli%26ftab%3DFeedbackAsSeller%26ssPageName%3DVIP:feedback:3:us+feedback.ebay.com+userid%3Dideeli&cd=13&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us&client=firefox-a

.

July 5 2009  16:04:54 GMT

Feedback: ideeli (9)

• Rating  1 month  6 months  12 months
• Positive  10  10  10
• Neutral  0  0  0
• Negative  0  0  0

Revised Feedback:  0

http://74.125.155.132/search?q=cache:gDeJ3FwuqmgJ:feedback.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll%3FViewFeedback%26userid%3Dideeli%26iid%3D170343935522%26ftab%3DFeedbackAsSeller%26ssPageName%3DVIP:feedback:2:us+feedback.ebay.com+userid%3Dideeli&cd=5&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us&client=firefox-a

.

July 7 2009  18:25:32 GMT

Feedback: ideeli (15)

• Rating  1 month  6 months  12 months
• Positive  20  20  20
• Neutral  0  0  0
• Negative  0  0  0

http://74.125.155.132/search?q=cache:BtuoieVIGsUJ:feedback.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll%3FViewFeedback2%26userid%3Dideeli%26ftab%3DFeedbackAsBuyer+feedback.ebay.com+userid%3Dideeli&cd=11&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us&client=firefox-a

.

July 7 2009  18:25:32 GMT - July 15 2009  22:02:45 GMT

A smaller version of original screenshot from instantvideogames:

Regarding the Negative Feedback.

Reported by coolbeans717:

eBay buyer chatychik4887 bought "NEW Alexis Hudson Twinkle I (Mocha)" #170351642263 on 3 July 2009 15:36:46 PDT (22:36:46 GMT) from ideeli, and left ideeli a Negative feedback.

The indication was the Negative feedback had "DO NOT BUY FROM THEM".

A similar report was made by craftscraftsandcrafts and nostalgicthreads.  The Negative feedback was something to the effect that the 'seller refused to ship to a different address and refunded her payment'.

 
Sometime between July 7 2009 18:25:32 GMT and July 15 2009 22:02:45 GMT, Negative feedback was received by ideeli and removed by eBay.

.

July 15 2009  22:02:45 GMT

Feedback: ideeli (30)

• Rating  1 month  6 months  12 months
• Positive  42  42  42
• Neutral  0  0  0
• Negative  0  0  0

Revised Feedback: 0

http://74.125.155.132/search?q=cache:Aw_i5jqWYy4J:feedback.ebay.in/ws/eBayISAPI.dll%3FViewFeedback%26userid%3Dideeli+feedback.ebay.com+userid%3Dideeli&cd=10&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us&client=firefox-a

.

July 16 2009  16:57:00 GMT

Neutral feedback received by ideeli.

	Why did it take 6 days to ship the order ?	Buyer: ggsecost98 ( 15)	Jul-16-09 09:57
	Cole Haan Air Dempsey Men's Penny (Black Calf 8.5M) (#170355611818)	US $94.00	View Item

.
July 18 2009  03:01:12 GMT

Feedback: ideeli (58)

• 100% Positive

http://74.125.155.132/search?q=cache:29sK_Ii33gcJ:cgi.ebay.ph/ws/eBayISAPI.dll%3FViewItem%26item%3D170355539015+feedback.ebay.com+ideeli&cd=47&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us&client=firefox-a

.

July 18 2009  22:56:46 GMT

Feedback: ideeli (72)

• Rating  1 month  6 months  12 months
• Positive  86  86  86
• Neutral  1  1  1
• Negative  0  0  0

Revised Feedback:  0

http://74.125.155.132/search?q=cache:cFQBvAFSWhIJ:feedback.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll%3FViewFeedback%26userid%3Dideeli%26ftab%3DFeedbackAsSeller+feedback.ebay.com+userid%3Dideeli&cd=14&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us&client=firefox-a

.

July 22 2009  20:15:17 GMT

Feedback: ideeli (192)

• Rating  1 month  6 months  12 months
• Positive  223  223  223
• Neutral  1  1  1
• Negative  0  0  0

Revised Feedback:  0

http://74.125.155.132/search?q=cache:Yv-FPFh_OYQJ:feedback.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll%3FViewFeedback%26userid%3Dideeli%26ssPageName%3DVIP:feedback+feedback.ebay.com+userid%3Dideeli&cd=2&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us&client=firefox-a

.

July 23 2009  18:58:00 GMT

Negative feedback received by ideeli.

	COUNTERFEIT SHOES!!! SHOES MADE IN INDIA. THIS IS AGAINST THE LAW!!	Buyer: topqualitycoins ( 789)	Jul-23-09 14:36
	Reply by ideeli (Jul-23-09 15:13): Buyer has not replied to e/v-mail to confirm authenticity we are happy to help.
	Cole Haan Air Sharon Women's Slide (Black 10B) (#170355539755)	US $79.00	View Item
	BEWARE, THESE ARE NOT ORIGINAL COLE HAAN, BUT MADE IN CHINA!! DO NOT BUY	Buyer: topqualitycoins ( 789)	Jul-23-09 11:58
	Reply by ideeli (Jul-23-09 15:12): ideeli is an authorized seller of this brand Buyers welcome to confirm with CH
	Cole Haan Air Geneva Men's Slip-On (T.Moro 9M) (#170355539097)	US $109.00	View Item

.

July 23 2009  22:34:55 GMT

Feedback: ideeli (255)

• 99.6% Positive

http://74.125.155.132/search?q=cache:CbY3D34DQcQJ:myworld.ebay.com/ideeli/+feedback.ebay.com+ideeli&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us&client=firefox-a

.

July 24 2009  12:37:16 GMT

Feedback: ideeli (269)

• Rating  1 month  6 months  12 months
• Positive  313  313  313
• Neutral  1  1  1
• Negative  2  2  2

http://74.125.155.132/search?q=cache:HQCTKvQfaisJ:ebay.chodientu.vn/feedback/ideeli/+feedback.ebay.com+ideeli&cd=85&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us&client=firefox-a

.

July 24 2009  12:37:16 GMT - July 25 2009  06:09:26 GMT

Sometime between July 24 2009 12:37:16 GMT and July 25 2009 06:09:26 GMT, two (2) Negative feedbacks were removed by eBay.

.

July 24 2009  12:37:16 GMT - July 31 2009  01:43:11 GMT

Sometime between July 24 2009 12:37:16 GMT and July 31 2009 01:43:11 GMT, the July 16 2009  16:57:00 GMT Neutral feedback was removed by eBay.

.

July 25 2009  06:09:26 GMT

Feedback: ideeli (295)

• 100% Positive

http://74.125.155.132/search?q=cache:Y-Qw8yGbID0J:cgi.ebay.com.sg/ws/eBayISAPI.dll%3FViewItem%26item%3D170355539718+feedback.ebay.com+ideeli&cd=18&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us&client=firefox-a

.

July 25 2009  13:46:00 GMT

	seller took a long to ship item	Buyer: tmays1906 ( 15)	Jul-25-09 06:46
	Cole Haan Adrien Bit Men's Slip-on Shoe (Tan 13M) (#170355538904)	US $79.00	View Item

.

July 31 2009  01:43:11 GMT

Feedback: ideeli (451)

• 99.8% Positive

• Rating  1 month  6 months  12 months
• Positive  506  511  511
• Neutral  1  1  1
• Negative  1  1  1

Revised Feedback:  1

	Ordered shoes, They didn't fit and seller only gives an in store credit.	sherwood2sm7 ( 13)	Jul-30-09 11:36
	Cole Haan Air Barrett Men's Penny (Burgundy 9.5M) (#170355538980)	US $99.00	View Item

.

August 5 2009  04:41 GMT

Feedback: ideeli (543)

• 99.8% Positive

• Rating  1 month  6 months  12 months
• Positive  590  609  609
• Neutral  3  3  3
• Negative  1  1  1

Revised Feedback:  1

	slow shipment	Buyer: chimbambastuff ( 405)	Aug-04-09 22:41
	Cole Haan Air Ibiza Women's Strap (White/Orange 8B) (#170355539060)	US $49.00	View Item
	slow shipment	Buyer: chimbambastuff ( 405)	Aug-04-09 22:41
	Cole Haan Carma Air WS Women's Wedge (Ivory 8B) (#170355539864)	US $139.00	View Item

...

"I am the Energizer bunny of forensic science: I never sleep and I never give up."
Abby Sciuto, NCIS

...

* Old professional habits die hard.

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The eBay Weed of the Day

The eBay Weed of the Day
16 July 2009
EventHorizon1984

In the article 'TripAdvisor Warns Of Hotels Posting Fake Reviews' author Melissa Trujillo reported one company "has been quietly posting disclaimers to warn customers of hotels writing fake reviews to improve their popularity rankings or hurt competitors".

This is a common problem. As referenced in the article:

• "Apple required that consumers purchase or download an application before they can review it online in the App Store"
• "A plastic surgery company, Lifestyle Lift Inc., agreed to pay $300,000 to resolve an investigation into positive online reviews written by employees, the New York attorney general announced Tuesday"
• "travel industry insiders — but often not casual travelers — understand the financial incentives hotels have to artificially inflate their rankings on the site. Some offer discounts or freebies to patrons who write positive reviews or hire public relations companies who say they can improve the reviews"

Common and widespread to the extent that the U.S. FTC (Federal Trade Commission) wrote the FTC GUIDES CONCERNING USE OF ENDORSEMENTS AND TESTIMONIALS IN ADVERTISING in 1975 and 1980.

Very briefly that Guide requires companies to identify themselves when commenting on their products. And people making comments about a product, that a company shows to the public, must be independent of the company. Or the person or company must provide to the public their relationship.

This Federal Guide apparently is so abused that the "Federal Trade Commission is revising guidelines on testimonials and endorsements to reflect the growth of online marketing".

Which brings us to what is a "Weed"?

We use the term "Weed" to describe people paid to post. The term derives from how these individuals are viewed. For example the featured article notes, "company has policies to weed out suspicious reviews".

A Wall Street Journal poster provided a partial description of the tactics an eBay Weed employs. This edited version is similar to PowerPoint discussion points given by public relations companies to writers.

1. Blame the messenger.
2. Attack the messenger or message.
3. Downplay the message.
4. Twist what the messenger is trying to say.
5. Spin everything positive for Ebay

6. Never blame Ebay for anything
7. Tell users to go elsewhere if they don’t like it

For the Weeds that will use some of those tactics on this article, tell your supervisor to study a little history. Or actually read the various Public Relations text books. Some of us did.

Philip Morris Public Relations 1992:

• Change the focus of the issue
• Explore and exploit the opposition's weaknesses
• Investigate legal challenges to opposition efforts
• Develop alliances with other groups being attacked by the opposition
• Begin large-scale program of journalism education (focusing on accuracy, accountability, objectivity, etc.)
• Become a source of information and expertise

The above combined checklists sounds familiar doesn't it?

One persona missing from the public relations tactics is the 'friend'. A theatrical example is Security Officer Price from the film Stalag 17 (1953). This personae and it's subtypes are the hardest to detect, and we'll leave that for a future article.

Which brings us to the eBay Weed of the Day.

Disclaimer: We are commenting on individual(s) associated with the following posts, who may have attempted to influence public opinion through methods unsanctioned by the FTC. This opinion should not be taken as fact, and the reader should form their own unbiased opinion.

This part of a recent post was made on a recent article involving eBay.

• #1  "Some people just can't handle change or changing markets. A handful of people have been complaining for more than a year now (mostly the same ones on every blog they can find in a day); they need to learn to move on."

Interestingly months earlier the following comment was made on a different article by another independent voice.

• #2  "if you take out the 10 or 15 most vocal anti-eBay people blogging all over the place (sometimes with different names as well), you realize that the noise is pretty low if noticeable at all. Life goes on, adapt or die.

To be obvious:

1. "Some people just can't handle change or changing markets"
2. "adapt or die"

1. "they need to learn to move on"
2. "Life goes on"

1. "A handful of people have been complaining for more than a year now"
2. "if you take out the 10 or 15 most vocal anti-eBay people"

1. "(mostly the same ones on every blog they can find in a day)"
2. " blogging all over the place (sometimes with different names as well)"

The dissimilar writing styles 'sound' like two separate writers. Which begs the questions. Two different people stating near identical talking points months apart?  Down to the parenthesis; "(", ")"?

We leave you with this thought. Those are not the only examples.

"Sure. Fine. Whatever."
Dana Scully, X-Files (Syzygy)

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DESTROY ALL COUNTERFEITS! - eBay's New June 2009 User Agreement

DESTROY ALL COUNTERFEITS! - eBay's New June 2009 User Agreement
14 May 2009
EventHorizon1984
Commentary

We made a condensed comment on the AuctionByte blog "eBay Revises Fakes Policy: Return, not Destroy".  What follows is a full article.

The material in this article is provided to you free of charge, "AS IS" WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EITHER EXPRESSED OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE, OR NON-INFRINGEMENT.

Basically talk to a attorney figuratively face-to-face when seeking legal advice.  Not that we're dispensing any.

The May 13th AuctionBytes articles "eBay's New Policy Instructs Buyers to Destroy Fakes" and "Questions over eBay's New Fakes Policy" brought to light a section in eBay's User Agreement, that would be implemented 14 June 2009.

• For covered claims that meet the conditions and are not excluded, buyers are required to destroy an item if they claim it is not authentic. Once a buyer confirms destruction of the item, eBay will reimburse the buyer.
• For covered claims that meet the conditions and are not excluded, sellers agree to not hold buyers or eBay responsible for the destruction of an item if it is not believed to be authentic

Looking at the California statutes, eBay INC being located in the State of California, this type of action is covered under "California Criminal Law", "Crimes Against Property", "Larceny", "Grand Theft", etal. 

All 50 U.S. States and U.S. Territories have similar laws.  Then there's the matter of Interstate Commerce, and it's coverage by the U.S. Attorney General and the F.B.I.

And yes, there's more.

A day later someone at eBay with a legal background must have read the MBA produced User Agreement.

***Updated: Changes to the eBay User Agreement***
May 14, 2009 | 04:46PM PST/PT

Scott Shipman

On May 15, eBay will be releasing a revised user agreement. This revision will address the obligations of buyers and sellers in transactions where a buyer has alleged receipt of a counterfeit item.

Under the revised agreement:

• Buyers and sellers shall work in good faith during the resolution process to determine that the item is not counterfeit.
• If buyer and seller cannot determine that the item is not counterfeit, buyers are required to send the item back to the seller. Cost of return shipping will be paid by the buyer or eBay, unless both buyer and seller have agreed otherwise.
• Covered claims that meet the conditions and are not excluded will count as a violation by the seller of our prohibited and infringing items policy.
• If eBay determines the buyer is not acting in good faith, eBay may restrict or eliminate their ability to return items or make future claims.
• Sellers shall not list, advertise, or cause that item to appear for sale, barter or trade, on any eBay Inc. web site or service.

These revisions to the user agreement are being made to:

• Provide sellers protections against inaccurate counterfeit claims.
• Provide buyers assurances about the authenticity of the item received.
• Maintain integrity of the eBay marketplace.

The new User Agreement is effective immediately for new members registering on or after today, and on June 14, 2009, for current members. You don't need to do anything to accept the new User Agreement. If you don't wish to accept it, you can follow these instructions to close your account.

Sincerely,
Scott Shipman
Senior Counsel
eBay Inc.

For the casual reader, these are eBay User Agreement sections being referenced:

http://pages.ebay.com/help/policies/user-agreement.html

Buyer Obligations:

• Buyers agree to file claims in accordance with the conditions, exclusions and coverage limitations as further explained in the eBay Purchase Protection policy.

• For covered claims that meet the conditions and are not excluded, eBay will reimburse eligible buyers by PayPal or by coupon redeemable on eBay, in eBay’s discretion, based upon a number of factors, such as whether the buyer has a PayPal account, the type of payment made to the seller and the payment amount.

• Buyers who eBay believes are not acting in good faith, abusing the program or a seller, attempting to commit or committing fraud, or trying to unjustly benefit from the program may become ineligible for eBay Purchase Protection. Buyers who become ineligible will be notified by eBay prior to ineligibility.  eBay reserves the right to temporarily, indefinitely or permanently suspend the eBay Purchase Protection program immediately if we suspect abuse, excessive claims, tampering, or interference with the proper working of the program.

• eBay Purchase Protection doesn’t cover certain types and categories of goods or services, false, abusive or illegitimate claims, or transactions where you have been or may be compensated from another third party. Please read the eBay Purchase Protection policy for more details.

 Seller Obligations:

• Sellers agree to follow the program requirements as explained in the eBay Purchase Protection policy.

• All sellers with an open claim must work in good faith to resolve the claim, refund money and/or provide a replacement item, and accept a return of the item as explained by the eBay Purchase Protection Policy.

• If a seller doesn't resolve a claim, the seller agrees to pay eBay the amount paid by eBay to the buyer in accordance with the eBay Purchase Protection policy. eBay will invoice the seller for these amounts and seller agrees to pay eBay in accordance with the invoice terms.

Obligations when a buyer opens a claim alleging an item is counterfeit:

• Sellers shall work with the buyer in good faith during the resolution process to provide buyer with appropriate documentation or other assurances to satisfy the buyer that the item is not counterfeit, if such information is available.

• If buyer and seller cannot agree that the item is not counterfeit, for covered claims that meet the conditions and are not excluded, buyers are required to send the item back to the seller. Cost of return shipping will be paid by the buyer or eBay in our sole discretion, unless otherwise agreed upon by the buyer and seller.

• Covered claims that meet the conditions and are not excluded will count as a violation by the seller of our prohibited and infringing items policy.

• Sellers shall not list, advertise, or cause that item to appear for sale, barter or trade, on any eBay Inc. (including our subsidiaries, joint ventures, and other members of the group) web site or service located around the world.

• While buyers are not obligated to provide third party confirmation that an item is counterfeit in order to open a claim, in cases where there is written confirmation from the manufacturer that the item is counterfeit, or in additional circumstances where eBay elects to exercise its discretion, eBay may request the destruction of the item by an authorized third party and at eBay’s expense.

Let us briefly go through the new legalize.  Keep in mind that legal documents are written to minimize, or eliminate, vague, and subject to multiple interpretation, language.  At least that is the goal.

Condensing the above counterfeit section down to a more understandable form:

• "If buyer and seller cannot agree that the item is not counterfeit" this "will count as a violation by the seller of our prohibited and infringing items policy", and "buyers are not obligated to provide third party confirmation that an item is counterfeit".

Same as Scott Shipman's announcement, got it?

This part is solid:

• "in cases where there is written confirmation from the manufacturer that the item is counterfeit"

However there remains more language that eBay's legal team must clean up.  Which is not necessarily Scott Shipman's pervue. See http://news.ebay.com/team.cfm Michael Jacobson, eBay Senior Vice President and General Counsel.

Take a look at this:

• "or in additional circumstances where eBay elects to exercise its discretion, eBay may request the destruction of the item by an authorized third party and at eBay’s expense."

Read it very carefully.  eBay can destroy seller property when "eBay elects to exercise its discretion".  This part does not clearly explain "discretion".  In less legalize, "discretion" could be very very very very loosely replaced with 'whim'.

This has a bit more clarity:

•  "eBay may request the destruction of the item by an authorized third party".

But lacks the explanation of what happens should eBay NOT request destruction.  Because of the word "may", the statement can be interpreted as:

• "or in additional circumstances where eBay elects to exercise its discretion, eBay may or may not request the destruction of the item by an authorized third party and at eBay’s expense."

Consider what happens in the event that eBay does NOT request destruction of the item?  Do you know what happens to the seller's item?  There are multiple possibilities, indicating that this part is vague, and NOT clearly written.

Eventually eBay's legal team needs to put in a list of authorized third parties that will be used for destruction.  That is fairly minor though.

This part is not minor:

• "at eBay’s expense."

This CAN be interpreted as, 'eBay will pay for the cost of destruction'.  Fine, but incomplete.  Remember IN CONTEXT "at eBay’s expense" refers to the cost of destruction PERIOD.

Lets revisit the original issue in the original User Agreement.  eBay makes the buyer whole and pays for destruction of a seller's item, but THEN who ultimately pays for the money given back to the buyer?  The rewritten user agreement remains ambiguous or missing in this matter.

Consider what happens when a seller resolves the claim in good faith, informs the buyer to return the item for a refund, the buyer maintains the item is counterfeit, and eBay chooses to "exercise its discretion"?

• "If a seller doesn't resolve a claim, the seller agrees to pay eBay the amount paid by eBay to the buyer"

Is it likely that this provision, under Seller Obligations, would be applied whereby eBay unilaterally chooses to "exercise its discretion", declares the claim is not resolved, and eBay has the now seller's item destroyed?

• "eBay will invoice the seller for these amounts and seller agrees to pay eBay in accordance with the invoice terms."

Anyone notice there is more 'whim' in the new rewritten user agreement?  Is this deliberate or an oversight?

And as William Cobb would put it, soooo Is there more?  Yes. 

Think it's time to hit to personally hit the word processor Michael Jacobson ESQ, and clean up this mess?

"It's sort of an obsession with me to do the best I can for a client. My clients aren't blameless. Many of them are crooks. Probably a lot of them are guilty. That's not for me to determine. That's for a jury to determine."
Perry Mason

"The character of every act depends upon the circumstances in which it is done."
Oliver Wendell Holmes JR, U.S. Supreme Court

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The "DESTROY ALL COUNTERFEITS!" is homage to the Toho Company movie "Kaiju soshingeki" or "Destroy All Monsters!" (1968).

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eBay Media Center - Senior Management
http://news.ebay.com/team.cfm

Michael Jacobson
Senior Vice President and General Counsel, eBay Inc.

Download image

As senior vice president and general counsel at eBay, Mike Jacobson's responsibilities include overseeing eBay's legal department, its risk management program, and its policy group. He is responsible for interactions with content regulators, law enforcement, contracts, SEC compliance, and other legal matters. Prior to eBay, Mike was a partner with Cooley Godward LLP where he was recognized as an expert in securities law. His responsibilities included corporate and securities transactions, including mergers and acquisition transactions, public offerings, and venture capital financing. Mike earned a Bachelor of Arts in Economics, Magna Cum Laude, in 1975 from Harvard College, where he was a member of Phi Beta Kappa. He subsequently received his law degree from Stanford University in 1981, where he was a Nathan Abbot Scholar and a member of Order of the Coif. He also received the Hilmer Oehlmann Jr. award as well as first and second year honors.

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Notable Comments

.

Questions over eBay's New Fakes Policy
by: Grab your torches

Wed May 13 14:28:53 2009
Just calm down, you silly people
When the smoke that you yourselves are generating clears, you'll see that a third party verification is needed. This system is already in place and has been used for a long time.

.

4343martino ( 1851) View seller's items | View Blog Well fer sure...every buyer is a honest upstanding citizen of what ever third world country they happen to be in..You should know that by now world-secure....there never has been or ever will be a dishonest e-bay buyer...they dont exist..not in this world or the next..just ask e-bay they will tell ya...LOL>>>What a crock of sh*t e-bay has created with this one..chalk up another one for the lawyers...LOL>>> Mark May-13-09 15:27:25 PDT

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Questions over eBay's New Fakes Policy
by: Grab your torches
Thu May 14 13:45:31 2009

So much hype here.
Where does this false info about mailing counterfeits come from? It is illegal to sell them, yes. Illegal to use USPS to sell them, yes. NOT illegal to use USPS to send them to be authenticated/destroyed.
The eBay UA only states that a buyer must "confirm" that a counterfeit has been destroyed. It says nothing about the manner of that confirmation. The current process for a destroying a counterfeit is not spelled out either. Do you assume this means the buyer just has to say they did? No, they ship it to Texas, where it is supposedly destroyed if counterfeit, or resold if authentic. Is there any reason to believe that this won't be pretty much the same thing?

Any idiot knows that if all eBay will require is a buyer saying they destroyed it, then this cannot possibly be legal. Why then, do you all believe this is what eBay is going to do?

It seems much more likely that the user agreement is being left deliberately vague, for any number of reasons.

I swear, Ina could tell you that eBay Singapore was adding a category for human trafficking and you would all eat it up and repeat it everywhere.
Clowns, all of you.

.

Questions over eBay's New Fakes Policy
by: Grab your torches
Thu May 14 14:18:52 2009

Why doesn't somebody here just go ahead and buy a fake purse? Do it. You'll be making the world a better place removing a counterfeit. Much better than reporting it, getting the listing removed so the seller can peddle it somewhere else. Actually buy it and the fake seller is out the money and the counterfeit.
Now, tell eBay it's a fake and see what they ask you to do.

.

Questions over eBay's New Fakes Policy
by: Grab your torches
Thu May 14 15:04:12 2009

"If ebay doesn't want incorrect information floating around about ANY of its policies, then the policy should be completely transparent and 100% of it posted."

Seriously? This is a defense?
I would like a little more clarity over this policy as well, but that DOES NOT JUSTIFY MAKING THINGS UP!

.

Questions over eBay's New Fakes Policy
by: Grab your torches
Thu May 14 15:11:55 2009

Some secret policies are good.
The list of words in a title that restrict how many of a certain thing you can sell, for example. Make that known and people selling counterfeits know exactly what to avoid.
Exactly how best match works also. Remember when some unscrupulous sellers figured out to put NEW NEW NEW in the title to push their items to the top?

While I do not see the logic behind their vagueness in this case, I wont deign to say that it does not exist. I can't say with any certainty that 100% transparency wouldn't create an opening for the counterfeit sellers to abuse.

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Play IT Again Usher "eBay" Lieberman

Play IT Again Usher "eBay" Lieberman*
30 April 2009
EventHorizon1984
Commentary


Usher Lieberman did IT again.  Let's summarize shall we?

1. "as of June 15, will no longer be providing third party checkout service on eBay.", Dinesh Lathi Vice President Seller Experience, 13 April 2009
2. eBay Eliminates Third-Party Checkout, Impacts ProStores, Vendors, Ina Steiner, 15 April 2009
3. "No sooner do I give her props for solid sourcing that she publishes something wholly misinformed and just plain wrong", Usher Lieberman, 15 April 2009
4. "Some blogs have incorrectly reported that eBay is doing away with third party checkout.", Dinesh Lathi Vice President Seller Experience, 15 April 2009
5. "No one else here will work with you, Ina.", Usher Lieberman, 15-28 April 2009
6. “At a time when eBay’s business and image are suffering, shutting down communication with their sellers hardly seems to be a constructive move for the company. EBay’s current PR team appear to have chosen stonewalling instead of taking advantage of a valuable conduit to their community.”, David Steiner, 28 April 2009

eBay VP Dinesh Lathi did his usual, make a statement with technical holes in it and correct the big gaffe the next day.  Evidence that Dinesh Lathi needs to listen to his fact checking team, or that he needs a better fact checking team.

Now the previous seasoned and battle tested PR hack Hani Durzy might have said, 'VP Dinesh Lathi filled in perceived gaps in the third party checkout announcement. eBay's third party checkout is not going away.' and let the matter drop and be forgotten.

But eBay PR flack Usher Lieberman went above and beyond, stating "publishes something wholly misinformed and just plain wrong" and "No one else here will work with you".  Language not from a professional corporate Public Relations person like Hani Durzy, but language one might hear from a hormonal teenage boy with anger management problems.

As can be seen by the chronology above and below, Dinesh Lathi made the error, not AuctionBytes.  And in a very professional manner Vice President Dinesh Lathi corrected himself.

From a corporate stand point, something this minor should not have The Wall Street Journal taking an interest.

Maybe it's time for eBay Inc to announce that Mr. Lieberman will take extended time off for family matters.

"Smooth move Ex-Lax."
Donna Baumer

* As tempting as it was to use "Spin It Again", the term is overused and we love Casablanca.  And yes we're aware Rick Blaine never said Play it again Sam.

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//  13 April 2009, 1:50 PM HST
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The April 13th email from eBay regarding 3rd party checkout.  Other than the removal of personal data, no changes were made to the original email.

Update your checkout service by June 15

Dear *:

Our records indicate that you?ve recently completed selling transactions through . We?re writing to let you know that as of June 15, will no longer be providing third party checkout service on eBay.

A big step toward reducing unpaid items for sellers is ensuring a secure and consistent checkout experience for buyers. That?s why, in the months ahead, we?ll be working to integrate key functions offered by current third party providers into eBay checkout.

The ultimate goal is to have all checkout and payments take place right on eBay--and to help you make a seamless transition to on-eBay checkout that fully supports your business as usual.

In the interim, as of June 15, sellers will only be allowed to use eBay checkout or third party checkout services offered by one of a select group of approved Certified Providers.

This would be a great time to take a close look at your business needs, and if you haven?t already done so, switch to eBay checkout before June 15.

If you need specific functionality that is not yet integrated into eBay checkout, you can choose a solution offered by a Certified Provider approved for off-eBay checkout.

We?ll keep you updated as new functionality becomes available in eBay checkout. We?ll also make sure you have the time and support you need to make a smooth transition down the road.

Thanks for helping us keep eBay a great place to buy and sell.

Sincerely,



Dinesh Lathi
Vice President, Seller Experience

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//  15 April 2009
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Excerpts from "eBay Eliminates Third-Party Checkout, Impacts ProStores, Vendors" article.

http://www.auctionbytes.com/cab/abn/y09/m04/i15/s01

Auctionbytes-NewsFlash, Number 2020 - April 15, 2009 - ISSN 1539-5065

eBay Eliminates Third-Party Checkout, Impacts ProStores, Vendors
By Ina Steiner
AuctionBytes.com
April 15, 2009

• "eBay will eliminate its Third Party Checkout Redirect on eBay as of June 15, 2009. Sellers who use third-party checkout solutions will no longer have the opportunity to display branding, cross-sell, up-sell and other merchandising opportunities at point-of-sale. This means a loss of sales for sellers and lost revenue for vendors who collect commissions on merchant sales. eBay will do away with third-party checkout completely next year."
• "The elimination of off-eBay checkout is clearly part of the company's move to try and become a marketplace that can guarantee all transactions by collecting information about when buyers pay and when sellers ship. On Tuesday, eBay Director of Seller Development Todd Lutwak told AuctionBytes that, over time, eBay would roll out additional tools and incentives for sellers to provide eBay with shipping information. eBay is also moving toward capturing data from payment services, including the ability to accept merchant credit cards in eBay Checkout. "

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//  15 April 2009, 9:25 AM PST
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http://twitter.com/usherml/status/1526364771

No sooner do I give her props for solid sourcing that she publishes something wholly misinformed and just plain wrong: http://bit.ly/2iD3Pg

9:25 AM Apr 15th from web

usherml

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//  15 April 2009
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http://www.auctionbytes.com/cab/abn/y09/m04/i15/s01

Update 4/15/09: I received an email from eBay spokesperson Usher Lieberman today stating: eBay is narrowing access to third-party checkout to approved providers and has asked these third-party checkout partners to update their user interface or UI to conform with a set of guidelines provided by eBay. This DOES NOT involve any changes to the third-party checkout functionality consistent with eBay listing policies and existing legal agreements, just to the user interface. Some of the approved third-party checkout partners may opt out of these user interface changes, in which case they will need to begin using eBay Checkout.

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//  15 April 2009, 1:00 PM PST
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http://www2.ebay.com/aw/core/200904151259582.html

***Third Party Checkout: Clarification***
April 15, 2009 | 01:00PM PST/PT

Dinesh Lathi

Some blogs have incorrectly reported that eBay is doing away with third party checkout. We want to clarify that this is not the case.

The facts: Beginning June 15, eBay will only allow third-party checkout services from approved providers who have updated their user interface according to a set of eBay guidelines. Our goal is to give buyers a more consistent checkout experience. These guidelines do not involve any changes to functionality that is consistent with eBay listing policies and existing legal agreements.

Some of the current third-party checkout providers may decide to begin using eBay Checkout instead of making user interface changes to their own checkout system. In this case, sellers can continue to use their services.

If you are a seller using a third-party checkout provider, we strongly encourage you to contact your provider about their plans. Most of our approved partners are planning to make the necessary changes to their solution, including: 

• 4Sellers
• Afterbuy
• Auctiva Corporation
• ChannelAdvisor
• Cultuzz Digital Media
• Digital River
• Kyozou
• Sandbourne Systems
• Vendio

To reiterate, we are not eliminating third party checkout on June 15, we are only asking third-party checkout providers to update the user interface.

Please keep in mind that the definitive source of information about eBay is eBay. You can find accurate information about any planned changes through this Announcement Board and through emails, calls and other official communications from eBay.

Sincerely,
Dinesh Lathi
VP Seller Experience

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//  28 April 2009
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Excerpts from "Spin City: eBay Struggles to Control the Message" article.

http://blog.auctionbytes.com/cgi-bin/blog/blog.pl?/pl/2009/4/1240930825.html

Spin City: eBay Struggles to Control the Message
By: David Steiner
Tue Apr 28 2009 11:00:25

• "There was a palpable shift when John Donahoe transitioned into the role of CEO and Jose Mallabo took over as Director of Corporate Communications early last year. In one of his first responses to an inquiry from Ina, Mallabo responded via email, "I will use this as an opportunity to set some expectations moving forward. While we appreciate that these glitches are of great importance to your readers - and we certainly appreciate you drawing our attention to them, we just can't guarantee you a response on absolutely everything. If they are of a size that impacts a critical mass of the community, then we'll put it on the systems board. If not, we will do our very best to track down the answers for you in a reasonable time frame but often times these glitches are so obscure and impossible to replicate that getting answers can take a considerable amount of our team's time." "
• "Interestingly, Mallabo posted a comment from a non-eBay IP address in March of 2008. Shortly thereafter, another post appeared from the same DSL IP address as Mallabo's, but using the name John Rathert (the name of someone listed as a cofounder of his previous business), criticizing another commenter and stating, "You and David are about as big a joke as there is.  Go write about the fuzz in your navels." "
• "In an incident at last year's eBay Live, Ina was pulled aside by Usher Lieberman, a member of eBay's PR team, and was told not to ask about specific user's issues or else she would no longer be granted access to eBay executives. "
• "Ina told Lieberman that if he had a problem working with her, she would happily work with someone else in the PR Department. His response was, "No one else here will work with you, Ina." "

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//  29 April 2009
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Excerpts from "AuctionByte Bites Back at eBay" Wall Street Journal article.

http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2009/04/29/auctionbytes-bites-back-at-ebay

April 29, 2009, 2:26 PM ET

AuctionBytes Bites Back at eBay
By Geoffrey A. Fowler

• "eBay is facing a spat with AuctionBytes, a trade publication about eBay and e-commerce that attracts about half a million visitors to its Web site each month. "
• "In a post titled “Spin City: eBay Struggles to Control the Message” on Tuesday, AuctionBytes president David Steiner wrote that after 10 years covering the company, he has felt a “palpable shift” in eBay’s approach to communications since John Donahoe took office as eBay chief executive last year. "
• "The spat appears to have been most recently instigated by a report that AuctionBytes posted last week about changes to eBay’s third-party checkout system. Ina Steiner felt eBay’s public relations department was unresponsive to her requests for clarification, resulting in a post in which she reported that eBay had “nothing more to say.” "
• "EBay spokesman Alan Marks said his company could have done a better job communicating with its sellers, especially in the first half of last year. But he insisted “nothing has changed” about eBay’s commitment to communicating with sellers since Donahoe became CEO. “If anything, we have become more transparent,” Marks said "

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//  30 April 2009
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Excerpt from "TameBay Morsels 30/04/09" article.

http://www.tamebay.com/2009/04/tamebay-morsels-300409.html#comments

TameBay Morsels 30/04/09
by Chris Dawson

• "Finally those lovely people at eBay seem to have a few differences with the time served Ina Steiner of Auctionbytes. If eBay UK PR are reading this we promise to be nice (even when we disagree with you) in exchange for free listing fees for life (ok I’m joking, fees are so low these days it wouldn’t make much difference anyway, we’ll just carry on saying what we think ) "

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eBay Live! 2008 - Sound of Silence

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9hUy9ePyo6Q
The Sounds of Silence
Simon & Garfunkel

Hello darkness, my old friend
I've come to talk with you again
       http://www.tamebay.com/2008/06/live-day-one-almost-alive.html
Because a vision softly creeping
Left its seeds while I was sleeping
       http://www.matthewbredel.com/207/ebay-live-chicago-day-1-peeved-powersellers.html
And the vision that was planted in my brain
Still remains
       http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T_iW-krg-wI
Within the sound of silence

       http://blog.skipmcgrath.com/public/item/207156
In restless dreams I walked alone
Narrow streets of cobblestone
       http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OXn32LcGPNA
'Neath the halo of a street lamp
I turn my collar to the cold and damp
       http://blog.auctionbytes.com/cgi-bin/blog/blog.pl?/comments/2008/6/1213892402.html
When my eyes were stabbed by the flash of a neon light
That split the night
       http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J75WaLKb2pk
And touched the sound of silence

       http://www.tamebay.com/2008/06/keynote-speech-pictures.html
And in the naked light I saw
Ten thousand people maybe more
       http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-kIUyb0CeEo
       http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OYecfV3ubP8
People talking without speaking
People hearing without listening
       http://www.tamebay.com/2008/06/live-from-the-live-keynote.html
People writing songs that voices never shared
No one dared
       http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PieMBe1ZbrI
Disturb the sound of silence

       http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IHY0r3Sn9rc
"Fools," said I, "you do not know
Silence like a cancer grows
       http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zBX4vRjPHXM
Hear my words that I might teach you
       http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cro1Gp5dTVA
Take my arms that I might reach you"
But my words like silent raindrops fell
       http://blog.auctionbytes.com/cgi-bin/blog/blog.pl?/comments/2008/6/1214065457.html
And echoed in the wells of silence

        http://pages.ebay.com/ebaylive/
And the people bowed and prayed     
        http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q6BeMeF5yvs
To the neon god they made
And the sign flashed out its warning
       http://www.startupnation.com/blogs/index.php/2008/06/21/ebay-live-somebody-get-me-a-helmet/
In the words that it was forming
And the sign said "The words of the prophets are written on the subway walls
       http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-s4jMHe4zo0
And tenement halls
And whispered in the sound of silence
       http://blog.auctionbytes.com/cgi-bin/blog/blog.pl?/comments/2008/6/1214089217.html

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Footnote

http://forums.ebay.com/db2/thread.jspa?threadID=1000722889&tstart=0&mod=1214242018164
eBay Stores Forum
EBAY EMPLOYEES: What Do You Do For A Living?

star138  (5084 )		Jun-23-08 10:26 PDT	18 of 18
The following was posted on the powersellers board. Just when you think it can't...it gets scarier. fyatrading (5389 ) View Listings | Report Jun-22-08 14:40 PDT I just returned from ebay live - lets see if they got the message - but based on my 1 on 1 with Lorrie Norrington. _ they do not understand why some of their best power sellers were telling them they have not had a sale in 30 days - their respone - let us takke a look at your listiing - not a clue BUT at the opening reception with FREE Pizza there were no more than 10 people standing in each line where there should have been thousands- At the closing Gala featuring Chris Issaks - I was able to sit at a front row table for 10 by MYSELF - all the tables around me were occuped by only 1 or 2 people - They had seating for over 10,000 maybe even 15,000-20,000 and when Chris Isaak was playing there were only maybe 200 people in the house standing on the dance floor in a hall that abou 30 big screens so the people way in the back could see - but there were thousands and thosands of empty chairs they had so many tote bags left that every chair at the gala had a tote bag - you got one at check in and were only supposed to get one - BUT they had SOOOO many left they also just opened over 30 cases for people to take what they wanted at the exits - in addition to the 10,000 Plus that were on each chair - which most were empty It was like having Chris Isaaks come to your house for a private show - great for me = BUt did ebay get the message When you walked into the gala all 800 ebay employees there lined a red carpet and cheered you in and wanted to high five evryone - sellers just walked past them and scowled refusing to high five It was a sight to see - and Lorrie was asking why cant we have fun here - GEE you wonder why they have to ask But just Imagine a HUGE hall with tables of 10 for 10,000-20,000 people with only 200 people in the room when the headliner was performing and enough empty seats that every person or couple who wanted to could have a table for them selves EVEN on the FRONT ROW.

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Epilogue

Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
Though wise men at their end know dark is right,
Because their words had forked no lightning they
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright
Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight,
And learn, too late, they grieved it on its way,
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight
Blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

And you, my father, there on the sad height,
Curse, bless me now with your fierce tears, I pray.
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Dylan Thomas

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"It means... I don't take shit from no one"
Thornton Melon (Rodney Dangerfield), Back to School (1986)

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In Memorium - onepreciousplace - Sheryl J. Williams

http://forums.ebay.com/db2/thread.jspa?threadID=2000581525&tstart=0&mod=1212780055228

PILLAGER - Sheryl J. Williams, 55, Pillager, passed away on Wednesday, May 28, 2008. She was born July 29, 1952, in St. Paul to George and Eula (Weaver) Williams.

Sheryl attended Bethel College and St. Cloud State University and received a degree in journalism. She published Precious Insights, a magazine for collectors.

When she stopped publishing her magazine, she went to work for Office Max and later worked for Home Depot.

She is survived by her mother, Eula Williams, Pillager; her brother, Mark (Judy) Williams, Brookings, Ore.; also three nieces and one nephew, one great-niece and two great-nephews; two aunts; and one uncle.

She was preceded in death by her father; and a sister, Marcia.

Services will be held on Monday, June 2, 2008, at 2:30 p.m. at First Baptist Church in Pillager with Pastor Robert Osell officiating. Interment will be in Wildwood Cemetery in Pillager. Friends may call on Sunday from 2-4 p.m. at the Halvorson-Johnson Funeral Home and Cremation Services in Brainerd and one hour prior to the service at the church in Pillager on Monday.

In lieu of flowers, memorials are preferred to the memorial fund of the First Baptist Church in Pillager.

Arrangements are with the Halvorson-Johnson Funeral Home and Cremation Services.

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http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/25/technology/circuits/25powe.html

Sellers also applaud software programs that help them with listings and analysis. Ms. Williams, who specializes in items from the porcelain collection called Precious Moments, said she is a fan of Sellathon, a piece of software that, among other things, highlights which search terms bring traffic.

Now when she writes descriptions for the figurines of shepherds, she knows to include misspellings like "shepard" and "sheperd" in her descriptions. She can't afford to miss a potential buyer becaues her entire income is made on eBay; her elderly mother lives with her and they both rely on it.

Allen Brisson-Smith for The New York Times PACKAGE TRACKING - Sheryl Williams of Pillager, Minn., who sells porcelain figurines on eBay, says she will spend the next several weeks "in a panic."

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http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=200221655376

Precious Moments DEALER ONLY Angels on cloud - RARE! Item number: 200221655376   This item has been added to My eBay for Guests. As a guest, you can:   Track up to 10 items on this computer in My eBay   Receive an email reminder for this item a few hours before it ends

View larger picture Winning bid: US $277.49  0% APR until Jan 2009 - new eBay MasterCard Ended: May-11-08 18:40:54 PDT Shipping costs: Calculate Ships to: United States Item location: Pillager, Minnesota, United States History: 17 bids Winning bidder: yaunkjp( 322) You can also:  Email to a friend Listing and payment details:  HideShow Starting time: May-04-08 18:40:54 PDT Starting bid: US $9.95 This is a Featured Plus! listing Payment methods: PayPal, Personal check, Money order/Cashiers check See details Meet the seller Seller: onepreciousplace( 2190) Feedback: 100 % Positive Member: since Jan-30-98 in United States    See detailed feedback    Ask seller a question    Add to Favorite Sellers    View seller's other items Contact the seller instantly Buy safely 1.   Check the seller's reputation Score: 2190 Positive See detailed feedback 2.   Check how you're protected Up to $2,000 in buyer protection.  See eligibility

Description (revised) Item Specifics - Item Condition Condition: New BUT LOVE GOES ON FOREVER RARE COLLECTORS' CENTER DEALER FIGURINE click picture to enlarge click picture to enlarge This beautiful figurine is much sought after by avid Precious Moments Collectors. The piece was given to Precious Moments Collectors' Centers in 1984 as a gift from Enesco for their participation and sales of the Precious Moments line. The figurine is approximately 9" tall, and came with a walnut base and glass dome for protection. On each base, there was an engraved plaque giving the name of the store which received it. Unfortunately, this gorgeous, mint figurine does not have the dome and walnut base with it, nor does it have its box. The piece is immaculate. I have inspected it with a blacklight to see if there have been any repairs made to it, and there are none - it is clean and perfect. It will be packaged with the utmost care to arrive to the winning bidder in excellent shape. Enesco # E-7350 Title: "But Love Goes On Forever" aka "Dealer's Dome" or "Retailer's Dome" Marking: Cross (only mark) Market Status: 1984 GIFT TO RETAILERS - not intended for resale Size: about 9" high Description: Angel boy and angel girl seated back-to-back on a huge white cloud Medium: Porcelain Bisque Product Type: 9" figurine Box: NO BOX, NO PAPERWORK, NO DOME AND BASE See my other auctions for more great items! PayPal:I accept all forms of PayPal payments. Please remit payment within 3 days of the end of the auction. Money Orders, Cashier's Checks and Personal Checks: Payments must be received within 7 business days of the end of the auction. I am very happy to combine like items to save money in shipping to you. If you are purchasing multiple items, PLEASE do NOT pay for them until you have finished shopping. In that way, I can weigh the items and combine the shipping for you. USPS Priority Mail, Insured, with Delivery Confirmation for the quickest shipping. My goal is to get the treasures you purchase from me to you quickly! I ship Monday through Friday and do my best to ship within 48 hours of receipt of PayPal payment. ALL forms of mail payments will require 7-10 business days to clear the bank before your items will be shipped. Due to so many fake money orders, the bank will no longer accept them as cash - there is a hold on funds until they clear. Your understanding is greatly appreciated! Insurance is required on all fragile items, optional on other items. Auction Templates & Image Hosting - The Seller Sourcebook Copyright 2003 - 2008, Unauthorized Duplication Prohibited txzj pxzj156 txzj5 Powered by eBay Turbo Lister The free listing tool. List your items fast and easy and manage your active items.

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http://forums.ebay.com/db2/thread.jspa?threadID=1000704729&tstart=0&mod=1212758384162

OMG - HELP - I've been bushwacked!
onepreciousplace  (2180 ) View Listings		May-22-08 14:47 PDT
Oh, my goodness - people, what do I do on this one? Last week I sold a big figurine to a guy for almost $300. I packed it with great care and shipped it to him, and just got an e-mail from him claiming I sent him the little version of the figurine, NOT the big one - and I do not and never had had the little version of it. This is a HUGE loss for me, obviously he can zip the hell out of my feedback, and what do I do to prove he didn't get the right thing. God - I have lived in fear for 10 years that something like this would happen, and now it has, when I can least afford it! HELP! eBay Stores Board Biggest Loser Challenge ~ Sheryl ~

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onepreciousplace

 (2180

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		May-22-08 14:50 PDT	2 of 138
It went for 2 pounds, I believe - the smaller one would have gone for 1 pound. Will PayPal buy that? eBay Stores Board Biggest Loser Challenge ~ Sheryl ~

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onepreciousplace  (2180 ) View Listings		May-22-08 14:59 PDT	6 of 138
Well, the timing is perfect on the piece, as I shipped it heavily packed and insured, Priority Mail, from Minnesota to Wisconsin and it left here on Tuesday. I think I will go check his feedback and see if he has bought one of the smaller versions - might be a hint right there. I don't know how PayPal could deal with the situation, because he says he has one thing, and I say I shipped another, and nobody was there to verify from a neutral party on either side, but as the seller, according to all the new eBay/PayPal rules, I lose this one big-time! eBay Stores Board Biggest Loser Challenge ~ Sheryl ~

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onepreciousplace

 (2180

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		May-22-08 15:12 PDT	10 of 138
Oh, I love that! I was thinking since it is porcelain, that when the crap hits the fan, I will tell him that my item is marked with an invisible code where only I can find it, so when he sends it back, it had better be covered by insurance, and that it had better have the # E-xxxx and a correct marking inscribed into the bottom of it. What would be too funny is if he sends it without delivery confirmation and actually sends the real piece back - my luck could NOT be so good! eBay Stores Board Biggest Loser Challenge ~ Sheryl ~

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onepreciousplace  (2180 ) View Listings		May-22-08 16:07 PDT	12 of 138
Yes, you sure better - I am going to go order some as we speak - no more of this crap! I just went to Live Help and they suggested me to leave a detailed message about what I thought was going on to forewarn Trust and Safety, so I did that. Then I went to PayPal and emptied my account. The backup credit card I have on there is maxed, so they cannot charge against that, and it will be awhile anyway. Don't know what this clown is going to do .. . just looked at the text of the auction, and when I listed the size I listed it as "about 9" - good for me - that might tip the scales in my favor, since his bellyache was that it wasn't as big as I said it was. The other one which is a dime a dozen sells here if at all for about $10, and is about 3.5" high - a BIG difference! eBay Stores Board Biggest Loser Challenge ~ Sheryl ~

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onepreciousplace

 (2180

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		May-22-08 16:13 PDT	13 of 138
$3.99 at blacklight.com eBay Stores Board Biggest Loser Challenge ~ Sheryl ~

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onepreciousplace  (2180 ) View Listings		May-22-08 16:23 PDT	15 of 138
I was thinking about being a real poop and telling them that I already spent the money so cannot give them a refund (That is the truth - had to cough up $450 for new glasses today, and that paid for part of it!), so they should break it and claim the insurance on it, since it was insured! Rotten of me, ain't it?!?!?!?! eBay Stores Board Biggest Loser Challenge ~ Sheryl ~

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9*muses  (1 )		May-22-08 17:48 PDT	22 of 138
Wow this really sucks. Your buyer is a power seller and competitor, also has a guide for the figurines. Probably knows the system and would not doubt that you will soon be getting the "I don't want to leave you a negative over this" message. With all these new rules and changes, its no longer going to be a win-win situation for sellers, only for ebay and paypal that get the fees and give away your hard earned money.

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onepreciousplace  (2180 ) View Listings		May-22-08 18:41 PDT	30 of 138
You know, that is precisely what I have always felt - I have met thousands of PM collectors over the years, and 99.999% of them are good eggs - never a problem - always good manners and very appreciative. In fact, the dings I got on my star ratings NONE of them came from PM buyers - all from jigsaw puzzles. This is really a first for me, and I hate the idea of having to mark every d*mned piece, but it is just protection for me. AND, I am going to try it when I get it, but I am going to mark one and then take a pic of it with my blacklight I use to inspect figurines on so it shows, and keep it in my archives for future reference. Part of the problem now, as I see it, is that there are people out there buying PM's with the intention of turning right around and reselling them. I do that myself if it is a BIN on something good and the price is right. Most of these people I've watched, like this one, crash and burn over the years, because they don't know what the heck they're doing. This will probably happen to this one, although the sales they are getting seem to be mostly HUGE size - like 7xl, 6xl clothing, which is hard-to-find. I've been at this for 30 years, published a hobby magazine about it for 10 years, worked for Greenbook price guide for many, many years, spoke at events all around the country - I know my stuff, so they're not dealing with a rookie when they're messing with me. I never intend for that to be a threat, and so far, after all these years, it hasn't needed to be . . . until now. I guess I should be happy that I've enjoyed this monkeybusiness for 30 years without too many bumps in the road, but this one took the cake! Half the people don't even read the descriptions, and now I have one who is nitpicking this one to death, because she claims the piece is 6" tall and I said "almost 9" - it is so rare, who on earth would care? So, I'm gonna take a nap on it for the night, and then decide what to do about it next - she has admitted in the current emails which came within the last hour or so that she did get what I advertised - her only gripe is the size isn't as big as she wants it. Well, last I checked, porcelain figurines are not inflatable, or I could fix that in a heartbeat eBay Stores Board Biggest Loser Challenge ~ Sheryl ~

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onepreciousplace  (2180 ) View Listings		May-22-08 19:17 PDT	35 of 138
Well, I decided, since she has said in the last two e-mails that she has exactly the figurine pictured with exactly the same number on it, and that her only complaint is that it is not exactly 9" tall, I have the evidence needed to support me with PayPal and eBay that she got exactly what she saw. SO - I decided enough was enough, and I emailed her and told her to carefully pack the exact figurine back up in the exact same packaging - the figurine was wrapped in tissue paper, then put in a big, heavy clear bag, which was wrapped around it a couple of times with air in it, then packed inside a box filled with styrofoam peanuts, then inside yet another box. So we shall see what she (turns out to be, I guess) says about that. I told her I would refund her when the figurine arrived back in the exact perfect shape it was depicted in the auction. I did not offer to reimburse her for shipping and insurance in either direction, and if she decides to send it back, I will definitely deduct that from the refund I give her. Way I figure it, if she was that darned fussy, she could have asked for exact measurements right down to the 1/8" - the auction states ask questions, the auction also stated "about 9" tall" - she has no excuses. However, it is a lovely figurine and it doesn't deserve to be in the hands of an idjit, so better that I get it back and sell it to someone with a brain, who will appreciate it than to leave it in the clutches of a dingbat! eBay Stores Board Biggest Loser Challenge ~ Sheryl ~

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onepreciousplace  (2180 ) View Listings		May-22-08 20:27 PDT	38 of 138
Good idea - so far, no response, but I will ask the delivery person to take it back to the po and give me a "hold" slip, and then will go down there in the afternoon and we will open it in front of the postmaster. As luck would have it, the postmaster who we generally have is out on medical leave, and we all have our fingers crossed that he will never come back, and the gal who is running the place now is one sharp gal - she will know exactly what to do with it! I really appreciate the advice and input, and I DO like the idea of MO on items over $100 - great idea! I'm thinking that means that I can still do PayPal for the smaller items, but just change payment formats on the big-ticket items and insist on USPS postal money orders ONLY or they will be returned. You folks are brilliant! THANKS! eBay Stores Board Biggest Loser Challenge ~ Sheryl ~

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onepreciousplace  (2180 ) View Listings		May-24-08 09:58 PDT	43 of 138
Help again - this jerk has now decided after two days of no response, that she is sending back this item for a refund. I shipped it to her via Priority Mail insured, and now she wants to return it to me via UPS. Anyone know if this is against PayPal rules - must be returned in the same manner in which it is shipped, correct? I haven't answered yet on this, but I am VERY upset with this whole transaction, and I hate the way UPS handles small, fragile packages, not to mention that it will take ove a week, instead of 2 days, to get it returned. Help!?!?!?!? eBay Stores Board Biggest Loser Challenge ~ Sheryl ~

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onepreciousplace  (2180 ) View Listings		May-24-08 10:08 PDT	46 of 138
I mentioned above that I had sent a message to Trust & Safety explaining the matter, and it took a couple of days, but they sent me back a very specific letter and told me amongst other things to file a fraud case with the USPS, just like someone here mentioned before. I just e-mailed her and told her absolutely I would NOT accept anything but USPS Priority Mail insured as a return, and if it came back any other way, it would be refused, and there would be no refund. Thankfully, all the communications I have had with this one have been through the eBay e-mail, so they can track each and every bit of this since the onset. This is going to drive me nuts before it is all done. I have to go away for awhile - my John Deere is calling me to race up and down the yard and mow some lawn! eBay Stores Board Biggest Loser Challenge ~ Sheryl ~

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onepreciousplace  (2180 ) View Listings		May-24-08 15:24 PDT	49 of 138
Yes, it was in the listing. AND the buyer, who now claims she collects ONLY figurines that are exactly 9" tall (which there is no such thing - there are very few even close, and 9" is a category, and I did say approximately 9") so this person if she goes by her very strict standards, which she NEVER did e-mail and ask for exact measurements, she doesn't even own any figurines! I have had two other PM experts who sell here look at the auction, and both of them said I couldn't have done a better job of the description if I had tried, and neither one of them would even offer her a refund, because there was no excuse - she either had a change of heart when she got it because of the cost, or she is doing what T&S suspects, and a lot of other people do, as well - a bait and switch - she may be planning on sending back the generic version of this piece which is approximately 3.5" tall in lieu of the one I got. I have a huge e-mail with suggestions from T&S about this, and they include insisting that she ship it back through the post office as it came to her, having the PO keep it at the office, going down with camera in hand (and our PO has one, as well) to open the box and take pics of exactly what comes out of the box. If it truly is a switch, I will immediately file forms for mail fraud, and have the USPS witnesses to prove it.
onepreciousplace  (2180 ) View Listings		May-24-08 15:25 PDT	50 of 138
oops - I meant the one I sent!

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onepreciousplace  (2180 ) View Listings		May-24-08 15:51 PDT	52 of 138
done - and my UPS driver knows us well, so when he stops at the school on Tuesday, he'll find me waiting, as I live right next door, and I'll let him know what's up. I did demand that she send it back Priority Mail insured, just as I sent it, to validate her PayPal transaction, and told her that T&S had told me to tell her that, but so far, no response. I also thought about it for awhile, and sent another e-mail telling me that she needs to write down the exact height and dimensions of the piece, the product number permanently marked on the bottom, and the mark embossed into it. Also must be done before shipping so I know she is sending the correct piece - or at least I have it in writing from her thru eBay!
onepreciousplace  (2180 ) View Listings		May-24-08 20:23 PDT	53 of 138
Well, just came back to my computer to find that this jerk has now filed with PayPal an "item not as advertised" and has not answered the last of my e-mails. In addition, I had transferred money out of my account today, but they froze the transfer - it isn't a large amount of money, and will hardly cover the $277 plus shipping/insurance fees, but nevertheless, even with my 100% feedback and 10+ years on eBay, here we go - so much for them telling the truth on freezing your PayPal account. The interesting thing regarding my PayPal accounts are that the credit cards attached to it have very low minimums, and thanks to a few NPB's from the last couple of weeks, are actually maxed out, including my default card, so unless somehow they can deduct the money from my checking account, I think I am safe until this gets to me from PayPal. Then I am going to forward all of the messages I have received from this creep, including the two that have gone unanswered, and I will pursue the Mail Fraud to the hilt, because now I know for sure this one is absolutely up to no good! If gas weren't so expensive, I would call the cops in Wisconsin and drive over there and show up on the doorstep and have them get the figurine back for me. I really and truly believe this will be the end of me and eBay - they don't do one damned thing to stand behind the sellers, and you know my 100% feedback is going to be trashed, if she hasn't done it already, and I am probably going to lose $300 in the process. I need this like I need another hole in my head (but then, maybe I had one too many for even thinking I could sell on eBay and have things go properly these days!).
onepreciousplace  (2180 ) View Listings		May-24-08 20:39 PDT	54 of 138
Additonal note - I had twelve auctions running which were supposed to end tomorrow night, all with PayPal as an option. I just went to PayPal to read her complaint, and she is insisting that she ship it back UPS and I refused in my comment. She will now probably escalate it to a full-scale war, which is fine with me. Meanwhile, there is a $297 and change freeze on my PayPal account - therefore the reason I cancelled all of my auctions for this weekend. There is no way in H*LL that they are going to get their hands on any of my money until this crook is found out! I tell ya what, folks - you people can have this place - it is for the birds!

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onepreciousplace  (2180 ) View Listings		May-24-08 20:51 PDT	56 of 138
Both buying and selling - just one ID from what I gather - someplace in the 300 feedback and not 100%
homedecorstudios  (23 ) View Listings | Report		May-24-08 21:09 PDT	57 of 138
I am probably going to lose $300 in the process. The customer will have to return something to you to get that refund. At the moment paypal just has it on hold. and she is insisting that she ship it back UPS and I refused in my comment. She can ship in back any way she wants, she is paying for it. Paypal will accept a UPS tracking number. Also if you refuse it you May well lose the item & the cash. So Don't refuse it. There is no way in H*LL that they are going to get their hands on any of my money until this crook is found out! It sounds like a petty Snad complaint, I don't see how that makes the buyer a crook. It's all part of doing business online occasional buyers remorse, damages & Snad complaints. _____________________________________ In a democracy it's your vote that counts; in feudalism, it's your Count that votes.

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onepreciousplace  (2180 ) View Listings		May-25-08 10:35 PDT	64 of 138
Well, the way I figure it, PayPal cannot get any money out of me. The credit card I have on file is maxed, and has a very, very low line of credit. They already tried to do a chargeback against it, and it was rejected. I have no more incoming payments, so they have "captured" the $42 and change in my account as of yesterday, and it is no problem at all to keep that little card charged to the max. I do not have to use PayPal, and I will not use it again until this situation clears in my behalf. And if it doesn't, PayPal and I are just plain done. I have had to file on items before where I didn't get it, but PayPal cannot recover the money, and this might just happen again. The really stupid thing about this is that someone posted a note the other day here how to generate a return shipping label and give the customer the link so they can print it, attach it to the package and mail it. I would have been more than happy to pay for USPS return postage and insurance if she hadn't filed the PayPal against me, but now my PayPal account is locked up, so I can no longer do that. Also - interesting thought chopsueysisters - buys and sells on the same account, so I could become a buyer, then not be able to pay because my PayPal account is locked up, so they will have to wait for their claim to clear before I can pay. Granted, I don't want their junk, it is just wasting more of my money, but the thought has crossed my mind!

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onepreciousplace  (2180 ) View Listings		May-26-08 09:02 PDT	76 of 138
Well, let's see if I can answer all of this . . . I actually went ahead and escalated this claim to PayPal myself yesterday, as it seems that this person has disappeared into the woodwork. I don't want this to drag out any longer than possible, and a day or two days of not getting my figurine back is too many. I explained in some of the information on the PayPal file that this piece is hard-to-find and very fragile, and I am not happy with the idea of shipping UPS, because UPS tells you point-blank that your package had better be done so well that it can withstand dropping from one conveyor belt to another, and also must be strong enough to withstand crushing when they drop a 70-pound package on top of it. With my dumb luck, that is exactly what will happen - and even if they insure it when they ship it, and it ends up broken - then we have another problem in the mix - have to claim insurance and get repaid (is this the responsibility then of the shipper? or do I get stuck with that PIA, also?) I provided scans of two books stating that the piece I shipped was 9". I also provided the fact that this is the 2nd one I have sold, the other being about a month ago, and this buyer had bid and not won the first one, bid and won the 2nd one - multiple bids on both auctions, and never once contacted me to verify that there might not be a typo in the information. I have not yet done it, but will do it today, forward all of the e-mails prior to the filing of the claim with PayPal, because in one of these messages, this buyer admits she has no idea that there are books of information out there about Precious Moments - he/she comes right out and says they are clueless about what they are dealing with and what they are trying to collect. As for returning the money, I had already agreed to take it back and refund the money before the complaint was filed, so other than the fact that I was insisting on a USPS return, I cannot figure why they filed the complaint. Up until that point, things were basically pretty civilized. I noted in my PayPal info that if he/she had not filed the complaint with PayPal and locked up my account, I would have provided a return shipping label with insurance so they could simply have resealed the package, put the new label on it and shipped it back at my expense. However, because my PayPal account is now frozen, I can no longer do that, as far as I know. I don't think you can do that by going directly to USPS and generating the label. There is another thread here where someone posted how to send them the link to print the label without letting them get any of your information, which was what I was intending to do before the complaint was filed. So, this is noted in my PayPal documentation. My big issue is the fact that this person refuses to tell me what they got - I have asked now four times for the product number and the marking on the bottom of the piece, and what they believe the size to be. I'm not sure how PayPal is going to look at that, but it sure looks suspicious to me - that plus the fact that they refuse to ship it back USPS. I do not have the smaller version of the figurine, so there is no possible way I could have sent them that piece. In addition, although they claim they don't collect and don't know a thing about the small pieces in the collection, they actually buy and sell on the same account, and right now they have a very small piece from the Noah's Ark collection up for sale for nearly $100 on a BIN. There is a skunk in the woodpile here someplace, and the bottom line here is a double-whammy, because I am convinced that I am not only going to lose a very valuable figurine (in the price guides at $750, although, as always, a lot less in eBay-land), but that in addition, I will also lose the almost $300 that I was paid for the item. And, to comment about the credit card thing once again, it is a little-known secret, but you can have your credit cards set so that they will reject any and all charges over what your line of credit is - and I have all of mine set that way. I try to be careful and not run mine over, but every now and again I'd goof, and those over-limit fees are a killer, so I have had all of mine fixed. PayPal has already attempted to charge the card to get their money back, because there was only about $43 in my account at the time the chargeback was filed, and it failed. So my account is in a negative balance. As far as them whupping my credit rating, it is in the tank anyway, so that is just a good chuckle for the day! Hope I covered everything - and as someone mentioned 'way back in this thread, when I sell again on eBay, from now on it will be USPS money orders only, or forget it. No more of these people dinging around in my accounts. It will probably slow my sales - what sales there are - but that's the way the old cookie crumbles. eBay does not want us here any more, it is plain to see. Funny thing - had a nice chat with a gal at PayPal regarding this issue, and she was absolutely floored that I cannot leave anything but a positive feedback for this negative buyer! I imagine the people at PayPal really don't have a clue what crap eBay is really up to, but she seemed genuinely shocked that eBay would disadvantage their sellers, who pay the bills (my words, not hers) over the buyers!

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onepreciousplace  (2180 ) View Listings		May-26-08 11:15 PDT	80 of 138
Well, as far as calling him/her - I still don't know, as they never signed anything they ever sent - I am just not going to do it - even if I do get the figurine back that I sent, which I am still in serious doubt, it cost me ALL of the listing fees on eBay for every auction I cancelled, which was a lot and over $50, then I lose all the eBay fees because it was a high-ticket item and listing and FVF are not recoverable when the item is returned. Then, of course, if I've got the guts to do it, I have to once again list it and try to sell it, and it will be awhile before I do that, because if you sell things that are unusual like this, and people watch your listings, they get suspicious that you really didn't sell it the first time, and they start to wonder what you are up to. So there will have to be a waiting period before I would even be able to relist it. I think, however, that I will pull the contact information, because the few times I've ever done that, it is rather amazing how quickly people respond when they know you know where they are, including the phone number. So may try that as a scare tactic. As far as not accepting the package, however it might come back, I told him/her I would refuse if it came UPS, but since I know my driver, I will talk to him and have him make sure he sees the nose on my face on any package he may deliver here. Yes, I think it would be real nice if this person would send back what I sent them, but they are playing it a little too weird here for me to believe that is what they are up to. As an interesting aside to this, I have one of these figurines left - it is piece signed for me by Sam Butcher himself, and I have had it stored downstairs with the bulk of my collection for quite awhile. Not to be whining, but I am handicapped to the point where climbing stairs is next to impossible for me, but this morning, I managed to make my way down those 13 stairs, very carefully, rescued this matching figurine, and brought it upstairs to measure and see how far off my "approximately 9" guestimate was. And they were right - I should not have used what it said in the book, because I believe the number there included the extra height for the dome and the base which it sits on - it is probably more like 6 1/2" high. However, for them to not bother to tell me what the size is after I asked that many times doesn't strike me as acceptable, either. So yes, I goofed, I already said I would take the thing back . . . and so I have learned another thing from eBay auctions - from now on, I won't list any approximate height on the auction. It's obvious the books are wrong on this, I haven't got time to approximately measure each of the 2000 pieces I still have to sell, so I will just wait to see if there are any questions about size and answer them as they arrive.

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onepreciousplace  (2180 ) View Listings		May-26-08 19:12 PDT	85 of 138
Thanks, tired-and-retired for all of that information. Will give me some reading to do, but glad that you and Lisa corrected me on the refund from PayPal - that is good news. I did pull the buyer contact information this afternoon, hoping that it would motivate them into getting moving on this whole thing, but I figure they are either gone or ignoring me at this point. As far as fixing my PayPal account, there frankly is NOTHING I can do about it at this point, so it is going to have to sit until my disability check arrives on the 3rd. I would hope if PayPal is going to have a hissy fit about it, they would at least pick up the phone and call. I have had reason this time, and one other time a month or two ago to actually speak to people at PayPal, and frankly, they have both been very helpful in each situation. I'm hoping their customer service extends to situations like this, as well - and of course, because there is a dispute with this, they certainly have plenty of information to read regarding what has happened. I have not gone back to e-mail them again to tell them what the exact size of the piece is, because I believe that PayPal, because they are claiming "item not as described," yet have provided no information other than that as to their thinking, PayPal is probably at least going to try and find out what their beef is - because they haven't given any reason for this at all. Anyway - one way or another, they will get their money back if I get a box from them - and if it comes empty or otherwise, not a darned thing I can do. If there is any truth to what people say about filing mail fraud claims and that they won't even look at anything for less than $10,000, I can kiss my fanny goodbye on the whole thing. The only thing I can do is hope and pray that they send the piece back that I sent to them, and that it arrives in one piece as I sent it out.

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onepreciousplace  (2180 ) View Listings		May-27-08 10:30 PDT	88 of 138
No automatic withdrawal from eBay for their fees, besides which I don't owe 'em any money at this point. I do have a negative balance on my PayPal account. I think maybe this whole thing might be educational for someone besides me. First of all, as I've mentioned a couple of times, my credit card cannot be charged, because they have already tried it and it was refused. I have it set up with the company - refuse even 1 cent over limit, because I don't want to pay their overlimit fees. The interesting wrinkle for today is that I had about 8 packages to ship, and I always go through PayPal to ship the items so I can get a packing slip to print and write a thank-you note on - that sort of thing. Went to do the first label this morning, and got a message from PayPal that my account was in a negative balance, so not only would they charge the postage fees, but the rest of the balance, as well. It took a bit longer, but I have had an account set up with USPS online forever and a week, so I just moseyed on over there and did my postage for my packages, and that was the end of that. I printed out the page from eBay to send with instead of the normal PayPal packing slip, and all of my items, because they are Priority Mail, get automatic delivery confirmation on them. So, other than the fact that it took a little longer, the packages are done and ready to be picked up by my mailman bright and early tomorrow morning!
onepreciousplace  (2180 ) View Listings		May-27-08 16:19 PDT	89 of 138
Here's something I'm curious about, for those of you who have dealt with messes like this before. I have just now found out, because I actually sorted out the feedback and looked at the items recently purchased and sold very carefully, that this seller told me a very blatant lie - in a statement they sent through eBay, so therefore I have copies in my file, they told me that they ONLY collect 9" pieces. When I looked at their purchasing feedback, they have just recently purchased several figurines which are not anything close to 9" tall - an out and out lie. Then, when I look at their sales, they also are selling items which are in the line which are even smaller than the ones they just purchased. Now my question about this is - how much of this is worth my time to report to PayPal, if any? I did report today that as recommended, I had obtained the buyer's phone number and had called several times without receiving an answer, although I know they were home and/or at their computer, because they listed a couple of items, and when I saw the listings go up, I called - again with no answer. They also have not answered my very polite e-mail asking the status of the figurine, and if they had shipped it today as they had originally promised, and although I can see they are bidding on things and are not too far from their computer, they have not responded to my e-mails, either. I might have bought into the 9" stuff until I took the time to look at what they have been buying, but no more. I think it will take divine intervention for me to get my original figurine back - it is very, very depressing! I even ate chocolate today and blew my diet because it was so bad, and I had a wild cherry freezie from SA, as well and I'm having Subway for supper - with all the trimmings, and to h with Atkins, I'm gonna eat the bread, as well! Pfffftttttt!

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chopsueysisters  (2689 )		Jun-05-08 10:39 PDT	98 of 138
Sheryl (onepreciousplace) passed away sometime last week. The details we know is posted here http://forums.ebay.com/db2/thread.jspa?threadID=2000581525 We go together Like rama lama lama ka dinga da dinga donk Remembered forever As shoo-bop sha wadda wadda yippity boom de boom

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lisasopinion (Private )		Jun-05-08 13:45 PDT	103 of 138
Suzi, I didn't want to say anything about that, but I"m going to say it anyway because I've been thinking about it all day long. I believe that her trouble with paypal and that recent problem ebay transaction with the figurine did play a role in her death. How much of a role, we will never know. Sheryl was the perfect seller, look at her feedback! I think the recent changes and the stress of what paypal did just was too much for her heart to handle. She was so stressed out, we all read it in her posts here. And, all of it was not necessary, thats the worst part of all because she did nothing wrong!!!!!!!!!! But, I believe that if she hadn't been so stressed out about this ebay and paypal stuff she might be alive today. Let this be a warning to all of us. When we are getting too stressed out due to ebay or paypal, then it's time to leave. It's not worth risking your life over.

// eBay's take on the incident.

liljohn254 (193 ) View Listings | Report		Jun-06-08 06:16 PDT	137 of 138
Although she wrote in a public forum, she was a private person. I personally think out of respect to her and her family, this thread should be deleted. After all her family could be reading these posts. The other thread honors her and her love of her product. No need to hash out things that don't need to be.

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APC - eBay boss: "not offering PayPal is like buying heroin"

http://apcmag.com/ebay_boss_not_offering_paypal_is_like_buying_heroin.htm

eBay boss: "not offering PayPal is like buying heroin"

Angus Kidman
06 May 2008

eBay's Australian management held a public meeting for sellers in Melbourne tonight to justify its plans to make PayPal compulsory. Things got nasty. Very nasty.

It took only took four minutes before the booing and hissing began, and not much longer before eBay vice president Simon Smith was comparing people who didn't want to use PayPal to drug addicts. APC was there to give you a blow-by-blow account and pictures from the meeting that saw million-dollar sellers, specialist cake-tin vendors and proud pornography users united in their opposition to eBay's plans.

Shirley looks like your typical well-presented middle-aged suburbanite, and not at all out of place in Preston, a nondescript suburb in Melbourne's north. Her choice of language as she chats with her friends is therefore somewhat surprising.

"For them to spruik on that this is about buyer protection and seller protection is such crap. It's purely about revenue. I'm hoping somebody else brings this up."

They surely will, Shirley. It's a cold Monday night at the Darebin Arts and Entertainment Centre in Preston, and several hundred people have gathered to let eBay know what they think of plans to make the company's own service, PayPal, the only game in town when it comes to making electronic payments on the popular auction site. When the plans were announced in April, a series of meetings was immediately announced, possibly in the hope people might calm down before the changes go through in June (assuming the ACCC doesn't object).

Preston was apparently chosen because a high percentage of local sellers live in this part of Melbourne. At any rate, of the four public meetings being held to discuss the controversial change over the next week or so, this has the largest registration.

After this event, the next major attraction to visit Preston is "Puppetry of the Penis". Even before the meeting proper kicks off, I get the impression quite a few of the attendees wouldn't mind inflicting some genital punishment on eBay senior management.

The company is doing its best to mollify people by offering a wide selection of pre-dinner snacks, including sushi, sandwiches, sausage rolls and samosas. I nibble on these, but can't help wondering how eBay would feel if people interpreted auction ending times as liberally as it interprets the concept of a 6pm start.

At 6:15, harried-looking staff are still putting eBay pens and notepads on seats in the main hall. At 6:17, some of the sandwiches are taken away. "We want to have some food when they come out," an eBay staffer explains to a confused venue manager.

At 6:25, the masses are allowed in, but it's another ten minutes before things finally get going. Frankly, this does not look like a major international company poised for a possibly contentious dispute with its sellers. It looks like opening night for the local school musical.

Eventually, the eBay team -- regional VP Simon Smith, PayPal Australia MD Andrew Pipolo and trust and safety director Alastair MacGibbon -- are brought on stage and seated in front of posters proclaiming "Making eBay even safer" and "practice safe shopping".

Radio presenter Angela Catterns has been drafted in to, as she puts it, act as a "moderator". "Referee!" yells someone from the crowd, setting the pattern for an evening of interruptions and disbelief. "The idea is that Simon will begin with a brief opening address, then we'll be opening the floor to you," Catterns, who proclaims herself a long-time eBay fan, explains.

They came, they heard, they booed

Smith begins by repeating the explanation eBay has been using ever since it announced this change: PayPal is the most popular and safest option for buyers, and keeping buyers happy will ultimately produce more business for everyone. "A happy buyer will spend more for the same item," he said to mild murmurs of disbelief.

"Not only are buyers protected on PayPal to a much higher degree, they're much less likely to have a problem in the first place. It was very hard to justify allowing payment through other relatively unsafe mechanisms." That mention of unsafe mechanisms earns Smith his first genuine boos, just four minutes into the presentation. "It does require some adjustment, some change and change is generally uncomfortable," he continues over the grumbles.

Then the open mic session begins. "Keep it nice, keep yourselves nice," Catterns says to the restive crowd. "This is not an abuse session, it's a Q&A session and I'd appreciate it if you would approach it in that manner."

The questions in fact start relatively benignly, with a seller asking if we'll see local versions of the PayPal debit card found in the US (no plans, says Pipolo) and if the mechanism found Stateside which allows buyers to pay postage charges directly from their PayPal account will be made available here.

That option is a possibility, according to Smith. "That's something we would like to offer in Australia; we trying to figure how to do that from a product engineering perspective. Postage is one of our focuses at the moment." The next questioner wants to know if goods from overseas sellers who don't offer PayPal will appear on the local site (no, but you can always cheat by using non-Australian eBay site addresses like ebay.de).

But then the narkiness really starts. The next man applauds the company's gumption for holding the meetings at all -- "I think it's very brave of you, there's clearly a lot of vocal opposition" -- but then well and truly sticks the knife in by noting that Smith's opening spiel mentioned buyers 21 times and sellers just four times. Are there any plans to compensate sellers for the costs they'll face in making the changes and paying extra fees?

Smith's answer is, by eBay standards, quite direct. "You guys are our customers, you pay the fees -- but what you're paying for are buyers. You're paying for the five out of six Australian online shoppers that come to eBay every month. We need to focus very hard on making sure that the buyers have a good experience. That's why we have an emphasis on the buyers. And we think that the PayPal fees offer good value." That last remark earns Smith another round of protracted booing.

Another speaker says that since the changes were announced, his sales have dropped by a third. "You're forcing us as sellers to look at other marketplaces." That comment gets a cheer. Smith responds quickly: "We've not seen any decline since we made the announcement." With that, the boos return as loud as ever.

"Unsafe choices"

A common theme from many sellers is that, contrary to eBay's claims, PayPal is the most troublesome payment mechanism they've encountered. One seller with 4500 transactions on her record says that her most recent experience with PayPal resulted in an unjustified chargeback. Why on earth should she believe that she's four times safer with PayPal, as eBay claims?

Alastair MacGibbon, who seems to specialise in tortured analogies after a recent clanger on A Current Affair relating to seatbelts, is quick to respond. "I cross against the lights occasionally and I've never been hit by a bus, but that doesn't mean it's a good idea." Predictably, that gets an even louder boo, making the generally unflappable MacGibbon almost lose his cool. "You can boo and hiss all you like, I can just tell you the simple facts."

Unbelievably, though, this isn't the most ill-thought-out analogy of the evening. After some unresolved arguments over the size of fees and whether eBay deliberately makes it hard for people to exchange bank details, a speaker pipes up just after 7pm with the core question of the evening: "How come we are now longer able to offer freedom of choice to our buyers?"

Smith first points out that most ecommerce sites don't offer the luxury of choosing between a bank payment and a credit card, but that fails to quiet the restive crowd. "What about democracy?" someone yells out. Smith's next response is perhaps not the wisest under the circumstances: "We're not allowing people to offer unsafe choices, just like in this democracy you can't go out and buy heroin on the streets." Telling customers who care enough about your company to attend a public meeting about its future that their rejection of a payment system makes them the moral equivalent of drug addicts is not likely to endear you to them, we'd have thought, but then we are but lowly journalists -- not masters of the online auctioneering universe.

Porn and piñatas

A welcome moment of comic relief comes when an older gentleman in a long jacket explains that he wants to be able to make purchases which will arrive at his house in a "plain brown wrapper" without the details appearing on his credit card, lest his wife sees them. Amidst so much corporate spin, having a proud pornography user explain why PayPal isn't always a good idea is a welcome relief. Why shouldn't buyers like himself have a choice, he asks? "If they wish to take the risk, be it on their own heads." Smith's response is predictably unpopular: "The issue is people don't make an informed choice."

Pipolo concurs with the next questioner than the policy of enforcing PayPal but allowing buyers who pick up goods in person to pay in cash has created a rather large loophole in the company's buyer protection scheme. "It is something we are looking at -- I agree, it's an anomaly."

To avoid getting hit with chargebacks for undelivered goods under the buyer protection scheme, sellers must be able to provide proof of postage, but one seller complains that no-one at eBay customer service seems to be able to say what constitutes effective proof. Using registered post is apparently the answer, but how is that supposed to work for volume sellers who have parcels picked up directly? For large sellers, eBay is considering introducing some sort of "courtesy credit program" to recognise that a fraudulent non-delivery is unlikely, Pipolo tantalisingly suggests, though he offers no further details.

Our old friend Shirley stands up, and says that she willingly acknowledges that eBay has a business imperative: why can't the company? "You are all about increasing your revenue. Be honest about it!"

Her question (Catterns has become a tad frustrated at the number of people offering criticisms rather than asking questions) is whether this approach will go worldwide. Smith again regurgitates the company line that this is an Australia-only scheme but may be copied in other countries.

The next questioner, Steve, says that he makes a million dollars a year in eBay sales and pays more than $100,000 in fees. "Things have been good for me, but I fear that eBay's going to take a turn for the worse. There's going to be a change."

His question also touches on a recurring theme for the evening: most sellers haven't experienced the claimed four-times-as-many-problems-with-other-payment-methods that eBay constantly proclaims. Why is the typical seller experience so much different to what eBay says is the norm? eBay’s answer -- possibly accurate but hardly satisfying to this crowd -- is that their individual customer sample size isn't big enough to be representative.

Many of the question askers have seemed upset, but for sheer frustration, the tale of the cake tin takes some beating. A woman who specialises in selling cake tins recounts angrily how she was hit by a chargeback fee from a German buyer who purchased a tin but claimed to eBay that she never received her "piñata". Not only was the claim unjustified, she said, but eBay charged her $25 simply to allow her to appeal the claim.

The collected eBay executives deny all knowledge of any fees associated with disputes, though several people sitting near me are quick to proclaim "That's happened to me too". MacGibbon suggests the case of the piñata and the cake tin should be reopened for investigation and asks that she talk to someone outside afterwards. But the management collective fail to satisfy her with an answer to her other question: "Why can't I service [non-PayPal customers] just because you tell me I can't?"

By now, most pretence of asking questions has disappeared. "The problem may be you don't trust your buyers and sellers, another seller announces. "You're treating us like little children. We've got an independent adjudicator here tonight, but that's about the only independence I've ever seen at eBay. You hide your customer service line!"

With just five minutes to go, Smith makes a belated appeal to the collected mob, acknowledging that they are unlikely to be a massive source of fraudulent transactions. "The problem is not the people in this room -- the problem is the thousands of people not in this room. We've had to make hard choices to protect the people in this room."

He also acknowledges that this may impact the size of eBay's community, but once again rules out any fee changes. "In the short term at least I think we'll probably take a hit, but we have no plans to change our pricing. We believe that the sellers will see a healthier, faster more vibrant growing business in the long term, and that is their reward." And then, after less than an hour of questions, it's over.

Presumably nobody was assuming that this evening would go quietly. Anyone who cares enough about eBay payment options to go to a Monday night meeting was unlikely to feel neutral about the subject. But eBay probably didn't help its cause by consistently failing to offer a justification for reducing choices for sellers and buyers, beyond offering its standard and tired line about security. It also needs to give up on the analogies to "help" customers understand why they need extra PayPal fees foisted on them -- they come across as either ridiculous or insulting.

Shirley certainly would take a lot more convincing. "They can lose 25% of their customers and their attitude will be 'who cares?', because they stand to gain so much more in financial terms," she'd remarked before the event got underway. Somehow, I doubt anything that got said would have changed her mind -- or anyone else's.

   

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Waltzing Matilda

Once a jolly swagman camped by a billabong,
Under the shade of a coolibah tree,
And he sang as he watched and waited 'til his billy boiled
"Who'll come a-Waltzing Matilda, with me?" Waltzing Matilda, Waltzing Matilda
"You'll come a-Waltzing Matilda, with me"
And he sang as he watched and waited 'til his billy boiled,
"You'll come a-Waltzing Matilda, with me". Down came a jumbuck to drink at the billabong,
Up got the swagman and grabbed him with glee,
And he sang as he stowed that jumbuck in his tucker bag,
"You'll come a-Waltzing Matilda, with me". Waltzing Matilda, Waltzing Matilda
"You'll come a-Waltzing Matilda, with me"
And he sang as he stowed that jumbuck in his tucker bag,
"You'll come a-Waltzing Matilda, with me". Down came the squatter, mounted on his thoroughbred,
Up came the troopers, one, two, three,
"Who's that jolly jumbuck you've got in your tucker bag?"
"You'll come a-Waltzing Matilda, with me". Waltzing Matilda, Waltzing Matilda
"You'll come a-Waltzing Matilda, with me"
"Who's that jolly jumbuck you've got in your tucker bag?",
"You'll come a-Waltzing Matilda, with me". Up got the swagman and jumped into the billabong,
"You'll never catch me alive", said he,
And his ghost may be heard as you pass by that billabong,
"Who'll come a-Waltzing Matilda, with me?" Waltzing Matilda, Waltzing Matilda
Who'll come a-Waltzing Matilda, with me
And his ghost may be heard as you pass by that billabong,
"Who'll come a-Waltzing Matilda, with me?"

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eBay World_Securities

The eBay Shopping.com Affair Part Deux

The eBay Shoping.com Affair Part Deux

By Event Horizon
1 May 2008 Edition
Revision: 2 May 2008 12:21 HST

This is a short follow up to our previous articles about the faux sdc_prod listings.

• The eBay Shopping.com Affair
  15 March 2008
  http://eventhorizon1984.typepad.com/event_horizon_1984_blog/2008/03/internet-transa.html

• From eBay Seller Central - Ebay is padding their listings
  1 March 2008
  http://eventhorizon1984.typepad.com/event_horizon_1984_blog/2008/02/from-ebay-sel-1.html

Our research indicates between 161 thousand and half-a-million faux listings were posted on eBay, by eBay, that Leap day weekend.

eBay's official statement regarding the faux listings of 29 February 2008:
"Some Shopping.com listings appeared accidentally on eBay.com over the past two days. This system issue has been resolved. We apologize for any confusion or inconvenience this may have caused."
eBay, 2 March 2008

Apology accepted, BUT sorry eBay. Those listings appear to be making a comeback.

Or never left, since we've been receiving regular "eBay Item Ending" emails for all sdc_prod* listings we put on a watch list. 

Since March 2008.

1 May 2008

There are 10,001 fake listings for seller sdc_prod_9074_35
http://cgi6.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewListedItems&userid=sdc_prod_9074_35&sort=3&page=40&rows=50&since=30&rdir=0

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There are 754 fake listings for seller sdc_prod_9391_43
http://cgi6.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewListedItems&include=0&since=-1&rdir=0&rows=25&userid=sdc_prod_9391_43

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There are 10,001 fake listings for seller sdc_prod_442675_57
http://cgi6.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewListedItems&include=0&since=-1&rdir=0&rows=25&userid=sdc_prod_442675_57

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There are 10,001 fake listings for seller sdc_prod_90076
http://cgi6.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewListedItems&userid=sdc_prod_90076&sort=3&page=1&rows=25&since=-1&rdir=0

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Apparently if one uses a non-eBay expected method to obtain a product list, you'll see the faux listings.

And do keep in mind that this method used to print out products has a limit of, you guessed it, 10001. It is highly probably that the sellers showing "10001" have more than ten-thousand-one items.

For perspective, here are the fake listing counts taken during the Leap Day 'test, accident, glitch'.

• 21,481 - sdc_prod_9074_35
• 11,102 - sdc_prod_9391_43
• 4,702 - sdc_prod_442675_57
• unknown - sdc_prod_90076

There are three interesting points about all this.

1. These products are hidden in a standard search. But show up as valid listings using different methods.
2. The number of listings or count is obtainable, and presumably ends up in various auction count tallies. By inference, listing counts eBay included in their report to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.
3. Has anyone given any thought to how much each faux listing adds to eBay's GMV (Gross Merchandise Value) total? Ten's of millions of dollars? Hundred's of millions of dollars? Enough to show a significant quarter to quarter increase?

Final questions. Are there more of these? And how long before eBay hides them even better?

Here's a list of the sellers reported to have faux February 29th listings.

1. sdc_prod_301013_74  The Twister Group
2. sdc_prod_305839_99  BargainBasementBatteries
3. sdc_prod_310426  ANTOnline
4. sdc_prod_409455_97  Sababa Shopping
5. sdc_prod_434012  SpectrumSuperStore
6. sdc_prod_442675_57  Boyne & Kelly L.L.C.
7. sdc_prod_9021_2  Buy.com
8. sdc_prod_9055  Focus Camera
9. sdc_prod_9074_35  pcRUSH.com
10. sdc_prod_9074_47  pcRUSH.com
11. sdc_prod_9090  CompSource Inc.
12. sdc_prod_9124_14  TheNerds, Inc.
13. sdc_prod_9352_67  Digital Foto Club
14. sdc_prod_9391_43  Adorama
15. sdc_prod_9452  eTronics, Inc.
16. sdc_prod_90076  OnlineSports, Inc.

Have fun looking.

But be quick, because eBay or that nasty eBay Glitch will hide them again.

Copyright © 2008 Event Horizon, Established 1984

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Craigslist - Kettles and Pots

http://blog.craigslist.org/2008/05/kettles-and-pots/

Kettles and Pots

Although our response to each of Ebay’s unfounded claims will have to wait, it’s worth pointing out that Ebay is suing us for implementing protections for craigslist that it clearly believes are perfectly appropriate for protecting itself, for example:

1. Ebay is suing us for implementing a shareholder rights agreement, which it has called a “poison pill”. Here is a 2004 filing by Ebay regarding an increase in authorized shares, which it reserves the right to use for the purpose of implementing a poison pill:

http://sec.edgar-online.com/2004/05/17/0000950134-04-007721/Section9.asp

2. Ebay is suing us for offering each of our shareholders the opportunity to exchange their shares for an incrementally larger number of shares bound by a “right of first refusal” agreement, whereby shares must be offered to craigslist on the same terms offered to any other potential acquirer. It had previously insisted that craigslist shareholders be bound by a right of refusal agreement, and has from time to time bound shareholders of Ebay and its various subsidiaries by right of first refusal agreements.

3. Ebay is suing craigslist for implementing an indemnification agreement, which calls for craigslist to pay legal fees for craigslist directors and officers should they be sued individually in the course of their duties. Here is a 1998 filing by Ebay regarding a similar indemnification agreement for its own directors and officers;

http://www.secinfo.com/dut49.71xp.7.htm#1stPage

4. Ebay is suing us for implementing staggered board elections. Here is a 1999 filing by Ebay indicating that Ebay itself is no stranger to staggered board elections:

http://sec.edgar-online.com/1999/04/20/16/0001012870-99-001210/Section5.asp

This entry was posted on Thursday, May 1st, 2008 at 1:57 pm and is filed under Legal.

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The eBay Shopping.com Affair

The eBay Shopping.com Affair
aka "The eBay Leap Day Auction Count Affair"
aka "The eBay SDC_PROD Affair"

By Event Horizon
Ides of March Edition, 15 March 2008
Revision: 2 April 2008 00:01 HST

"It's always difficult to keep personal prejudice out of a thing like this. And wherever you run into it, prejudice always obscures the truth. I don't really know what the truth is. I don't suppose anybody will ever really know."
Juror #8, Twelve Angry Men (1957)  

The Leap Day weekend brought with it an extra day of buy and selling on eBay. It also ushered in an interesting event. A number of listings from Shopping.com, an eBay company, ended up on eBay.com. Counted in the hundreds of thousands these product listings were viewable on eBay.com, but not buyable.

In short an event that AuctionBytes would characterize as eBay Mystery Listings.

This was an event that had ample room for opinions. Aside from the fact that the average eBay buyer could not buy these products, there was the question of did these listings affect the auction counts? An important question as eBay provides those listing counts in their many reports to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.

Opinions ranged from an eBay Forum poster describing the event as "Ebay is padding their listings", to Randy Smythe of My Blog Utopia! stating "this padding of listings is a non-starter."

All this would definitely pique the curiosity of anyone interested in eBay. For about 5 seconds. Because all the relevant data is spread across Google, or deleted, archived, horded, and just plain not in one place for quick perusal. End 5 seconds.

We're going to attempt to put a smidgen of all that happened in this article. And over time expand the article slightly to accommodate new found pieces.

Before we begin, changing the subject slightly, you're wondering why the style of the title sounds oddly familiar? We were inspired by eBay, with their one mini-smidgen contribution.

• "Agent Sent Message", ebay Customer Service, 1 March 2008

Cue theme. Run introduction. Roll article.

Prologue. Internet transations are perishable and human memories short.

"people simply remember a version of events which makes as much sense as they require it to make"
Douglas Adams, Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency (1987)

This article should not be considered a complete rendering of the Leap Day (2/29/2008) weekend events or a tome with all the available data. It is meant to give a relatively quick overview of the situation, and provide leads for those who wish to pursue more in depth study.

I. How many listings were involved?

"It was an accident" Captain James Kirk
"You seem to have a lot of them." Captain John Christopher
Star Trek, Tomorrow Is Yesterday (26 January 1967)

Do Listing Counts Matter?

Let's start with the simple matter of, does it matter at all? The answer is, Yes.

Listing counts are important to eBay, as the figures are reported to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.

Reference the "23-Jan-2008" "Form 8-K for EBAY INC" "Results of Operations and Financial Condition, Financial Statements and Exhibits" report.

• In the "Unaudited eBay Marketplaces Supplemental Operating Data" section is "Number of New Listings (2)" with the definition "(2) Listings on eBay Marketplaces trading platforms during the quarter, regardless of whether the listing subsequently closed successfully."

Listing counts are important to eBay, as they are mentioned in the report to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.

Reference the "29-Feb-2008" "Form 10-K for EBAY INC" "Annual Report".

• In the "Key Operating Metrics and Financial Information" section (emphasis ours) eBay states , "Members of our senior management team regularly review key operating metrics such as active users, listings".
• Further, "These financial measures allow us to monitor the profitability of our business and to evaluate the effectiveness of investments that we have made (and continue to make) in the areas of marketing, product development, international expansion, customer support and site operations. We believe that an understanding of these key operating and financial measures and how they change over time is important to investors, analysts and other parties analyzing our business results and future market opportunities."
  
• In the "Financial Summary" section (emphasis ours) eBay states, "we face challenges in the U.S., U.K. and Germany, which are our three largest markets, as growth of listings, active users and GMV on the eBay.com platform in those countries has slowed."
• In the "Results of Operations" section eBay has the metric "Number of listings (3)" with the definition of the metric being "(3) Listings on eBay Marketplaces trading platforms during the period, regardless of whether the listing subsequently closed successfully."

The fact that eBay has the subject of "listings" in their official reports, belies pundits claims that the listing counts are of no concern.

Those who proffer the specious argument that the amounts involved are small and therefore inconsequential, must not deal often in large real world real time computer systems. Let's propose the scenario that someone or some group accidentally dumps a quarter million to a half million database TEST records into a PRODUCTION system. This same person or group then tells people in authority nonsense such as 'it's 35 thousand Usher'.

This is what those people would hear in the real world:

• "You're Fired!", Donald Trump

eBay's official position on the number of listings.

• eBay - Listings erroneously placed on eBay.com: 35,000

"An eBay spokesman told PC Magazine at the time that 5,000 shopping.com listings were erroneously placed on ebay.com. After sellers expressed doubt about that number in the comments section, eBay was asked to again confirm that it was indeed 5,000. The same spokesman responded Friday that he had originally told PC Magazine that eBay pulled 35,000 listings, but a review of the interview confirmed that he said 5,000."
PC Magazine, 10 March 2008

• 4 March 2008 - "5,000 shopping.com listings were erroneously placed on ebay.com"
• 7 March 2008 - "eBay pulled 35,000 listings"
• 10 March 200 - "a review of the interview confirmed that he said 5,000"

{eBay, Usher} "Lieberman said fewer than 35,000 listings were affected by the glitch".
AuctionBytes, 5 March 2008

Usher Lieberman is eBay's Spokesman, and is not an integral part of eBay's programming departments. He reports to the press what he's told.  In the matter of contradictory statements or "false and misleading statements to the press" [SEC], the original source of the "5,000" and "35,000" counts should be investigated.

 

Our research regarding the listing counts during the February 29th Leap Day weekend. 

• Total Listings, Hard Count: 
  • 161,358 to 192,966 (161,358 + 31,608) to 241,368 (161,358  + 80,000)
• Total Listings, Soft Count:
  • 271,280 to 302,888 (271,280 + 31,608) to 351,280 (271,280 + 80,000) 
• Estimated Listings Count: 500,000 (rounded)

Total Listings Hard Count Methodology.

The "Hard Count" represents the total number of auction listings confirmed by screen shots, archives, and reported by AuctionBytes. In theory the Hard Count should equal or be close to the Soft Count. But in practice it is not an easy task to collect hard evidence, from multiple witnesses, after the fact.

The  31,608 figure derives from the AuctionBytes observation that "indicated the seller had over 80,000 listings on eBay.com."

AuctionBytes does not reveal the identity of that seller. Making it possible that the seller with "80,000" items is part of the list of observed sellers. The 31,608 figure is derived from taking "80,000" and subtracting the largest listing count reported, which is 48,392. In this way listing counts are not added in twice.

In other words, if the seller with item count of "48,392" (part of the observed list of sellers) actually has "80,000" items, the total should be 161,358 + 31,608. The  31,608 being the uncounted part of the "80,000" (80,000 - 48,392). The 31,608 can increase to a maximum of 80,000, depending on who the seller is or is not.

For instance in the case of this seller not being on the reported list of 14 sellers, the soft count would be 161,358 plus  80,000 or 241,368.

There is also the case of the count from AuctionBytes being completely wrong; 0 items.

The Hard Count ranges from a minimum of 161,358 items, to a maximum of 241,368 items.

Total Listings Soft Count Methodology.

The "Soft Count" represents the total number of auction listings reported, but not necessarily verified by screen captures, etc.. The figure of 271,280 is the lower limit of those reported observations. As in the Hard Count, the 31,608 figure derives from the AuctionBytes observation that "indicated the seller had over 80,000 listings on eBay.com."

The observed Soft Count ranges from a minimum of 271,280 items, to a maximum of 351,280 items.

Estimated Listing Count Methodology.

Using the Medved "EBay Auction Counts: February 24, 2008 to March 1, 2008" chart, an estimate can be made as to the number of listings removed.

eBay stipulated two things:

• That the problem started "Friday night".
  
• That by March 2nd the "system issue has been resolved", i.e. the "accidental" listings were completely removed.

Logically we're looking for an increase and subsequent rapid decrease of at least 161,358 (Hard Count) listings and up to 351,280 (Soft Count), during the weekend time frame.

As it turns out there is just such an occurrence. There is an auction count spike in the auction count beginning at about the "2/29" (09:00 PM PST, Midnight EST) line and ending at about the "3/2" (09:00 PM PST, Midnight EST) line. From a graphing standpoint this increase conveniently begins after a relatively flat period of auction listings.

That would be approximately 13,900,000 (peak) - 13,400,000 (base) = 500,000 listings

• 13,393,000 28-FEB-2008 04:30 AM PST, 07:30 AM EST. Initial low point;   base.
• 13,910,000 29-FEB-2008 10:00 AM PST, 01:00 PM EST. Peak
• 13,454,000 01-MAR-2008 07:00 PM PST, 10:00 PM EST. Lowest point of the   day.
• 13,410,000 02-MAR-2008 02:32 PM PST, 05:32 PM EST. eBay announces "system issue has been resolved".
• 13,333,000 02-MAR-2008 08:00 PM PST, 11:00 PM EST. Lowest point of the day and weekend.

http://www.medved.net/cgi-bin/cal.exe?EIND  Chart times are Eastern Standard Time (EST).

Using Randy Smythe's 13.5 million average daily auction listings as a measure, the half-a-million auction listings represents 3.7% of the daily total. A significant amount as far as the report by eBay's Accountants to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission is concerned.

Is There More?

The question arises, were there more "test" listings. Our answer is, you are free to ponder this question.

But think about this. eBay held a listing special beginning on March 1st. Historically auction counts rise during a listing special. Typically a million or more. How many listings would have to be removed to not only negate the expected listing count increase, but cause the count to fall?

And ponder this too. As a matter of good business, eBay does put back listings removed in error. Such an increase due to putting back deleted listings would show up much later on Medved ("EBay Auction Counts: March 2, 2008 to March 8, 2008"). Abet buried in subsequent listing specials and promotions.

http://www.medved.net/cgi-bin/cal.exe?EIND  Chart times are Eastern Standard Time (EST).

eBay's 2008 Q1 (1st Quarter, January 01 to March 31) report to the U.S. Security and Exchange Commission should be interesting.

II. SDC_PROD Seller List and Counts

"The world isn't run by weapons anymore, or energy, or money. It's run by little ones and zeroes, little bits of data. It's all just electrons." Cosmo, Sneakers (1992)

We believe that none of the Shopping.com sellers were aware their items were being transferred to eBay.com. As stipulated by eBay,  "Shopping.com listings appeared accidentally on eBay.com". It would be an interesting exercise to find out if the involved Shopping.com sellers were billed eBay.com listing fees at the time, and then credited afterwards.

SDC_PROD Seller List

This is a list of the fourteen (14) "sdc_prod" (shopping dot com) seller accounts that were located and reported, 29 February to 1 March 2008. Plus additional sdc_prod sellers that were located post event.

This list contains:

• A brief description of the seller.
  
• A link to the seller's eBay.com Feedback page.
  
• A link to the current number of items by the sdc_prod seller.
• A link to search Google for the specific sellers.
  • That link can help you perform a search of the Google archives for sdc_prod related material. Use the "repeat the search with the omitted results included" option to maximize the available data.
  • On Google links to eBay.com or ebay.auction.co.kr use the "Cached" link to obtain the archived data.
  • Because this issue involves eBay.com, ignore eBay Express references.
  • And be quick because the Google archive cache data  is dynamic; changing from day to day. 
• The "reported listing count" of items by sdc_prod name seller on eBay.com. As reported 29 February to 1 March 2008. And where available.
• Links to screen captures of these auction counts. Where available.

The total count from the screen captures, 161,358, is evidence that eBay Spokesman Usher Lieberman  made a number of "false and misleading statements to the press" when he said on multiple occasions   that "5,000 listings" or "35,000 listings" were involved.

Time permitting, this section will be updated.

* sdc_prod_301013_74 
Shopping.com seller The Twister Group
Member since Oct-18-06 in Illinois, United States 

• Feedback sdc_prod_301013_74
• Products on eBay.com from sdc_prod_301013_74
• Search Google for sdc_prod_301013_74

  eBay.com reported listing count, 27,291

"27076 items found" ( LINK Google archive screen capture )
"27076 items found" ( LINK screen capture from www.suspendedfromebay.com )
"27076 items found" ( LINK screen capture from www.companyexposed.com )
"27076 items found" ( LINK screen capture from pages.suddenlink.net/docswife )

* sdc_prod_305839_99
Shopping.com seller BargainBasementBatteries
Member since Oct-30-07 in California, United States

• Feedback sdc_prod_305839_99
• Products on eBay.com from sdc_prod_305839_99
• Search Google for sdc_prod_305839_99

  eBay.com reported listing count, 56

"56 items found" ( LINK screen capture from www.giovanni666.info )

* sdc_prod_310426
Shopping.com seller ANTOnline
Member since Feb-15-08 in Georgia, United States

• Feedback sdc_prod_310426
• Products on eBay.com from sdc_prod_310426
• Search Google for sdc_prod_310426

  eBay.com reported listing count, 21,798

"21798 items found" ( LINK screen capture from www.youtube.com/watch?v=mePI-UWDGOE )
"21798 items found" ( LINK screen capture from forums.ebay.com, www.suspendedfromebay.com, Google archive )

* sdc_prod_409455_97
Shopping.com seller Sababa Shopping
Member since Jul-16-07 in New York, United States

• Feedback sdc_prod_409455_97
• Products on eBay.com from sdc_prod_409455_97
• Search Google for sdc_prod_409455_97 

  eBay.com listing reported count unavailable

* sdc_prod_434012
Shopping.com  seller SpectrumSuperStore
Member since Apr-11-07 in California, United States

• Feedback sdc_prod_434012
• Products on eBay.com from sdc_prod_434012 
• Search Google for sdc_prod_434012

  eBay.com reported listing count, 35,002

"35011 items found" ( LINK screen capture from www.giovanni666.info )
"34998 items found" ( LINK screen capture from thevirginmarypretzel )
"Up to 10,000 listings can be displayed in this view" ( LINK screen capture from www.companyexposed.com )

* sdc_prod_442675_57
Shopping.com seller Boyne & Kelly L.L.C.
Member since Oct-25-07 in New Jersey, United States

• Feedback sdc_prod_442675_57 
• Products on eBay.com from sdc_prod_442675_57 
• Search Google for sdc_prod_442675_57

  eBay.com reported listing count, 4,702

* sdc_prod_9021_2
Shopping.com seller Buy.com
Member since Feb-22-08 in California, United States

• Feedback sdc_prod_9021_2
• Products on eBay.com from sdc_prod_9021_2 
• Search Google for sdc_prod_9021_2

  eBay.com reported listing count, 12,233

"12233 items found" ( LINK screen capture from www.youtube.com/watch?v=mePI-UWDGOE )
"12233 items found" ( LINK screen capture from img255.imageshack.us )

* sdc_prod_9055
Shopping.com seller Focus Camera
Member since Oct-30-07 in New York, United States

• Feedback sdc_prod_9055 
• Products on eBay.com from sdc_prod_9055
• Search Google for sdc_prod_9055

  eBay.com reported listing count, 1,925

* sdc_prod_9074_35
Shopping.com seller pcRUSH.com
Member since Feb-28-08 in California, United States

• Feedback sdc_prod_9074_35 
• Products on eBay.com from sdc_prod_9074_35 
• Search Google for sdc_prod_9074_35

  eBay.com reported listing count, 21,401

"21481 items found" ( LINK Google archive screen capture )
860 pages, 25 items per page. 859 x 25 = 21,475 items ( LINK Google archive screen capture )
"Up to 10,000 listings can be displayed in this view" ( LINK screen capture from www.suspendedfromebay.com )

* sdc_prod_9090
Shopping.com seller CompSource Inc.
Member since Mar-26-07 in Ohio, United States

• Feedback sdc_prod_9090 
• Products on eBay.com from sdc_prod_9090 
• Search Google for sdc_prod_9090 

  eBay.com reported listing count, 32,601

"32601 items found" ( LINK Google archive screen capture )
1301 pages, 25 items per page. 1300 x 25 = 32,500 items ( LINK Google archive screen capture  )

* sdc_prod_9124_14
Shopping.com seller TheNerds, Inc.
Member since Dec-12-07 in Florida, United States

• Feedback sdc_prod_9124_14
• Products on eBay.com from sdc_prod_9124_14
• Search Google for sdc_prod_9124_14

  eBay.com reported listing count, 48,392

* sdc_prod_9352_67
Shopping.com seller Digital Foto Club
Member since May-28-07 in New York, United States

• Feedback sdc_prod_9352_67
• Products on eBay.com from sdc_prod_9352_67
• Search Google for sdc_prod_9352_67

  eBay.com reported listing count, 30,278

* sdc_prod_9391_43
Shopping.com seller Adorama
Member since Feb-22-08 in New York, United States

• Feedback sdc_prod_9391_43
• Products on eBay.com from sdc_prod_9391_43
• Search Google for sdc_prod_9391_43

  eBay.com reported listing count, 11,102

"11102 items found" ( LINK Google archive screen capture )

* sdc_prod_9452
Shopping.com seller eTronics, Inc.
Member since Jul-25-07 in New York, United States

• Feedback sdc_prod_9452 
• Products on eBay.com from sdc_prod_9452 
• Search Google for sdc_prod_9452 

  eBay.com reported listing count, 24,499

* sdc_prod_90076
Shopping.com seller OnlineSports, Inc.
Member since Nov-13-06 in California, United States

• Feedback sdc_prod_90076
  
• Products on eBay.com from sdc_prod_90076
  
• Search Google for sdc_prod_90076
  

  eBay.com reported listing count, UNKNOWN

III. What Happened?

"Never underestimate the power of human stupidity."
Robert Heinlein, Time Enough For Love (1973)

There are two basic explanations.

1. eBay deliberately elevated auction counts, in effect producing "materially false and misleading statements" to improve their stock price. U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission violation. A simple plan based on the simple but stupid premise that 'no one will find this.' Orange jumpsuits all around.
2. Human (Computer) Error. A cadre of programmers are allowed to run large scale tests on a live system. And goofed.
 

We had planned to explore and write about each possibility, but we'll leave that for another time.

IV. "THIS IS NOT AN EBAY LISTING"

"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it."
George Santayana, The Life of Reason (1905)

Event Timeframe

Like many incidents, there are events that lead up to it, follow it, are associated with it, or simply happen in the same time frame.

Here is a short chronology of those occurrences.

== 2007 ==

.

February 2007

http://www.medved.net/cgi-bin/cal.exe?EIND  Chart times are Eastern Standard Time.

.

9 March 2007

Are Ebay's Listing Numbers Inflated by Fraud?
03/09/2007 08:31 PM                  ID: 60834

Ebay Inc's (NASDAQ:EBAY) listing numbers have demonstrated dramatic volatility during the 'Vladuz' security scare. Some Ebay users have suggested that the millions of fraudulent listings are significantly inflating Ebay's listing numbers.

In response, an Ebay spokesperson claims: "there just isn't enough information there to tie the swings in listings that they show to any one cause". They declined to comment as to the number of accounts that may have been compromised.

It is also suggested that Medved's calculations for Ebay's total of listing numbers are overestimated too. As the Ebay spokesperson confirms, the Medved statistics used to quantify Ebay's listing numbers "far exceed our real activity in this area".

Source: www.theregister.co.uk

http://www.medved.net/cgi-bin/cal.exe?EIND  Chart times are Eastern Standard Time.

== 2008 ==

.

13 February 2008

"February 13th, insertion fees for all auction-style and fixed price listings will be only 20 cents!"
Stephanie Tilenius, General Manager for eBay North America

"20¢ Auction-style and Fixed Price listing fees" (eBay)

http://www.medved.net/cgi-bin/cal.exe?EIND  Chart times are Eastern Standard Time.

.

20 February 2008

Start of eBay Policy changes and media fee cut.

*** A Message from Bill Cobb - New Pricing and Other News ***
General Announcements
January 29, 2008 | 05:59 AM PST/PT

***A Message from Lorrie Norrington – New Media Category Pricing Effective February 20***
"I am pleased to announce we are accelerating our plan to phase-in category-specific pricing for media. This fee cut will coincide with the site-wide pricing changes previously announced to take effect on February 20." 
Lorrie Norrington, President of eBay Global Marketplace Operations, February 11, 2008 | 10:01AM PST/PT

.

20 February 2008

Regarding the events of February 20th.

"The bug was related to the gallery feature that allows users to place a small photo of their item on the initial search returns page, a spokesman said. EBay traditionally charged 35 cents to include a gallery photo, but as part of the policy changes that went into effect February 20, they are now free of charge.
However, "the code actually rolled out three hours late, so there were a certain number of listings ... that didn't get gallery free"
Usher Lieberman eBay Spokesman to PC Magazine, 4 March 2008

• It is unclear from the PC Magazine article, if the "bug" was implemented on February 20th, the day of the "policy changes", or on February 29th.

.

20 February 2008

"the bug first emerged on Friday"
"But it wasn't a test. It ended up being a bug," Usher Lieberman 
Usher Lieberman eBay Spokesman to PC Magazine, 4 March 2008

Despite Usher Lieberman's assertion that the "bug" happened on February 29th, there is evidence showing sdc_prod products appearing before the 29th.

While there are reports of sdc_prod listings appearing as early as December 2007, the earliest evidence of a "bug" is 20 February 2008.

Samples of a Shopping.com listings inserted onto eBay.com.

"Items for sale by sdc_prod_310426"
"Time listed" "Feb-20 15:49"

.

22 February 2008

Samples of a Shopping.com listings inserted onto eBay.com.

"Items for sale by sdc_prod_409455_97"
"Time listed" "Feb-22 10:22"

Google archive - February 29, 2008 16:37:41 GMT
Seller sdc_prod_434012, item number 320199419130, 30 day auction listing. Seller has no 30 day store. Start date February 22nd
"eBay (item 320199419130 end time March-22-08 06:45:06 PDT)" screen shot.

.

23 February 2008

Sample of a Shopping.com listing inserted onto eBay.com.

Listings on eBay.com are accessible on eBay International sites, such as eBay South Korea (ebay.auction.co.kr).

Google archive - Feb 29, 2008 22:42:51 GMT
Seller sdc_prod_310426, item number 120225811907. Start date February 23rd.
Time remaining on 30 day listing, 23 days 3 hours 35 minutes 46 seconds, screen shot

.

23 February 2008
05:49 AM PST

redsbe  (Private ) Feb-23-08 05:49 PST 1 of 33

When I search ebay or via google for test listings I only find a few hundred yet total ebay listings are now running at or above Feb 12th numbers of 12.4 m (before 20 cent listings and boycott) so I fail to see the importance of test listings in inflating numbers.

.

27 February 2008
06:04:36 PM PST

PayPal and eBay Pay Shoppers to Shop
AuctionBytes
By: Ina Steiner
Wed Feb 27 2008 18:04:36

.

28 February 2008
04:30 PM PST, 7:30 PM EST (Eastern Standard Time)

eBay Auction count at lowest point of the day; 13,393,000 items.

Coincidentally, or not, at about the time many of eBay's employees head for home, the auction count begins to rise. Did some programmer turn something on, and leave for the day, intending to check on the code's progress the following morning?

Auction count rises to 13,405,000 by 07:30 PST, 10:30 EST.

http://www.medved.net/cgi-bin/cal.exe?EIND  Chart times are Eastern Standard Time.

.

28 February 2008
09:00:01 PM PST, 12:00:01 AM 29 February EST (Eastern Standard Time).

Medved "EBay Auction Counts" approximately 13,425,000 items. First count on the February 29th chart.

http://www.medved.net/cgi-bin/cal.exe?EIND  Chart times are Eastern Standard Time (EST).

.

28 February 2008
11:59:59 PM PST

 "eBay is running a marketing campaign to encourage buyers to shop on its site by offering them coupons. One buyer sent AuctionBytes a coupon he had received (pictured) that offered $5 toward shipping on any one item. Part of the terms and conditions follows:

This Offer is valid only when you pay with, and seller accepts, PayPal. This Offer is intended for the recipient whose eBay User ID is printed on the Offer and purchase must be made on eBay.com with that eBay User ID. This Offer is not transferable.

This Offer is for one-time use. It may only be redeemed on the total shipping cost of an item or items on one purchase from a single seller, using a single method of shipping and single currency, in a single transaction. This Offer expires February 28, 2008 at 11:59:59 PM (PST)."
AuctionBytes, Wed Feb 27 2008 18:04:36

.
29 February 2008
04:23 AM PST

eBay Developer's Program
eBay Developer Forums > Technical Questions: eBay Shopping Web Services
Exclude Sellers Issue

Re: ExcludeSellers Issue
Posted: Feb 29, 2008 4:23 AM
"Because of the wide variety of searches that we do, we could easily use 200 to 400 ID's. 500 would be a good number for us."
stsi.com

The above statement is in response to the earlier part of the thread:

ExcludeSellers Issue
Posted: Jan 10, 2008 11:40 AM
Is there a limit on the number of Excluded Sellers that can be specified in a GetSearchResults call? I have several excluded sellers that keep returning search results. I have checked the XML for the call, and it looks correct.

Also, is it a problem if entries are duplicated? (I will be correcting this in any event.)

Thanks.
stsi.com

Re: ExcludeSellers Issue
Posted: Jan 10, 2008 12:12 PM
After further research, it looks like there is a limit of 100 excluded sellers. Can this limit be raised?
stsi.com

Re: ExcludeSellers Issue
Posted: Jan 14, 2008 3:42 PM
"Yes the limit is 100, which most users have found sufficient for their use case. How many IDs do you have?"
Rekha Patel, rekha.developersupport@ebay.com, eBay Developer Support, 11 January 2008

Re: ExcludeSellers Issue
Feb 29, 2008 4:27 AM
"Also, is it possible to use wildcards for excluded sellers? For example, I'd like to exclude the various iterations of sdc_prod_*, instead of having to type in all the numbers that this seller uses...."
stsi.com

.
29 February 2008
10:00 AM PST, 01:00 PM Eastern Standard Time

Medved "EBay Auction Counts" reaches maximum for the day of approximately 13,900,000 items. The
previous low count was 13,393,000 items on February 28th at 04:30 PM PST, 7:30 EST. An increase of about half-a-million listings in 16.5 hours.

Coincidentally, or not, during the time many of eBay's employees show up at work, the auction count abruptly stops rising.

One scenario:

• 07:00AM (10:00AM EST) - Programmers apply brakes to sdc_prod application.
• 08:30AM (11:30AM EST) - Or so they thought, sdc_prod application continues to add listings.
• 10:00AM (13:00AM EST) - Management puts  brakes to sdc_prod. Programmer grunts delete sdc_prod listings.

A case could be made that by 10AM eBay applied working corrective action on the sdc_prod listing problem. Because at this point the auction count drops.

http://www.medved.net/cgi-bin/cal.exe?EIND  Chart times are Eastern Standard Time (EST).

.
29 February 2008
01:00 PM PST, 04:00 PM Eastern Standard Time

Medved "EBay Auction Counts" drops slightly approximately 13,875,000 items, from 13,900,000 items. Last count of the February 29th chart.

.

29 February 2008

Regarding the events of "Friday night" 29 February 2008.

eBay's statements:

1) "a "bug" in its system had accidentally placed listings from eBay-owned shopping.com onto eBay.com late Friday night."
However, "the code actually rolled out three hours late, so there were a certain number of listings ... that didn't get gallery free, so we were going back and fixing that" on Friday, the spokesman said. "What happened was, when we wrote the code to implement that fix in the database table, there was a string that was left on there that populated and sent shopping.com listings onto ebay.com that it shouldn't have."
Approximately 5,000 listings were pulled from shopping.com, but they have since been removed, according to eBay."
PC Magazine, 4 March 2008

2) "eBay spokesperson Usher Lieberman initially told AuctionBytes they appeared due to a test, but on Monday, said he was incorrect and that the listings were the result of a glitch.
On Tuesday, Lieberman explained the nature of the glitch. Programmers rolled out code on Friday evening that was meant to credit certain listings that were eligible for free Gallery. The credit was due to them because eBay had promised sellers Gallery would be free for listings started at a certain time of day, and the code had been rolled out 3 hours past the deadline.
Lieberman said the programmers inadvertently caused the Shopping.com listings to appear on eBay.com when it created and launched the script to credit the sellers' accounts for Gallery fees.
Lieberman said fewer than 35,000 listings were affected by the glitch."
AuctionBytes, 5 March 2008

3) "An eBay spokesman told PC Magazine at the time that 5,000 shopping.com listings were erroneously placed on ebay.com. After sellers expressed doubt about that number in the comments section, eBay was asked to again confirm that it was indeed 5,000. The same spokesman responded Friday that he had originally told PC Magazine that eBay pulled 35,000 listings, but a review of the interview confirmed that he said 5,000."
PC Magazine, 10 March 2008

4) "Editor's Note: The eBay spokesman confirmed Monday that the number of postings pulled from shopping.com was indeed 35,000."
PC Magazine, 10 March 2008

.
29 February 2008
06:41 PM PST

First responders to Shopping.com listing anomaly.

By this time, the Medved "EBay Auction Counts" are somewhere between 13,875,000 listings (29 February 2008 01:00 PM PST) and 13,502,000 listings (1 March 2008 08:30 AM PST). "Between" as the Medved chart is blank between those times.

A possible scenario would be that eBay has been deleting listings since 10:00 AM; at least 8 hours. Or we should say an eBay application has been deleting sdc_prod listings.

eBay's March 1st Listing Special begins in 5 hours 19 minutes.

eBay user comments, edited.

mm*mc (154)  Feb-29-08 18:41 PST

Look at this 35000 listings never sold anything these look funny to me. Let me know what you think check this out. 320199384960

neverstopsworking (127) Feb-29-08 18:49 PST

WOW!!

Did you Notice You CAN'T Bid on Any Of Them, You can Only Watch Them and They're listed for at least 21 more days??

.

29 February 2008
07:25 PM PST

Referenced by PC Magazine article.

mydiscountstation  (921 )        Feb-29-08 19:25 PST

http://search.ebay.com/_W0QQsassZsdc_prod_434012

is e-bay padding their "listings" numbers?

This guy has over 35000 items. And there is no button for a buy it now and no button for making a bid.

interesting

.

29 February 2008
08:56 PM PST

eBay user comments, edited.

cmiprch  (1732 )        Feb-29-08 20:56 PST       44 of 418

That sounds more like a hack, to me.

Sounds more like a conspiracy to me. 30 of these kinds of ID's with 35K listings is 1M items. Imagine the kind of volume drop you can hide with 30, 60 or 90 or whatever number of these IDs.

cmiprch  (1732 )       Feb-29-08 21:19 PST       48 of 418

So "sdc" = shopping dot com?

Nice listings boost if eBay injected everything on shopping.com

.

29 February 2008
09:29 PM PST

Referenced by PC Magazine article.

monkey_business304  (0 )  Feb-29-08 21:29 PST

I have been collecting all ebay's padded listings and forwarding them to the FTC so they will investigate them.
Everything you can do will help.They should not get away with the crap they are doing.Im going to do my best to make sure they dont.

windorphin  (31 )  Feb-29-08 21:40 PST  4 of 273

Don't waste your time. They aren't fake listings. They are your replacements. They're bringing in the big guns now. Huge retailers to compete with.

.

29 February 2008
10:25 PM PST

eBay user comments, edited.

moopy_inc  (5562 )  Feb-29-08 22:25 PST 240 of 516

you would think they would at least use different user names. SDC_prod....I guess that is easier to keep up with. SDC = shopping dot com.....brilliant. haaaaa

orange_cape_hides_me  (Private ) Feb-29-08 22:30 PST 25 of 51

I think the API developer angle is probably where the answer lies. Someone is clearly testing auction formats and listings, and these are not meant to be bid on.

.

29 February 2008
10:31:50 PM PST, 12:31:50 CST &1:31:50 AM 1 March EST

12:31:50 AM CST
"I see. Actually, this is not an eBay listing, the problem is it's a Shopping.com listing that is showing on our site by mistake."
Evan M. A., eBay Live Help Customer Service

12:32:25 AM CST
It is a current issue, yes, we have a bug on it. These are meant to be on shopping.com only but due to some reason are showing on eBay as well and can't be bought through the site."
Evan M. A., eBay Live Help Customer Service

.

29 February 2008
10:35 PM PST

eBay user comments, edited.

badmomster (Private) Feb-29-08 20:35 PST 68 of 521

It seems to me that if Ebay is boosting their numbers with bogus auctions, that's an issue for the SEC.

niruss (1979) Feb-29-08 20:36 PSST 70 of 521

Also for the stockholders and the FTC.

bosshossman1  (1 )  Feb-29-08 22:33 PST 255 of 516

We are now up to 7 Ids, Keep up the good work.
I will keep the totals coming.

sdc_prod_434012 # of listings 35002
sdc_prod_9124_14 # of listings 48395
sdc_prod_9074_35 # of listings 21401
sdc_prod_9452 # of listings 24501
sdc_prod_301013_74 # of listings 27291
sdc_prod_9352_67 # of listings 30278
sdc_ prod_ 9055 # of listings 1925

justinal  (391 )        Feb-29-08 22:45 PST       31 of 273

Just curious, exactly what FTC code violation are you reporting them for?

And the SEC? It's an auction listing, not stock manipulation.

Going crazy will not help your cause.

aenthal  (2243 )       Feb-29-08 23:04 PST       34 of 273

These bogus auctions are not a violation of anything.
EBay has a right to put anything they wish on their web servers, and they apparently wish to use space up with displays of auctions that don't exist.

krs6670  (107 )  Feb-29-08 23:12 PST 35 of 273

a trust and safety poster kind of figured it out...
sdc= shopping dot com   

Feb-29-08 23:36 PST 385 of 700

O.K. looks like ebay is pulling all the listings. All the Ids we posted have had all the auctions pulled.

vsbeauty53  (15 )  Feb-29-08 23:59 PST  17 of 421

if they had nothing to hide, they didn't need to remove those (fake) listings. they are all gone now!

.
1 March 2008

Regarding the events of Saturday 1 March 2008.

"This was a limited test that has run its course" Usher Lieberman, eBay Spokesperson
AuctionBytes, 1 March 2008 01:56:54 AM PST

"He said he had made a mistake when he called the Shopping.com listings a test on Saturday morning. He was trying to track it down and after talking to a few people, felt comfortable saying it was a test, and subsequently found out the listings had appeared accidentally. Usher said it was his fault for initially getting it wrong."
Ina Steiner, AuctionBytes, 4 March 2008 04:02:46 AM PST

"AuctionBytes looked at one Shopping.com selling account on Saturday morning, it indicated the seller had over 80,000 listings on eBay.com"
Ina Steiner, AuctionBytes, 5 March 2008

• AuctionBytes does not report this fact, "80,000 listings," for 4 days.

.

1 March 2008
12:00:01 AM PST, 3:00:01 AM Easter Standard Time

eBay listing upgrade special, "2 days only March 1-2", begins. eBay sellers can list products at reduced prices. Historically the auction counts rise significantly during these eBay specials.

***Get Gallery Plus, Value Pack, Featured Plus!, and Picture Pack at a Discount This Weekend***
"The promotion will start on Saturday, March 1, 2008 at 00:00:01 Pacific time (12:00 a.m. plus one second) and end on Sunday, March 2, 2008 at 23:59:59 Pacific time (11:59 p.m. plus 59 seconds)."

There is no 12:00:01 AM count per sec, as there is a gap in the record from 01:00 PM PST (04:00 PM EST) February 29th to 08:30 AM PST (11:30 AM EST) March 1st.

13,875,000 listings, 29 February 2008 01:00 PM PST (04:00 PM EST)

http://www.medved.net/cgi-bin/cal.exe?EIND  Chart times are Eastern Standard Time (EST).

.
1 March 2008
00:02 AM PST

eBay user comments, edited.

vsbeauty53  (15 ) Mar-01-08 00:02 PST 20 of 426

look, I found this:

Here is a copy of the list again for those that missed it.
sdc_prod_434012 # of listings 35002
sdc_prod_9124_14 # of listings 48395
sdc_prod_9074_35 # of listings 21401
sdc_prod_9452 # of listings 24501
sdc_prod_301013_74 # of listings 27291
sdc_prod_9352_67 # of listings 30278
sdc_ prod_ 9055 # of listings 1925
sdc_prod_9021_2 # of listings 12233
sdc_prod_9391_43 #oflistings 11100

moopy_inc  (5562 )  Mar-01-08 00:17 PST  459 of 786

well, we all saw it, others on powersellersunite.com has seen it. I just wish these were found during the day. So many more people could have seen them.

atticcleanin  (35 ) Mar-01-08 00:25 PST  477 of 786

well should anyone need pics of id, then fb page then lisitng i think i grabbed like 4 or 5 of the 9

I got screenshots of a dozen different feedback names associated with SDC.

sdc_prod_434012 = SpectrumSuperStore
sdc_prod_9021_2 = Buy.com (who is NARU!)
sdc_prod_9124_14 = TheNerds, Inc.
sdc_prod_9452 = eTronics, Inc.
sdc_prod_409455_97 = Sababa Shopping
sdc_prod_9090 = CompSource Inc.
sdc_prod_310426 = ANTOnline (who is NARU!)
sdc_prod_9074_35 = pcRUSH.com (who is NARU!)
sdc_prod_9352_67 = Digital Foto Club
sdc_prod_301013_74 = The Twister Group
sdc_prod_305839_99 = BargainBasementBatteries
sdc_prod_9391_43 = Adorama (who is NARU!)

Since those are all unique (HA!) user IDs, we have at least 12 bogus sellers running around.

buyingcarsforfun  (80 ) Mar-01-08 01:36 PST 574 of 669

O.K. they are right back at it. I was double checking the Ids and these 4 have auctions listed again. Take a look.
sdc_prod_301013_74
sdc_prod_310426
sdc_prod_9352_67
sdc_prod_9452

.
1 March 2008
01:56:54 AM PST

Mystery Shopping.com Listings on eBay?
By: Ina Steiner, AuctionBytes
Sat Mar 1 2008 01:56:54

Excerpt:

 
• "Mystery listings are appearing on eBay that don't allow shoppers to bid or buy. The listings appear to be feeds from Shopping.com sellers. A look at the User ID sdc_prod_301013_74, for example, shows the seller has 27,076 listings - but the ones we clicked on did not have bid or buy buttons."

.
1 March 2008
05:20 AM PST

eBay user comment, edited.

molerfamily  (1 )        Mar-01-08 05:20 PST       69 of 273

Considering eBay does not report figures, it seems kinda like the conspiracies are rampant again. Because 3rd parties out there attempt to circumvent and create programs to provide folks this, it is just not logical for eBay to gain anything from this.

I agree with thizzwear completely on this. And Thizz, does not matter what date they were doing this testing, all the chicken littles will make that date fit into the agenda which they have. There is no winning for eBay for anything they do, the Chicken Littles of the world will use their twisted logic to make it appear they did this for some adverse reasoning.

The more these chicken littles talk, the less eductated they look. It has really become a joke to read all these things that are being said now.

.
1 March 2008
time unknown

eBay Numbers Inflated By Shopping.com Product Listings?
Pheebay.com
Date: 03/01/2008

Excerpts:

• "I'm betting Murphys Law is driving this event rather than any evil empire."
• "For me this isn't a significant issue in isolation but there is a potentially more worrying aspect to this story. Many readers will share the belief of many that eBay has never been good at introducing new or changed code leading many users to feel like Beta testers all too often. With the amount of changes planned for the coming months I have a hunch today is just one of a string of "cock ups" we will be reading and reporting in the near future."

.
1 March 2008
06:18 AM PST

eBay user comments, edited.

flaura22  (333 )        Mar-01-08 06:18 PST       79 of 418

I don't believe ebay has done anything with the intent to manipulate or deceive. The point is that IF whatever sort of glitch this is has mistakenly over inflated the numbers, then eBay is responsible for making the shareholders aware of the accounting errors IF the mistake has an impact on the stock values and/or IF the errors impact the financial reports to the shareholders.
I don't know about the whole casino scenario you've got going, I was thinking more along the lines of Enron and such.

eBay cannot be held accountable for any errors if they can say that they didn't know, which is why someone must have proof that an officer of eBay or PREFERABLY THE GENERAL COUNSEL FOR EBAY has been made aware of the possibility of a considerable accounting error in the financial reports to the shareholders.

shwp1  (1919 ) Mar-01-08 07:03 PST 681 of 878

I asked this earlier and it's still nagging at me.

Someone...[forgive me but I have forgotten who],
posted a link to another forum where one of the
sdc###### was inquiring how many id's they could have...
The were told 100....how many did they need?
sdc###### responded 400 or 500

soooooooooo

If sdc= shoppingdotcom
and shoppingdotcom is owned by Ebay

Isn't that like asking yourself a question...and doing it where everyone can hear [read] you ask?

the*katy*workshop  (1468 )  Mar-01-08 07:11 PST 683 of 878

27076 items found (Save this search)
Show only: Items from seller sdc_prod_301013_74

type2mtg  (51 )        Mar-01-08 07:10 PST       43 of 426

The absolute ONLY way for these items to show "by accident" is if the eBay techs included them in the database. If this was done "on accident" then those tech should absolutely be fired, because they are mixing two different databases and that is potentially a MAJOR screwup.

It seems that they probably have done this on purpose, because it's highly unlikely that the two different databases share the same table titles and attributes. Meaning that the SDC listings would have had to have been converted to fit the eBay database before they would show up, otherwise they would just error out and potentially bring down the whole eBay database.

Something is not right with this...you cannot just have stuff appear "on accident"...not when you're dealing with databases.

the*katy*workshop  (1468 )  Mar-01-08 07:13 PST 685 of 786

19808 items found (Save this search)
Show only: Items from seller sdc_prod_9452

.

1 March 2008
08:10 AM PST, 16:10 GMT

200k Shopping.com items appear on eBay
TameBay
Author: Chris Dawson
Posted at: Saturday, March 1st, 2008 at 4:10 pm   
Tags for this post: eBay.com, shopping.com, Snafu

Excerpt:

• "User names such as sdc_prod_9124_14 with some 48,000 eBay listings appeared, although currently all the listings appear to have been removed. SDC is the acronym for shopping.com, the shopping comparison site owned by eBay.
   
  sdc_prod_9124_14 The listings had no bid/bin links, simply a link to add to watched items leading so speculation that eBay are using them to increase listing numbers. A more rational explanation is that some one made an error in launching Shopping.com listings onto eBay and the error was swiftly reversed."

.
1 March 2008
08:21 AM PST

eBay user comment, edited.

emovieposter.com  (20539 )        Mar-01-08 08:21 PST       84 of 418

Just like they were nailed cold with the "shipping stars" snafu, they are nailed cold with this one. Of course they will announce it was a simple mistake, and get rid of the fake listings.

.

1 March 2008
08:30 AM PST, 11:30 AM EST

Medved "EBay Auction Counts" approximately 13,502,000 items. The auction count was previously
13,875,000 listings (29 February 2008 01:00 PM PST)

Eight and a half hours into eBay's listing upgrade special, "2 days only March 1-2", and the auction count is falling.

http://www.medved.net/cgi-bin/cal.exe?EIND  Chart times are Eastern Standard Time (EST).

.
1 March 2008
09:27 AM PST

eBay user comment, edited.

sandrarn83  (2919 )       Mar-01-08 09:27 PST       52 of 426

I read an article recently that Ebay (who owns Shopping) was going to start having some of the Shopping feeds shown on Ebay. That was one of the reasons I signed up for Shopping but then found that all my Amazon listings were already on Shopping. So no point in competing with my self and using my own money to be seen on Shopping when Amazon pays and does it for me.

Comment, edited.

Randy Smythe Says:  
March 1st, 2008 at 5:30 pm (17:30 GMT), 09:30 AM PST

Chris, it’s likely that it was a slip-up. There have been discussions about integrating SDC listings into to eBay for awhile. These listings would not have shown up on eBay.com in the form that they did if eBay hadn’t set them up this way. So I would say it was a slip-up before a test. Eventually we will see SDC listing on the main platform.

I agee with you that it wasn’t eBay trying to inflate listing numbers.

eBay user comments, edited.

djcarlos1  (3838 )        Mar-01-08 09:46 PST       93 of 418

I don't know if it's a glitch, hack or purposeful deception. However, what makes it curious is all the auctions I looked at started last Thursday the day after the listing sale ended.

Say it isn't so, Joel?
Posted: Mar-01-08 11:23 PST
boycott*victoriously  (17 )  Posts: 2,108

I must have missed that one. These are the ones I found, with last night's and this morning's results shown. That list you have only shows 10,000 counts ... could have been much more than that:

ID found:...............first shot..... Now
sdc_prod_9452...........19808....still there
sdc_prod_30103_74....27076....still there
sdc_prod_9055............1925.....zero now
sdc_prod_442675_57...4702.....zero now
sdc_prod_9124_14.......42578...zero now
sdc_prod_9090............ 24501...zero now
sdc_prod_434012..........35000...zero now

.
1 March 2008
01:02 PM PST, 03:02 PM CST

eBay Customer Service Agent (Lanie R.) and an eBay customer:
15:02 Agent Sent Message: I'm sorry for the inconvenience.This is actually an issue on the site right now I'm afraid. This is actually a Shopping.com listing that's appearing incorrectly on eBay.
15:03 Agent Sent Message: Our Technical team is working on getting resolved though, and I had this reported for you so we can add your account to the list.
15:03 Customer: Do these incorrect listings show up in ebays total listings/ Wouldn't they scew the listings totals?
15:04 Agent Sent Message: Oh, no it shouldn't though.
15:05 Agent Sent Message: The team is checking on the accounts of the sellers you reported as well for further investigation.
15:05 Customer: Shoudn't or absolutely doesn't?
15:05 Agent Sent Message: Absolutely doesn't.This is only a glitch on the search pages.
15:06 Agent Sent Message: You can check it from time to time to see it not on the eBay pages, only on Shopping.com
15:06 Customer: can you explain that a little further?
15:08 Customer: I'm not familiar with shopping.com. Why would their listings show up on ebay. Anf the one I mentionaed has ebay seller feedback.
15:08 Agent Sent Message: Sure! In the eBay account of the seller for items sold at eBay, it shouldn't get reflected, but if you were referring to the "items from seller" link for all items he is selling, I'm afraid the Shopping.com items will also appear and is confirmed as a tec
15:08 Agent Sent Message: hnical glitch.
15:09 Customer: can you respond to my last question also?
15:09 Agent Sent Message: Sorry for the confusion, Shopping.com is a specialty site owned by eBay but we handle separate accounts. It's similar to Express or Half.com
3/1/2008 15:10 Agent Sent Message: Ah, okay, Here's what happens, this particular seller has an account with SHopping.com to sell items, which is a different one as an eBay seller.

.
1 March 2008
01:12 PM PST

eBay user comments, edited.

suzisstuff  (3233 )  Mar-01-08 13:12 PST 8 of 33

Cyoung 67-
Another poster and I caught that auction in the act last night. OP did a “snapshot” when it was at 35,000 listings and sent it to ABC NEWS. I was watching it around the same time and the listings went from 37,000 at the first point. I checked in on it 4 more times, 2nd time I think it was 17,000 auctions, then 7,000 and then 5,000 and finally in went to 536. Now it is at zero. OP and I both posted our findings but cannot find it this morning. Surprise, Surprise!

EBAY CAUGHT IN THE ACT!

molerfamily  (1 )       Mar-01-08 14:08 PST       195 of 273

Would it not stand to reason, that if some deal was worked out, with say Shopping.com and premier members that pay to Shopping.com get free exposure listings with eBay, that in fact it is not costing them anything to have these listed in an eBay store account? That would make sense.
.
I do not profess to know what arrangement that Shopping.com merchants have, but it seems I read something to that effect somewhere.

rjrkea  (3275 ) View Listings | Report       Mar-01-08 13:56 PST       112 of 418

Well on Monday the Expanded Seller Protection enrollment link showed up for a period of time before getting removed.

Maybe this was some sort of a test like that where it went "live" and then was taken down.

On one hand I would think if it were a test, they would have used a much smaller amount of listings so it wasn't so visible and on the other hand maybe they wanted to see how large a volume they could handle for sellers as a means of luring users back from amazon or not lose them to amazon.

And then also maybe they wanted to see what current, knowledgeable users would say about the listings to quickly find out what "goofs" there were.

.

1 March 2008
2:55 PM, time zone unknown

eBay padding listing numbers on Auction site?
www.companyexposed.com
March 1, 2008
Published by admin @ 2:55 pm

Excerpt:

• "Today the Blogs and eBay Finance forums and eBay Seller forums are buzzing with examples of mysterious listings of items on which you cannot bid or which you cannot buy. These number in tens of thousands on seller accounts that were located today."

.
1 March 2008
2:56 PM PST

eBay user comment, edited.

The Number of Auctions
Posted: Mar-01-08 14:56 PST
lacemaker3  (300 ) Posts: 3,874

sdc_prod_301013_74 has been a member since Oct-18-06.

If you view the Text-format only page for their listings, it's very interesting. I am viewing it with 200 items per page.
- there are 27076 items found (but only 10000 can be viewed in the Text-format list)
- The first page of listings were started Jun-04-07 and ended on Nov-01-07 (why are they still listed in Text-format only? The item #s are invalid.)
- On the 15th page of listings, approx. half were started Apr-19-07 and ended Nov-15-07 16:19:44 PST. That's approx. 2900 listings that ended before Nov-15-07, and should no longer be on the site.
- All the rest of the listings (approx 7100) were started on Feb-25-08 and will end Mar-26-08, between 14:22:26 PDT and 14:32:16 PDT. They are 30 day listings.

.

1 March 2008
time unknown

Ebay Padding Counts w Fake Listings in Wake of Strike?
From: cappnonymous
Added: March 01, 2008

.

1 March 2008
05:24 PM PST

eBay user comment, edited

cloudberry121  (18 ) Mar-01-08 17:24 PST 18 of 20

There's been a lot of this going on this past month. Thousands of listings within weeks or even days and about 20% FB, if any. Odd times.

username: sdc_prod_301013_74 has 27291 listings.
username: sdc_prod_9090 has 32601 listings.
username: sdc_prod_9352_67 has 30278 listings.
username: sdc_prod_9074_35 has 21481 listings

.

1 March 2008
time unknown

Bogus Listings!!!
By dhoosierswife

Is eBay POSSIBLY padding their listings numbers???
By dhoosierswife

.

1 March 2008
06:06 PM PST

eBay user comments, edited

just_not_thinking  (0 )        Mar-01-08 18:06 PST       68 of 426

Looks like the possee slept late today!

Sandra and possee why do you care about this?

How does it effect you in any way at all?

Why can't ebay run tests on their own site?!!

vsbeauty53  (15 )        Mar-01-08 18:14 PST       71 of 333

Gosh! ebay Number of Listings dropped! close to 500,000 items just gone!

eBay view charts 14,109,304 -472525 -3.35% March 1, 2008 9:06 pm

What an overnight change!

pepins4b8e  (21 )        Mar-01-08 18:16 PST       73 of 333

You want them to let you know every time they do tests?
You think other sites let you know when they do test? You're dreaming!

sojo2004  (2698 )      Mar-01-08 18:23 PST     78 of 333

OK, this is what ebay says about test auctions:

Guidelines for Test Listings

Listings in the Test Auction category must be clearly labeled as a ’test’, both in the listing title and description.
No more than 10 test listings should run at once by a single account.
Accounts that leave or receive feedback in the Test Auction category must be used for test purposes only. This means that members must use a different account to leave or receive feedback for test purposes than is used for buy or sell on the site. Accounts found to be in violation of this guideline will be subject to immediate suspension.

Any Feedback left on test listings should be clearly labeled ‘test’.

All ’test’ feedback is subject to removal at any time, at eBay's discretion.

Normal listing fees will be charged when listing in the test category.

But I guess that just applies to members, not the management.

But in answer to pepin -- yes, if we have to clearly state a test listing is a test listing, then I DO think ebay should have to do the same.

sojo

Things are going swimmingly, thank you for asking.

.
1 March 2008
07:00 PM PST, 10:00 PM EST (Eastern Standard Time)

Medved "EBay Auction Counts"  approximately 13,455,000 items. Auction count at the lowest point of the day.

.
1 March 2008

08:09 PM PST

eBay user comment, edited.

time2buy1949  (Private )  Feb-29-08 20:09 PST

Search 19140 THATCH RAKE 15" 19T EA 12912226

Comments please? Just saw this at the very tail end of a thread in the Feedback Forum. Thought it was appropriate to mention here. (They had a different item number from this seller posted, but I'm not sure I can do that.)

No price, no way to bid on it (I tried $30 just to see what would happen - it said transaction blocked, cannot bid on this kind of item) and if you click on see sellers other listings he has 35K+ others. And it's a zero account. Location - CA. Website in auction too.

How the heck would you even list something up with no way to bid on it? This is either just leading to their website and bigtime circumvention or it's eBay themselves inflating the numbers. Interesting either way.

What do the experts think?

.
1 March 2008
08:30 PM PST, 11:30 PM Eastern Standard Time

Medved "EBay Auction Counts"  approximately 13,460,000 items. Last count of the March 1st chart.

Note auction count  spike beginning at the "2/29" (09:00 PM PST, Midnight EST) line and ending at the "3/2" (09:00 PM PST, Midnight EST) line.

http://www.medved.net/cgi-bin/cal.exe?EIND  Chart times are Eastern Standard Time (EST).

.

1 March 2008
08:34 PM PST

eBay user comment, edited.

erimess  (10 )        Mar-01-08 20:34 PST       238 of 273

Wow. I came over here to try to catch up on the latest and I've found a conglomeration of paranoid, fact-creating, lynching mob!

.

1 March 2008
10:00 PM PST, 01:00 AM 2 March EST (Eastern Standard Time)

Medved "EBay Auction Counts" approximately 13,425,000 items. First count on the March 2nd chart.

.

2 March 2008
00:34 AM PST

eBay user comment, edited.

oldspartantrader  (3913 )          Mar-02-08 00:34 PST     100 of 425

This is much more disconcerting to me as a stockholder than as a seller --

I have asked by stock guy for input and he believes that if this is in fact listing count manipulation it is an SEC matter for investigation

.
2 March 2008
07:00 AM PST, 10:00 AM EST

Medved "EBay Auction Counts" approximately 13,470,000 items. Second listing count peak of the weekend.

Previous peak count was approximately 13,900,000 items, on February 29th at 10 AM PST

http://www.medved.net/cgi-bin/cal.exe?EIND  Chart times are Eastern Standard Time (EST).

.

2 March 2008
07:04 AM PST

eBay user comments, edited

Shopping.com, Half.com and Ebay Express
Posted: Mar-02-08 07:04 PST
dakota_exchange  (2844 )   Posts: 5,856

I wonder... but then why, after all of this became obvious to many, did many of these same listings get pulled?

Shopping.com, Half.com and Ebay Express
Posted: Mar-02-08 08:01 PST
pakardbelle  (272 )   Posts: 1,019

Yesterday, I tried to bid on one of the SDC listings. And, this was not an eBay Express listing. It was one of the active auction format listings. And, the page would not accept my bid.

I put the item in my watched items, and it's still there. But now, when I click the item, the auction has been pulled. And when I search those listings for that seller, they are showing no auctions- so all 27K of the auction format listings have been pulled.

.

2 March 2008
08:26:53 AM PST

Comment, edited.

Date: Sun, 2 Mar 2008 08:26:53 -0800 (PST)

The evidence is consistent with that conclusion, but is not yet proof of that. This could yet be hacking, or API/server malfunction. It could also be an unannounced "test" that accidentally had the "unintended" side effect of inflating traffic, right, sure.

In any event, there clearly are "fake Ebay listings", and in large numbers. Large enough to materially affect traffic count? I suspect we'll know in a few days.

The interesting thing to watch here is whether or not this phenomenon continues, and if it stops, what happens to the traffic reports.
--
Regards, Bob Niland

.

2 March 2008
11:13 AM PST

eBay user comments, edited

audlee-e-nuff-treasures  (860 )         Mar-02-08 11:13 PST       32 of 432

Let's revamp this weekends events.
1. at 18:41 pst Friday evening a thread was started about listings that could not be bid on or bought.
2. between 12 am pst and 3 am Saturday these listings were being pulled.
3. These so called TEST listings if they were only TEST listings would have no reason to be pulled and some of the sdc_prod_### id's narued.
4. Then the thread of these findings is removed along with any that mention it.
5. why please tell me why, if this was only a TEST has it become an issue to remove them and the threads discussing them.

markd13  (84 )        Mar-02-08 11:19 PST       38 of 432

I see the Conspiracy Nut Jobs are out in full force.

And then we have the Free Speech nut jobs who have never read the Constitution or Bill of Rights and yammer on about something they have no knowledge. They don't seem to understand it doesn't cover entities like eBay.

But then again when have facts every stopped a nut job from their ranting.

.

2 March 2008
02:31 PM PST, 05:31 PM Easter Standard Time

Is eBay Fluffing The Numbers With Test Auctions??
Doc's Suspended From eBay Blog
March 2, 2008
Published by admin at 5:31 pm

Excerpt:

• "if they were using these thousands of test listings to skewer 3rd party listing stats generators like, Medved Charts and PowerSellersUnite.com it is outright fraud!"

.

2 March 2008
02:32 PM PST

eBay System Status Announcement Board
***Resolved: Shopping.com listings on eBay***
"Some Shopping.com listings appeared accidentally on eBay.com over the past two days. This system issue has been resolved. We apologize for any confusion or inconvenience this may have caused."

.

2 March 2008
03:53 PM PST

eBay user comments, edited

thehairball  (973 )        Mar-02-08 15:53 PST       143 of 432

That was ebays pathetic excuse for 400,000 listings that all appeared out of nowhere and then disappeared almost as quick and looked nothing like any other ebay listings and if thats the case...then ebay is a very unsafe place to shop! How in the hell do 400,000 listings "accidentally" appear? That means that your private information on this site is no longer safe if stuff from any other site can just somehow magically appear on this one!

magisterrex  (6944 )         Mar-02-08 15:54 PST       170 of 418

I don't know why so many people are quick to ASSume that eBay is an evil corporate entity that wants to steal their souls and use them as currency whilst dealing with the Devil.

When I last checked, you were supposed to be INNOCENT until PROVEN guilty. From the bizarre, over-the-top posts on this thread, I have no idea why some of you even sell here.

I know that if I felt that strongly about eBay, I would do what Bruce is doing, and exit, stage left.

.

2 March 2008
04:01 PM PST, 00:01 GMT March 3

Comment, edited.

Chris Dawson Says:
March 3rd, 2008 at 12:01 am

Such a prosaic explanation! Why couldn’t I have been proven wrong and it be a conspiracy? 

.

2 March 2008
04:01 PM, time zone unknown

eBay censoring info about padded listings on it's forums
www.companyexposed.com
March 2, 2008
By admin @ 4:01 pm 

Excerpt:

• "If the hundreds of thousands listings you cannot Buy Now or Bid on on eBay site are just an innocent mistake / glitch or have a legitimate reason to be there, why would eBay moderators be so diligent in removing posts from their forums discussing these? Although the eBay forum thread has been removed by eBay Moderators, Google cache still has some of the posts"

.

2 March 2008
03:53 PM PST

eBay user comments, edited

aviation  (3802 )        Mar-02-08 16:29 PST       187 of 418

By the way, at the moment, I don't believe eBay did this on purpose to inflate listings. While it's a possibility, I would hope eBay's not that stupid. I really can't see it happening as there are just too many people who would have to have been involved to do that.

in-weave  (7349 )         Mar-02-08 16:56 PST       197 of 418

Some Shopping.com listings appeared accidentally on eBay.com over the past two days. This system issue has been resolved. We apologize for any confusion or inconvenience this may have caused.

I don't think we've seen the end of this....and, in some ways, I don't want to know what carp is coming. There's a reason they "accidentally" appeared. eBay may not have wanted anyone to notice them so that may be the accident but I'll be very surpised if we don't see something relating to shopping.com listings/eBay by the middle of the summer.

.
2 March 2008
8:30 PM PST, 11:30 PM Eastern Standard Time

Medved "EBay Auction Counts" approximately 13,330,000 items. Last count of the March 2nd chart.

.

2 March 2008
10:06 PM PST

eBay user comment, edited.

just_not_thinking  (0 )  Mar-02-08 22:06 PST    145 of 425

POSSEE!!!

Why don't you start your own auction site posseauctions.com and make it perfect ...

I.E. the first website ever that has no glitches, and we'll all use it! Be sure to make a possee discussion board too!!

Remember it has to be perfect just like you, and never have any issues/glitches at all, even if millions of people are all using it at once.

Especially be sure to make a perfect message board! So we won't run the risk of not getting your daily/hourly/minutely/secondly words of possee wisdom!

Let us know when its ready possee!

.

2 March 2008
11:59 PM PST, 2:59 AM 3 March Eastern Standard Time

eBay listing upgrade special, "2 days only March 1-2" ends.

According to the Medved "EBay Auction Counts", at the time the listing special ended the count was approximately 13,355,000 items. The count at the start of the listing special was about 13,502,000 listings. An overall decrease.

http://www.medved.net/cgi-bin/cal.exe?EIND  Chart shows auction counts by days of the month, Eastern Standard Time.

http://www.medved.net/cgi-bin/cal.exe?EIND  Chart times are Eastern Standard Time (EST).

.

3 March 2008

Regarding the events and comments of Monday March 3rd.

"I spoke to eBay's Usher Lieberman during the IMA conference on Monday. He said he had made a mistake when he called the Shopping.com listings a test on Saturday morning. He was trying to track it down and after talking to a few people, felt comfortable saying it was a test, and subsequently found out the listings had appeared accidentally. Usher said it was his fault for initially getting it wrong."
Ina Steiner, AutionBytes, 4 March 2008 04:02:46

"but on Monday, said he was incorrect and that the listings were the result of a glitch."
Ina Steiner on Usher Lieberman, AuctionBytes, 5 March 2008

.

3 March 2008
06:21 AM PST

eBay Running A Test with Shopping.com Listings-Sorry It Was An Accident?
ebay & Beyond: Basics to Business
Posted by David White at 3/3/2008 6:21 AM

Excerpt:

• "they apparently choose to take this action in an effort to reduce the   visibiltiy of the test or accident, whichever it was.........eBay   needs to get their stories STRAIGHT!
   
  My Opinion
  If it really was a test, eBay should have announced it before they ran it, on the system announcement board. This was no accident. eBay rarely does anything by accident, but if they do, it is corrected very quickly, not 2 or more days later."

.

3 March 2008
06:53 AM PST

eBay user comment, edited.

dorothysew  (978 )  Mar-03-08 06:53 PST 157 of 425

lol we wanted ebay to acknowledge the glitches so we would know about them and wouldn't run around trying to find out if there was something we were doing wrong. Now people are using the notifications to complain that there are glitches?

Ebay really can't win with some of you.

.

3 March 2008
07:34 AM PST

Sponsored Ads a Huge Win for eBay!
My Blog Utopia!
Posted by Randy Smythe at 3/03/2008 07:34:00 AM

Excerpt: 

• "In fact we recently saw Shopping.com listings on the eBay.com site, which gives you an idea of their plans. eBay's response to the SDC listings was; "Some Shopping.com listings appeared accidentally on eBay.com over the past two days. This system issue has been resolved. We apologize for any confusion or inconvenience this may have caused." Notice it wasn't an error, it was accidental. Believe me, the accidental part was, that they showed up now, before they were supposed to. I have a hunch we will see SDC listings on the eBay platform sooner rather than later; first as a test and if that goes over well, they will roll them out site wide."

.

3 March 2008
10:21 AM PST

eBay user comment, edited.

oldspartantrader  (3884 )        Mar-03-08 10:21 PST       184 of 333

As I suspected -- These were not just run of the mill feeds I saw -- They were quite eBAY specific listings --

They were in fact eBAY listings like every other eBAY listing -- except they did not have any purpose in the normal realm of buying and selling

Comment, edited.

PAID BASHERS Definition of PADDING the Listing on eBay!
(2008-03-03 14:38:00)  by elikeebayto...

It now has been about a week that the PAID BASHERS community has been busy polluting our beloved board with sorry comments about how eBay has floated or artifically increased its listing. Maybe one day these PAID BASHERS who are PAID money to spread lies and misinformation can discuss the matter with their boss and get an answer for us all. Question: How can you accuse eBay ...

.

4 March 2008
04:02:46 AM PST

Update to Shopping.com Mystery Listings on eBay
By: Ina Steiner, AuctionBytes
Tue Mar 4 2008 04:02:46

I spoke to eBay's Usher Lieberman during the IMA conference on Monday. He said he had made a mistake when he called the Shopping.com listings a test on Saturday morning. He was trying to track it down and after talking to a few people, felt comfortable saying it was a test, and subsequently found out the listings had appeared accidentally. Usher said it was his fault for initially getting it wrong.

I asked Usher if he could tell me more, and he could not. I asked him if we might expect to see Shopping.com listings on eBay in the future, or eBay.com listings on Shopping. He said eBay is looking at a lot of different things and can't speculate on anything.

"Lots of things are on the table," he said.

.
4 March 2008
04:02 AM PST

Regarding events and comments taking place on Tuesday March 4th.

"On Tuesday, Lieberman explained the nature of the glitch. Programmers rolled out code on Friday evening that was meant to credit certain listings that were eligible for free Gallery. The credit was due to them because eBay had promised sellers Gallery would be free for listings started at a certain time of day, and the code had been rolled out 3 hours past the deadline."
AuctionBytes, 5 March 2008

.

4 March 2008
Late afternoon, early evening

Ebay Accused of Padding Listing Numbers
PC Magazine
03.04.08
by Brian Heater and Chloe Albanesius

Excerpts:

• "When the bug first emerged on Friday, the spokesman told a reporter that it was actually a planned test.   "But it wasn't a test. It ended up being a bug," he said. "So I ate a little bit of crow on that.""
• "EBay denied that any forum deletions were intentional. If any posts were taken down "it was accidental," the spokesman said. "We're not afraid of hearing from our community and allowing them to post and discuss things and be angry on our boards.""

.

4 March 2008
06:52 PM PST

ebay user comments, edited

oldspartantrader  (3884 )         Mar-04-08 18:52 PST       199 of 333

It is quite possible that the messy matter is approaching a large fan

Approximately 5,000 listings were pulled from shopping.com, but they have since been removed, according to eBay. (from the PCMAG article)

That is so far from reality that it is ludicrous -- Not only ludicrous but so easily shot through of holes that it borders on management malpractice -- and when it is shown to be GROSSLY understated will invite ever more scrutiny --

We may be seeing a company beginning to circle the wagons and the result will be downright ugly --

If only companies that make major goofs would read the Johnson and Johnson Tylenol Story -- It is a roadmap to not just successful damage control but also to public trust --

Although public trust is at risk -- eBAY is taking an even larger risk with shareholder trust -- A trust that if lost will lead to the dissolution of the company -- an extreme that is unlikely to be sure -- but a needless exposure non the less

Continued pressure here would be far more effective than any boycott in bending managements will -- This misstep is an opportunity that the dissenters will be foolish to waste

I would start by looking for deleted in threads on the net and follow with screen shots of them and the 5000 listings -- followed by 5000 more a day later -- and on and on --

There are now at least two main stream media giants with interest -- an opportunity that is priceless

bhearsch  (302 )        Mar-04-08 21:08 PST       207 of 333

The eBay owned Korean website often mirrors ebay.com auctions. Many of these sdc_prod_ listings are still live on their website. If you want to find them, go to Goog and enter the specific sdc_prod_ number, leave a space, and then enter site:ebay.auction.co.kr

When the results are shown, click on "repeat the search with the omitted results included."

You can find the sdc numbers on various websites/blogs. The eBay Korean website only shows the listings that are currently active and not the ones that have scrolled off but there are still quite a few.

.

5 March 2008

Regarding the events and comments of Wednesday March 5th.

"Lieberman said fewer than 35,000 listings were affected by the glitch."
AuctionBytes, 5 March 2008

AuctionBytes releases the "80,000" figure to eBay and the public. They first observed this figure on March 1st. Four days earlier.

• "However, he had no explanation for the fact that when AuctionBytes looked at one Shopping.com selling account on Saturday morning, it indicated the seller had over 80,000 listings on eBay.com." AuctionBytes, 5 March 2008

AuctionBytes becomes the first large news organization to report a count from direct observation of the situation. However AuctionBytes has not substantiated their claim with screen shots.

"Of the accusations of listing count manipulation, Lieberman said, "To think that we'd do that now is outrageous.""
AuctionBytes, 5 March 2008

.

5 March 2008

eBay Calls Claims of Manipulation 'Outrageous'
By: Ina Steiner, AuctionBytes
March 05, 2008

Excerpts:

• "When Shopping.com listings appeared on eBay.com last week, sellers pointed to it as an example of eBay attempting to boost listing numbers."
• "AuctionBytes previously reported that several discussion threads had been removed, including one linked to in the original blog post published on Saturday.
• Most sellers are likely taking little notice of the dust-up. Those who are suspicious may be unlikely to be satisfied with eBay's response."

.

5 March 2008
06:44AM PST

eBay user comment, edited

oldspartantrader  (3884 )  Mar-05-08 06:44 PST       210 of 333

The worm may be beginning to turn --

From the PCMAG article

Approximately 5,000 listings were pulled from shopping.com, but they have since been removed, according to eBay.

From the AB article

Lieberman said the programmers inadvertently caused the Shopping.com listings to appear on eBay.com when it created and launched the script to credit the sellers' accounts for Gallery fees.

Lieberman said fewer than 35,000 listings were affected by the glitch.

I am going to start a lottery methinks --

Whoever gets closest to the next eBAY estimated number of misplaced SDC listings will receive --

An all expense day trip to Leavenworth with full visitors passes and change for the vending machines -- While there they can visit the eBAY Exec of their choice

.

5 March 2008

Ziff Davis Media Files for Bankruptcy
By  VINNEE TONG

.

5 March 2008
08:04 AM PST

eBay user comments, edited

oldspartantrader  (3884 )  Mar-05-08 08:04 PST                 212 of 333

If both "buy" the explainations will likely go no where.

Should the SEC investigate there will be no buying of stories -- IMO

They are probably one of the scariest Regulatory bodies that Wall Street deals with -- They have teeth and are not at all shy about biting -- They are also pretty straight forward and fair without leaning in any particulat direction to meet an agenda

My attorney and accountant are also preparing letters to be sent to the State Attorney General requesting a watch on the situation with some of the "facts" that have surfaced attached as an addendum -- In that the Street is located here many a firm has been put in the hot seat through that AG Office even though technically domocilled elsewhere.

I am still jumping to no conclusions -- BUT -- The more the story changes the antsier I become --

jake-deals-4u  (700 )      Mar-05-08 08:16 PST     213 of 333

preparing letters to be sent to the State Attorney General requesting a watch on the situation with some of the "facts

Too bad im sure the facts are' Everybody uses eBay at their OWN RISK via a user agreemant that is NOT compulsory, its voluntary.

And im sure theres probably an 12th grade HS kid that could explain that its eBays business & they can do as they dang well please with their OWN SITE + if someone doesnt like it, they are FREE to leave!

OTOH i havent quite figured out why someone who is a stockholder ( at their own FREE WILL & PROFIT ) would bad-mouth & spread bad-will at a company that they have a personal financial stake in , far & above the average site user.

If i was so upset at a company that i held stock in, i would sell that stock ASAP reguardless of P/L

pepins4b8e  (21 )       Mar-05-08 08:41 PST       217 of 426

Carl, I own stock myself (although I'm sure not to your big wig level ). I fail to get a wedgie about this because while I see the listing numbers as an indicator, it is of small importance to me compared to the quarter-end results.

I guess we'll see if shareholders tend to think like me, or like you on this. I'm not criticizing your position. I just think that the press much prefers to follow Scarlett Johansson selling an evening with her on eBay versus some nebulous conspiracy about the number of listings on eBay.

.

5 March 2008
09:04 AM PST

Comment, edited

El Radical
Escrito el: 05-Marzo-2008 a las 17:04

La huelga de eBay ha sido más que un éxito. No fue sólo una caída del 13% de los artículos listados. Como sospechábamos eBay ha estado inflando artificialmente el número de artículos listados por 2 razones:

1) Para que los huelguistas nos desanimáramos haciéndonos creer que nuestra huelga era una huelga que llevábamos a cabo sólo unos cuantos vendedores.

2) PAra engañar a la bolsa.

La noticia acaba de salir en la propia CNN de EE.UU. Si se confirma la estafa en bolsa por parte de eBay estaría violando una Ley Federal muy seria y la multa que les caerá será de espanto, con el añadido de la mala reputación internacional que se producirá en el mercado financiero mundial de esta empresa y efectivo negativo en sus acciones.

Como véis, compañeros, cuando planatamos cojones y ovarios unidos, incluso podemos enfrentarnos contra las multinacionales y pisarles el cuello como ellos nos lo pisan a nosotros. Mis felicitaciones a todos los currantes vendedores de eBay y la solidaridad y apoyo de muchísimos compradores. Lo estamos consiguiendo. Van a venir más huelgas. Y vamos a seguir dándoles caña hasta que nos quiten el pie del cuello. Si tratan de hundirnos se hundirán ellos con nosotros.

.

5 March 2008
03:18 PM PST

What's going on over at eBay?
BloggingStocks
Posted Mar 5th 2008 3:18PM by Michael Fowlkes

Excerpt: 

• "But could there be something a little more sinister taking place on the site? Rumors are definitely swirling that the site has actually been padding its numbers with fake item listings. eBay wouldn't dare do such a thing, would it? It has already admitted that a "bug" in the system did in fact insert some fake listings into the site's database. The question is, was this really a bug, or did the site knowingly inflate its listings?"

.

5 March 2008
06:18 PM PST

eBay user comments, edited

jake-deals-4u  (701 )       Mar-05-08 18:18 PST       242 of 426

Im suprised that the listing #s were of a daily concern to you as an investor.

So a higher count would indicate what?

A lower count would indicate what?

I didnt know that short term listing count anomolies here would affect a long term investors strategy.

I cant find any angle to a blip in listing counts in an investment angle, unless it provides a draw-down for emotional expousements .

But then again if i was emotionally upset over a company i was financially Invested in, ide seek Divesting of that investment.

Do you check the day-day infrastructre of other investment vehicles?

badday911  (71 )        Mar-05-08 22:23 PST       46 of 70

Why don't they do it on there stupid playgroud thing they set up?

ALL companies I know of have a test bed server to try out new things. They don't want to risk problems on the servers that make them money or are mission critical.

I spent 23 1/2 years with HP working with high end servers before retiring so I'm absolutely certain that a company would not risk problems running tests on a live system.

In my opinion, eBay is padding their listings.

vik*nan  (33 )        Mar-05-08 23:25 PST       48 of 70

ALL companies I know of have a test bed server to try out new things.

a "sandbox" --- system or network to try out new software and equipment before deploying them to the production network.

Tests are never made on a production network even in smaller companies

aenthal  (2241 )        Mar-05-08 23:59 PST       54 of 70

I don't care if eBay pads their listings.
What will it get them? A larger count on their server?
And what will that get them?
More space used up on their server.
And what will that get them? Nothing. Fake auctions don't bring in money, even if you put up a million of them.

I tend to agree that this is technical phenomenon, not a Pinocchio problem.
But yes, they also have a Pinocchio problem, and an ostrich problem, and a robot problem (se habla Fortran because there are no humans behind that curtain, working the strings).

Let them tell all the Pinocchio versions of reality that they want.
You can't turn a delusion into reality, no matter how many times you repeat it, no matter how much fake evidence you create to support it.
Sometimes karma is sleeping.
But in eBay's case it is hungry, and it will bite them in the butt eventually.

But don't worry about how they expose that butt before karma gets them.
Just be glad that it eventually will.

windorphin  (31 )        Mar-06-08 06:15 PST       61 of 70

They use the numbers to show their stockholders that listings are not decreasing. Therefore they are lying and manipulating stock prices.

The analogy drawn about a restaurant filling their seats with mannequins with stockholders driving past is a good one. It is just as meaningless, and nobody will get in trouble for it.

It would only be a violation if they somehow cooked the books to show that those mannequins had eaten and paid.

.

6 March 2008

PC Magazine owner files Chapter 11
From the Associated Press

.

6 March 2008
05:22 PM PST

eBay user comments, edited

vik*nan  (33 ) Mar-06-08 17:22 PST 2 of 31

It would be like amazon listings accidentally showing up on yahoo. Just because ebay owns shopping.com does not mean they are magically connected.

ebay's backbone probvider is level3.net

SJC-DNS1.EBAYDNS.COM
SJC-DNS2.EBAYDNS.COM
SMF-DNS1.EBAYDNS.COM
SMF-DNS2.EBAYDNS.COM

Current Registrar: NETWORK SOLUTIONS, LLC.
IP Address: 66.135.194.100 (ARIN & RIPE IP search)

shopping.com's provider is pnap.net

NS2ANY.SHOPPING.COM
NS1ANY.SHOPPING.COM

Current Registrar: MARKMONITOR INC.
IP Address: 64.94.186.80 (ARIN & RIPE IP search)

uplatewhattodo  (18 ) Mar-06-08 21:18 PST 11 of 31

AS a techie myself, I do have to disagree with this analysis a bit. Everything about DNS and IP's etc has to do with how eBay and shopping.com provide the informaton out to the world. It says nothing as to how that information is stored in the database or databases. If they are sharing databases distributed across their internal networks, or even storage arrays are being shared by the two systems then it's possible.

They did say they were running a script that caused it which means they were running data directly into the database system(s) and bypassing all the interfaces.

A very bad idea to mess with a database that way if you don't know what you are doing, but it does make it possible. And it would violate Sarbanes Oxley if they didn't cross their t's and dot their i's, which they apparently did not do.

.

6 March 2008

Despite eBay's announcement of March 2nd, that "system issue has been resolved", 'accidental' auction listings can still be found.

Seller sdc_prod_305839_99
  "67 items found" ( LINK screen shot 3/6/2008 )

Seller sdc_prod_9352_67
  "417 items found" ( LINK screen shot 3/6/2008 )

.

6 March 2008
10:23 PM PST

eBay user comment, edited

postericon  (0 )   Mar-06-08 03:29 PST  263 of 426

think the whole thing was filed under rumors speculations

these links that ur bringin here they are written by a bunch of nobodies ur credibility is in the drink, u believe everything u read, u realy expect us to believe this junk
i think what's goin on here is worse than what is goin on at ebay. too bad too a shame this forum is wrecked

.

6 March 2008

eBay Listings on the Rise! Must be the Fee Changes
My Blog Utopia!
Posted by Randy Smythe
Thursday, March 06, 2008

Excerpt:

• "I complain about eBay as much as the next guy and they certainly need to revamp their whole PR department and communicate better with sellers but this padding of listings is a non-starter." 
 

.

7 March 2008

Regarding the events of Friday 7 March 2008.

PC Magazine, 10 March 2008:

1. "An eBay spokesman told PC Magazine at the time that 5,000 shopping.com listings were erroneously placed on ebay.com."
2. "eBay was asked to again confirm that it was indeed 5,000." "The same spokesman responded Friday that he had originally told PC Magazine that eBay pulled 35,000 listings"
3. "a review of the interview confirmed that he said 5,000."
4. "Editor's Note: The eBay spokesman confirmed Monday that the number of postings pulled from shopping.com was indeed 35,000."

.

7 March 2008
03:37 AM PST

eBay user comment, edited

schmoopie77  (109 )   Mar-07-08 03:37 PST  22 of 31

The eBay computer engineers do give us software which has glitches and bugs, so I can see someone making a colossal error. But technically, can this error even be caused?

"Lieberman said the programmers inadvertently caused the Shopping.com listings to appear on eBay.com when it created and launched the script to credit the sellers' accounts for Gallery fees."

It sounds as though they would be working with accounting software, not launching listings. Very bizarre.

.

7 March 2008

eBay Hires Blogger to Improve Communications
By Ina Steiner, AuctionBytes.com
March 07, 2008

.

7 March 2008

Klicken sie hier, um diesen Artikel nicht zu kaufen
Eingestellt am 07. März 2008 um 18:57 Uhr

Excerpt:

• "Die Stellungnahmen der amerikanischen eBay-Sprecher trugen auch nicht unbedingt zur Erhellung bei. In sich widersprechenden Statements war von Tests, Versehen oder Irrtümern die Rede. Ähnlich verwirrende Auskünfte gab es auch für Kunden, die sich bei „Live-Help“ direkt informieren wollten."

.

8 March 2008

FIASCO AFTER FIASCO DOGS EBAY 2008 POLICY CHANGES
By Editor, March 8th, 2008 at 7:00 PM

Excerpt:

• "Last weekend, first rumours, then facts, emerged regarding the mass insertion of listings with no bid or buy-now button, which many speculated were deliberately added to mask the effects of the seller boycott.  Throughout the bloggosphere, bloggers dependant on eBay for their content, and ad-click revenues, gave San Jose the benefit of the doubt.  Ina Steiner of AuctionBytes even interviewed a senior eBay bod, and both Randy Smythe and eBay UK’s tame bay gave reasons why it had to be a glitch or site test, rather than something from the dirty tricks department.  First eBay spokesman Usher Leiberman said it was a test, then said it wasn’t, and then declined to comment further.  Posts appeared on eBay announcement boards, and have been all over forums on both sides of the Atlantic."

.

10 March 2008

Despite eBay's announcement of March 2nd that "system issue has been resolved", 'accidental' auction listings can still be found.

Seller sdc_prod_310426
  70 items found ( screen shot 3/10/2008 )

Seller sdc_prod_434012
  51 items found ( screen shot 3/10/2008 )

.

10 March 2008

Honest Eddy’s Used Cars oder: eBay - das ehrliche, offene Umfeld
Auktionsblog
Posted in Allgemein on Mrz 10, 2008

Excerpt:

• Trotz der Ankündigungen seitens vieler US-Verkäufer, während des Streiks vom 18. bis 25. Februar keine Angebote zu listen sind die Angebotszahlen bei ebay.com im fraglichen Zeitraum fast nicht gesunken.

  Eine genauere Erklärung dafür findet sich natürlich nicht im ebay-Forum sondern extern.

.

10 March 2008

May Day Boycott Looming, EBay Revises Impact of 'Bug'
PC Magazine
03.10.08
by  Chloe Albanesius

Excerpt:

• "eBay admitted that shopping.com listings were accidentally placed on eBay"

.

10 March 2008

Later in the day PC Magazine changes the title of their article from "May Day Boycott Looming, EBay Revises Impact of 'Bug'" to, "Another eBay Boycott Planned for May Day", and disables the AppScout link containing the lower part of the article.

And later a new  AppScout  link is created with the article reverting to the original title, "May Day Boycott Looming, EBay Revises Impact of 'Bug'".

And the interesting times continues.

Epilogue

"INCONCEIVABLE." Vizzini
"You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means."
Inigo Montoya, The Princess Bride (1987)

Two weeks after the events of Leap Day Friday, we can draw one conclusion.

• "eBay's 2008 Q1 (1st Quarter, January 01 to March 31) report to the U.S. Security and Exchange Commission should be interesting."
   

Thank you for reading.

...... returning to our March vacation ......
"Quashing and Creating Computer Bugs Since 1973"

//
//
//

Notes

Related article:

From eBay Seller Central - Ebay is padding their listings
http://eventhorizon1984.typepad.com/event_horizon_1984_blog/2008/02/from-ebay-sel-1.html

Article title:

Q: Why does the title of article keep changing?

A: We've altered the title to avoid being labeled as SPAM. Apparently Google considers variations of "sdc_prod" and "Shopping.com" to be SPAM, and removes direct links to such articles and items. Apparently late last year eBay began flooding Google with Shopping.com and sdc_prod* "advertising". Google's standard reaction to advertising SPAM is death by link removal.

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The right to publish this news article - U.S. Supreme Court - 1988

http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/scripts/getcase.pl?navby=case&court=us&vol=485&page=47

1988, CHIEF JUSTICE REHNQUIST:

At the heart of the First Amendment is the recognition of the fundamental importance of the free flow of ideas and opinions on matters of public interest and concern. "[T]he [485 U.S. 46, 51] freedom to speak one's mind is not only an aspect of individual liberty - and thus a good unto itself - but also is essential to the common quest for truth and the vitality of society as a whole." Bose Corp. v. Consumers Union of United States, Inc., 466 U.S. 485, 503 -504 (1984). We have therefore been particularly vigilant to ensure that individual expressions of ideas remain free from governmentally imposed sanctions. The First Amendment recognizes no such thing as a "false" idea. Gertz v. Robert Welch, Inc., 418 U.S. 323, 339 (1974). As Justice Holmes wrote, "when men have realized that time has upset many fighting faiths, they may come to believe even more than they believe the very foundations of their own conduct that the ultimate good desired is better reached by free trade in ideas - that the best test of truth is the power of the thought to get itself accepted in the competition of the market . . . ." Abrams v. United States, 250 U.S. 616, 630 (1919) (dissenting opinion).

The sort of robust political debate encouraged by the First Amendment is bound to produce speech that is critical of those who hold public office or those public figures who are "intimately involved in the resolution of important public questions or, by reason of their fame, shape events in areas of concern to society at large." Associated Press v. Walker, decided with Curtis Publishing Co. v. Butts, 388 U.S. 130, 164 (1967) (Warren, C. J., concurring in result). Justice Frankfurter put it succinctly in Baumgartner v. United States, 322 U.S. 665, 673 -674 (1944), when he said that "[o]ne of the prerogatives of American citizenship is the right to criticize public men and measures." Such criticism, inevitably, will not always be reasoned or moderate; public figures as well as public officials will be subject to "vehement, caustic, and sometimes unpleasantly sharp attacks," New York Times, supra, at 270. "[T]he candidate who vaunts his spotless record and sterling integrity cannot convincingly cry `Foul!' when an opponent or an industrious reporter attempts [485 U.S. 46, 52] to demonstrate the contrary." Monitor Patriot Co. v. Roy, 401 U.S. 265, 274 (1971).

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Copyright © 2008 Event Horizon, Established 1984

EventHorizon1984 Blog Log

Event Horizon 1984

From eBay Seller Central - Ebay is padding their listings

15 March 2008 -
Please read our followup article "The eBay Shopping.com Affair".  And do share it with others.
http://eventhorizon1984.typepad.com/event_horizon_1984_blog/2008/03/internet-transa.html

//

Updated 05 March 2008 19:10 HST

By the time you read this, eBay will have removed 100's of thousands of auction listings from eBay.com.  This took place between 29 February and 1 March 2008. Many of these listings eBay apparently inserted during the February 18-25 boycott.

Also by the time you read this, as 3 March 2008, eBay removed the larger eBay forum threads documenting these questionable activities. Use Google to obtained archived copies of the original threads.

http://forums.ebay.com/db2/thread.jspa?threadID=2000527568  [specified topic removed]
http://www.google.com/search?q=Is+Ebay+Creating+Listings+To+Boost+totals+Look

sdc_prod_301013_74  DBA  The Twister Group (27,291 eBay.com listings 2/29/2008) 
sdc_prod_305839_99  DBA  BargainBasementBatteries 
sdc_prod_310426  DBA  ANTOnline (21,798 eBay.com listings 2/29/2008) 
sdc_prod_409455_97  DBA  Sababa Shopping 
sdc_prod_434012  DBA  SpectrumSuperStore (35,002 eBay.com listings 2/29/2008) 
sdc_prod_442675_57  DBA  Boyne & Kelly L.L.C. (4,702 eBay.com listings 2/29/2008) 
sdc_prod_9021_2  DBA  Buy.com (12,233 eBay.com listings 2/29/2008) 
sdc_prod_9055  DBA  Focus Camera (1,925 eBay.com listings 2/29/2008) 
sdc_prod_9074_35  DBA  pcRUSH.com (21,401 eBay.com listings 2/29/2008) 
sdc_prod_9090  DBA  CompSource Inc. (32,601 eBay.com listings 2/29/2008) 
sdc_prod_9124_14  DBA  TheNerds, Inc. (48,392 eBay.com listings 2/29/2008) 
sdc_prod_9352_67  DBA  Digital Foto Club (30,278 eBay.com listings 2/29/2008) 
sdc_prod_9391_43  DBA  Adorama (11,102 eBay.com listings 2/29/2008) 
sdc_prod_9452  DBA  eTronics, Inc. (24,499 eBay.com listings 2/29/2008) 

More details regarding the above sellers are available farther down in this article.

Prior to Midnight 29 February 2008, the above list of "sellers" (the sdc_prod names) had over 200,000 lets say interesting (bogus) auction listings on eBay.com.

But don't fret. The above list may represent only "a small percentage" of the sdc (Shopping Dot Com) sellers who eBay posted auction listings on their behalf.

//
//  eBay Customer Service Transcript - 29 February 2008
//

As a matter of privacy, we've edited out the email address. Otherwise the transcript that follows, a conversation between eBay Customer Service and joelycra, is unedited.

And joelycra please forward your eBay Customer Service transcript to the news service(s) of your choice.

From eBay Seller Central Forum
Ebay is padding their listings
http://forums.ebay.com/db2/thread.jspa?threadID=2000527614&start=40
http://www.activeboard.com/forum.spark?forumID=78886&p=3&topicID=15720025

joelycra  (735 )     Feb-29-08 22:44 PST     69 of 94

OK... Just got out of live chat also. They told me these are Shopping - com listings that are somehow appearing on eaby by mistake... here's the transcript:




12:17:09 AM CST
System
Initial Question/Comment: Other
12:17:14 AM CST
System
Thank you for contacting eBay Live Help!
12:17:14 AM CST
System
You are successfully connected to eBay Live Help. Please hold for the next available Live Help Agent.
12:17:35 AM CST
System
Evan M. A. has joined this session!
12:17:35 AM CST
System
Connected with Evan M. A.
12:17:40 AM CST
Evan M. A.
Hello, thank you for waiting and welcome to eBay Live Help! My name is Evan. If you're a registered member, may I please start by having you confirm your User ID and first name?
12:17:41 AM CST
zz***@bellsouth.net
hello
12:17:57 AM CST

12:18:09 AM CST
Evan M. A.
Hi, Joe. Thanks! How may I help you?
12:18:32 AM CST
zz***@bellsouth.net
I have a question about an auction listing
12:18:58 AM CST
zz***@bellsouth.net
item 310025758222
12:19:10 AM CST
Evan M. A.
Thanks again. And I'm willing to help as much as I can.
12:19:19 AM CST
Evan M. A.
And may I have your concern about this listing?
12:19:51 AM CST
zz***@bellsouth.net
look at it.... it's not a real item, you can't bid on it
12:20:15 AM CST
zz***@bellsouth.net
these listings are in every category.... on the last page of listings
12:21:40 AM CST
Evan M. A.
Oh, okay. I understand what you mean. And let me try to look up on this listing.
12:24:19 AM CST
zz****@bellsouth.net
some of these SDC sellers have 30-40 thousand listings, and who knows how many SDC sellers there are
12:24:20 AM CST
Evan M. A.
Please give me another couple of minutes to look in to this for you.
12:26:10 AM CST
Evan M. A.
Oh, I see. I'm still looking this up for you, okay?
12:26:16 AM CST
zz****@bellsouth.net
ok
12:27:40 AM CST
Evan M. A.
Thank you.
12:30:15 AM CST
Evan M. A.
Thanks for patiently waiting. I see that the listing is listed under the eBay Express. What I can do is to redirect you now to our eBay Express chat, for more assistance about this listing.
12:30:29 AM CST
Evan M. A.
What IÈUlike to do is connect you with our eBay Express chat, for help with this. There may be a wait time to speak to someone after I? transferred you, but it shouldn?be too long. In case this chat disconnects please feel free to come back into eBay Live Help by clicking on our link on the eBay homepage. May I go ahead and do that now?
12:30:51 AM CST
zz****@bellsouth.net
these are not ebay express listings
12:31:03 AM CST
zz****@bellsouth.net
these are auctions
12:31:50 AM CST
Evan M. A.
I see. Actually, this is not an eBay listing, the problem is it's a Shopping.com listing that is showing on our site by mistake.
12:32:25 AM CST
Evan M. A.
It is a current issue, yes, we have a bug on it. These are meant to be on shopping.com only but due to some reason are showing on eBay as well and can't be bought through the site.
12:33:32 AM CST
zz****@bellsouth.net
ok... that's what I needed... Thanks
12:34:25 AM CST
Evan M. A.
You're most welcome. Do you have any other concerns, Joe?
12:35:29 AM CST
zz****@bellsouth.net
no, thanks
12:35:35 AM CST
Evan M. A.
Thanks for using eBay Live Help! Once youˆÂ ready to close this chat window, please feel free to click on the º–it?utton.
12:35:40 AM CST
Evan M. A.
It's a pleasure chatting with you. Have a good night!


There could be millions of these listings.... just go to the last page of items in any category sorted by "ending soonest" and you'll find them.

//
//  eBay Customer Service Transcript - 1 March 2008
//

From the eBay Feedback Forum
Is Ebay Creating Listings To Boost totals Look
http://forums.ebay.com/db2/thread.jspa?threadID=2000527568&start=1080
http://www.activeboard.com/forum.spark?forumID=78886&p=3&topicID=15720025
http://www.google.com/search?q=Is+Ebay+Creating+Listings+To+Boost+totals+Look

idee99555  (0 ) View Listings | Report     Mar-01-08 19:03 PST     1082 of 1119

All right you guys. I went to live chat today to try and see what their story was on the inflated listings. I'm going to post the transcript. I don't see how it infracts the guidlines, but in case it gets pulled and anyone else wants it, email me. This is long and kind of disjointed, but this is the way it came to me. I had to request a transcript because the copy feature wouldn't work.

Dear eBay member,



Transcript of Session Number: 9852546
3/1/2008 14:35 Agent Sent Message: Hello, thank you for waiting and
welcome to eBay Live Help! My name is Lanie. If you're a registered
member, may I please start by having you confirm your User ID and first

name?
3/1/2008 14:35 Customer Sent Message: idee99555
3/1/2008 14:36 Agent Sent Message: Hi there!
3/1/2008 14:36 Agent Sent Message: Thanks! How can I help you?
3/1/2008 14:37 Customer Sent Message: there are some wierd listings
that have no opening bids and you can't bid on them. Thousands of
items.
What's going on?
3/1/2008 14:37 Customer Sent Message: for instance
3/1/2008 14:38 Customer Sent Message: Item number: 150217971814
3/1/2008 14:38 Agent Sent Message: I would gladly look into this for
you.
3/1/2008 14:38 Agent Sent Message: Kindly give me a moment to check .


3/1/2008 14:41 Agent Sent Message: Hi. Kindly check again the item
number. I can't seem to pull up a record on file. Thanks.
3/1/2008 14:41 Customer Sent Message: Item number: 150217971814 i'll
get you the name also
3/1/2008 14:42 Customer Sent Message: Meet the seller Seller:
sdc_prod_9452( 76)
3/1/2008 14:42 Customer Sent Message: eTronics, Inc( 76
3/1/2008 14:44 Customer Sent Message: 19808 items found
3/1/2008 14:45 Agent Sent Message: I appreciate your patience. Kindly
give me a moment more.
3/1/2008 14:48 Agent Sent Message: I saw the item and this is indeed
strange. I'm having this reported for you for investigation.Please stay

with me.
3/1/2008 14:51 Customer Sent Message: There are many others. does the
sdc_prod_#### seller designation have a particular meaning?
3/1/2008 14:54 Agent Sent Message: Hmm, for the seller's ID though, it

reads : sdc_prod_9452
3/1/2008 14:54 Agent Sent Message: I'm still coordinating with the
team
as we speak. Please give me a few minutes more.
3/1/2008 14:55 Customer Sent Message: I meant as an example. There are

others with thousands of similar listings and they have the same
sdc_prod_ and a number for seller name.
3/1/2008 14:58 Agent Sent Message: Ah okay. Thanks. The team would
reply momentarily, please continue to hold.
3/1/2008 14:58 Agent Sent Message: I appreciate your effort to let us
know about this problem.
3/1/2008 15:02 Agent Sent Message: Thanks for patiently waiting!
3/1/2008 15:02 Agent Sent Message: I'm sorry for the
inconvenience.This
is actually an issue on the site right now I'm afraid. This is actually

a Shopping.com listing that's appearing incorrectly on eBay.
3/1/2008 15:03 Agent Sent Message: Our Technical team is working on
getting resolved though, and I had this reported for you so we can add
your account to the list.
3/1/2008 15:03 Customer Sent Message: Do these incorrect listings show

up in ebays total listings/ Wouldn't they scew the listings totals?
3/1/2008 15:04 Agent Sent Message: Oh, no it shouldn't though.
3/1/2008 15:05 Agent Sent Message: The team is checking on the
accounts
of the sellers you reported as well for further investigation.
3/1/2008 15:05 Customer Sent Message: Shoudn't or absolutely doesn't?
3/1/2008 15:05 Agent Sent Message: Absolutely doesn't.This is only a
glitch on the search pages.
3/1/2008 15:06 Agent Sent Message: You can check it from time to time
to see it not on the eBay pages, only on Shopping.com
3/1/2008 15:06 Customer Sent Message: can you explain that a little
further?
3/1/2008 15:08 Customer Sent Message: I'm not familiar with
shopping.com. Why would their listings show up on ebay. Anf the one I
mentionaed has ebay seller feedback.
3/1/2008 15:08 Agent Sent Message: Sure! In the eBay account of the
seller for items sold at eBay, it shouldn't get reflected, but if you
were referring to the "items from seller" link for all items he is
selling, I'm afraid the Shopping.com items will also appear and is
confirmed as a tec
3/1/2008 15:08 Agent Sent Message: hnical glitch.
3/1/2008 15:09 Customer Sent Message: can you respond to my last
question also?
3/1/2008 15:09 Agent Sent Message: Sorry for the confusion,
Shopping.com is a specialty site owned by eBay but we handle separate
accounts. It's similar to Express or Half.com
3/1/2008 15:10 Agent Sent Message: Ah, okay, Here's what happens, this

particular seller has an account with SHopping.com to sell items, which

is a different one as an eBay seller.
3/1/2008 15:10 Customer Sent Message: Ok. Well there are numerous
"glitches" out there and they are causing major confusion and
conjecture. YOu guys need to clean 'em up.
3/1/2008 15:11 Agent Sent Message: The items listed under Shopping.com

site should only be seen in that site and not on eBay.
3/1/2008 15:12 Agent Sent Message: Yes, we truly appreciate your help
on this one and the team is on it as we speak . We do hope we can have
this resolved asap.
3/1/2008 15:12 Customer Sent Message: Should . . . there they are.
3/1/2008 15:12 Customer Sent Message: you've been a wealth of
information Lanie
3/1/2008 15:12 Customer Sent Message: Thanks
3/1/2008 15:13 Agent Sent Message: So nice to hear that from you.
Thanks for your cooperation and understanding as well.
3/1/2008 15:13 Agent Sent Message: Is there anything else I can help
you with?
3/1/2008 15:13 Customer Sent Message: bye
3/1/2008 15:13 Agent Sent Message: All right! Once you’re ready to
close this chat window, please click on the “Exit” button. Take
care! =)

3/1/2008 15:16 Customer Sent Message: I don't seem to be able to use
the copy function
3/1/2008 15:16 Agent Sent Message: You can copy or print this chat for

your reference or I would gladly send you a chat transcript,I'll just
need your email address.
3/1/2008 15:17 Customer Sent Message: I've tried copying and I get
nothing. idee99@yahoo.com
3/1/2008 15:17 Agent Sent Message: No worries. Processing it
now,you'll
have it in a few minutes.
3/1/2008 15:18 Customer Sent Message: thanks again


Sincerely,
Lanie R.

eBay Customer Support

//
//  AuctionBytes - Response from Usher Lieberman, ebay - 1 March 2008
//

AuctionBytes
http://blog.auctionbytes.com/cgi-bin/blog/blog.pl?/comments/2008/3/1204379814.html

March 01, 2008

Mystery Shopping.com Listings on eBay?

By: Ina Steiner

Sat Mar 1 2008 01:56:54

Mystery listings are appearing on eBay that don't allow shoppers to bid or buy. The listings appear to be feeds from Shopping.com sellers. A look at the User ID sdc_prod_301013_74

A discussion about the listings began Friday night on eBay's Feedback board. Some posters believe it is a sign that eBay is trying to inflate its listing numbers to mask any effects of the seller boycott. Because of the dearth of data from eBay, Wall Street analysts put a lot of credence on listing numbers to gauge the company's marketplace performance. This month, everyone studied listing numbers to try and measure the impact of the seller boycott. And sellers have been prowling the site looking for any evidence of manipulation.

Others believe the "sdc" mystery is a test eBay is running or may be a glitch.

Update 3/1/08: eBay spokesperson Usher Lieberman responded by email on Saturday, "This was a limited test that has run its course." I appreciate the update on a weekend and, if I learn more next week, will update this post.

Update: 3/2/08: eBay posted on its Systems Announcement board around 5:30 pm Eastern, "Some Shopping.com listings appeared accidentally on eBay.com over the past two days. This system issue has been resolved. We apologize for any confusion or inconvenience this may have caused."

Update 3/4/08: On Monday, eBay spokesperson Usher Lieberman said he had made a mistake when he called the Shopping.com listings a test on Saturday morning.

//
//  Response from eBay Customer Service - 2 March 2008
//

This is an interesting announcement (below). Ignores the fact many of the "accidentally" appearing items were showing 25 days remaining out of 30 days.

http://209.85.173.104/search?q=cache:nGCP4ib50X4J:search.ebay.com/_W0QQsassZsdc_prod_301013_74+sdc_prod_301013_74
"This page was last updated: Mar-01 19:00"

Let's see, 30 day listing - 25 days remaining = 5 days run, as of 3/1/2008
5 days before 3/1/2008 is 2/25/2008, give or take a day.

Guess 5 days in the real world is "two days" in eBay days.

From eBay System Status Announcement Board
http://www2.ebay.com/aw/core/200803021430071.html

***Resolved: Shopping.com listings on eBay***    
       
March 02, 2008 | 02:32PM PST/PT

Some Shopping.com listings appeared accidentally on eBay.com over the past two days. This system issue has been resolved. We apologize for any confusion or inconvenience this may have caused.

//
//  AuctionBytes - Response from Usher Lieberman, eBay - 4 March 2008
//

http://blog.auctionbytes.com/cgi-bin/blog/blog.pl?/pl/2008/3/1204635766.html

Update to Shopping.com Mystery Listings on eBay
By: Ina Steiner
Tue Mar 4 2008 04:02:46

I spoke to eBay's Usher Lieberman during the IMA conference on Monday. He said he had made a mistake when he called the Shopping.com listings a test on Saturday morning. He was trying to track it down and after talking to a few people, felt comfortable saying it was a test, and subsequently found out the listings had appeared accidentally. Usher said it was his fault for initially getting it wrong.

I asked Usher if he could tell me more, and he could not. I asked him if we might expect to see Shopping.com listings on eBay in the future, or eBay.com listings on Shopping. He said eBay is looking at a lot of different things and can't speculate on anything.

"Lots of things are on the table," he said.

//
//  AuctionBytes - Response from Usher Lieberman, eBay - 4 March 2008
//

http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2273210,00.asp

Excerpt

EBay Accused of Padding Listing Numbers
03.04.08
by Brian Heater and Chloe Albanesius

However, "the code actually rolled out three hours late, so there were a certain number of listings ... that didn't get gallery free, so we were going back and fixing that" on Friday, the spokesman said. "What happened was, when we wrote the code to implement that fix in the database table, there was a string that was left on there that populated and sent shopping.com listings onto ebay.com that it shouldn't have."

Approximately 5,000 listings were pulled from shopping.com, but they have since been removed, according to eBay.

Sellers pointed to the listings snafu as evidence that eBay was inflating its numbers to make up for losses sustained during the boycott. When the bug first emerged on Friday, the spokesman told a reporter that it was actually a planned test.

"But it wasn't a test. It ended up being a bug," he said. "So I ate a little bit of crow on that."

//
//  AuctionBytes - Response from Usher Lieberman, eBay - 5 March 2008
//

http://www.auctionbytes.com/cab/abn/y08/m03/i05/s03

Excerpt

eBay Calls Claims of Manipulation 'Outrageous'
By Ina Steiner
AuctionBytes.com
March 05, 2008

On Tuesday, Lieberman explained the nature of the glitch. Programmers rolled out code on Friday evening that was meant to credit certain listings that were eligible for free Gallery. The credit was due to them because eBay had promised sellers Gallery would be free for listings started at a certain time of day, and the code had been rolled out 3 hours past the deadline.

Lieberman said the programmers inadvertently caused the Shopping.com listings to appear on eBay.com when it created and launched the script to credit the sellers' accounts for Gallery fees.

Lieberman said fewer than 35,000 listings were affected by the glitch.

//
//  From the eBay Developer Forums regarding the "sdc_prod" name - 29 February 2008
//

eBay Developer Forums
Technical Questions: eBay Shopping Web Services
http://dev-forums.ebay.com/thread.jspa?q=sdc&forumID=1007&threadID=500004459&messageID=600012983#600012983

Replies: 4 - Pages: 1     Last Post: Feb 29, 2008 4:27 AM by: stsi.com »   
   

stsi.com
Member Since: 1/10/08
   
Read     ExcludeSellers Issue
Posted: Jan 10, 2008 11:40 AM    

Is there a limit on the number of Excluded Sellers that can be specified in a GetSearchResults call? I have several excluded sellers that keep returning search results. I have checked the XML for the call, and it looks correct.

Also, is it a problem if entries are duplicated? (I will be correcting this in any event.)

Thanks.

stsi.com
Member Since: 1/10/08
   
Read     Re: ExcludeSellers Issue
Posted: Jan 10, 2008 12:12 PM    

After further research, it looks like there is a limit of 100 excluded sellers. Can this limit be raised?

rekha.developersupport@ebay.com
Posts: 2,035
Member Since: 6/30/05
   
Read     Re: ExcludeSellers Issue
Posted: Jan 14, 2008 3:42 PM    

Hello stsi.com,

Yes the limit is 100, which most users have found sufficient for their use case. How many IDs do you have?

Best Regards
Rekha Patel
eBay Developer Support

stsi.com
Member Since: 1/10/08

Read     Re: ExcludeSellers Issue
Posted: Feb 29, 2008 4:23 AM    

Because of the wide variety of searches that we do, we could easily use 200 to 400 ID's. 500 would be a good number for us.

stsi.com
Member Since: 1/10/08
   
Read     Re: ExcludeSellers Issue
Posted: Feb 29, 2008 4:27 AM    

Also, is it possible to use wildcards for excluded sellers? For example, I'd like to exclude the various iterations of sdc_prod_*, instead of having to type in all the numbers that this seller uses....

//
//  Reaction snapshot excerpts from eBay PowerSellers - 1 March 2008
//

Is Ebay Creating Listings To Boost totals?  Strange listings...
http://forums.ebay.com/db1/thread.jspa?threadID=2000527597&start=40&anticache=1204400261806

fla***  (327 )      Mar-01-08 04:46 PST     73 of 109
(sp)Sarbanes-Oxley Act.

also known as the Public Company Accounting Reform and Investor Protection Act of 2002 and commonly called SOx or Sarbox; is a United States federal law enacted on July 30, 2002 in response to a number of major corporate and accounting scandals including those affecting Enron, Tyco International, Adelphia, Peregrine Systems and WorldCom. These scandals, which cost investors billions of dollars when the share prices of the affected companies collapsed, shook public confidence in the nation's securities markets.
The legislation establishes new or enhanced standards for all U.S. public company boards, management, and public accounting firms. The Act contains 11 titles, or sections, ranging from additional Corporate Board responsibilities to criminal penalties, and requires the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to implement rulings on requirements to comply with the new law.
The Act establishes a new quasi-public agency, the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board, or PCAOB, which is charged with overseeing, regulating, inspecting, and disciplining accounting firms in their roles as auditors of public companies. The Act also covers issues such as auditor independence, corporate governance, internal control assessment, and enhanced financial disclosure.

djc***  (3827 )        Mar-01-08 09:04 PST       88 of 110
Doing a little cleaning up, maybe?

djc***  (3827 )      Mar-01-08 09:46 PST     93 of 110
I don't know if it's a glitch, hack or purposeful deception. However, what makes it curious is all the auctions I looked at started last Thursday the day after the listing sale ended.

cmi***  (1712 )        Mar-01-08 09:52 PST       94 of 110
I don't know if it's a glitch, hack or purposeful deception. However, what makes it curious is all the auctions I looked at started last Thursday the day after the listing sale ended.

I noticed that too, 9 days ago they started. Awfully peculiar timing considering the "boycott" and all.

nan***  (9616 )         Mar-02-08 07:38 PST       133 of 280
Also Most if not all keep you from purchasing the items.

From this post (many are developers)
http://forums.ebay.com/db2/thread.jspa?threadID=2000527568
there are several people who asked Live Help and sent emails and one got Oh there is an error and another got it is just a test.

They are c&P all the auctions they can before they disappear.

Many are notifying all the media sources they can.

vq5***  (1072 )       Mar-02-08 09:04 PST       138 of 280
Update 3/1/08: eBay spokesperson Usher Lieberman responded by email on Saturday, "This was a limited test that has run its course." I appreciate the update on a weekend and, if I learn more next week, will update this post.

dar***  (369 )      Mar-02-08 09:06 PST     139 of 280
Why did they have to "Test" THAT MANY AUCTIONS during a boycott week?

avi***  (3794 )         Mar-02-08 09:10 PST       140 of 280
Why did they have to "Test" THAT MANY AUCTIONS during a boycott week?

Exactly.

And if it were a legitimate test, there would be no reason to pull the listings.

vail***  (9944 )      Mar-02-08 09:22 PST     141 of 280
"This was a limited test that has run its course."

Such HOGWASH!!!!!!!!!!!!!

gui***  (2168 )         Mar-02-08 09:38 PST       143 of 280
"This was a limited test that has run its course."

Now that sounds like hogwash. There is a category just for test auctions, designed just for that purpose Everything Else> Test Auctions If eBay wanted to do test auctions they would have put them in there with a disclaimer not to bid. IMO that takes credibility away from this being a real test. I may buy a glitch, a hack, or a seller that has no idea what they are doing, but a test that is listed in the wrong category. And they yank it as soon as it is reported, come on, that one isn't believable.

avi***  (3794 )        Mar-02-08 10:47 PST       152 of 280
And eBay is sweeping the threads about this, the big one on the Feedie board is gone. SSDD.

Yep, the big one's gone and so is a much smaller one started after the first one disappeared. The big one at Seller Central is gone, but another with a vague title remains. A short thread at Trust and Safety is still there.

emo***  (20315 )        Mar-02-08 11:23 PST       156 of 280
"I think it might have been a test of dumping SDC items into Ebay."

Gee, what an AMAZING coincidence they picked the exact time the boycott was started, when the ENTIRE world was looking at the listing totals to see if the boycott was actually working!

Hmmmm.....

sno***  (12648 )        Mar-02-08 15:03 PST       166 of 285
Post #138 wrote that Ebay responded with: "This was a limited test that has run its course."

So, did Ebay actually ADMIT to involvement in those listings? They obviously are not test listings, we all know that.....But if they were performing some "other" form of test - perhaps - let's see...could it be inflating the number of listings test? What limited test are they talking about?

mag***  (6913 )         Mar-02-08 15:54 PST       170 of 285
I don't know why so many people are quick to ASSume that eBay is an evil corporate entity that wants to steal their souls and use them as currency whilst dealing with the Devil.

When I last checked, you were supposed to be INNOCENT until PROVEN guilty. From the bizarre, over-the-top posts on this thread, I have no idea why some of you even sell here.

I know that if I felt that strongly about eBay, I would do what Bruce is doing, and exit, stage left.

djc***  (3828 ) View Listings | Report     Mar-02-08 17:24 PST     205 of 286
It's inconsistent statements like these that leads to speculation.

Update 3/1/08: eBay spokesperson Usher Lieberman responded by email on Saturday, "This was a limited test that has run its course." I appreciate the update on a weekend and, if I learn more next week, will update this post.

Update: 3/2/08: eBay posted on its Systems Announcement board around 5:30 pm Eastern, "Some Shopping.com listings appeared accidentally on eBay.com over the past two days. This system issue has been resolved. We apologize for any confusion or inconvenience this may have caused."

http://blog.auctionbytes.com/cgi-bin/blog/blog.pl?/pl/2008/3/1204379814.html

gir***  (305 )        Mar-02-08 18:09 PST       217 of 286
ok the difference would be this if it was a test then ebay has comtrol over its website..the only question would be what type of test and why...this is feel ok with..............now if not a test but rather an accident then this is more of a problem...an accident is an event in which you have no control over..that would mean some one some where and some how was able to get control of the ebay computers and put all those listings on..using the same technology someone could put what ever they wanted on a millon pieces of porn or a millon pages of mad magazine etc....and also if they can control they ebay computers to do that copuld they also not use them to harvest your personal finnancial info?

oke**  (1560 )      Mar-02-08 18:11 PST     218 of 286
I don't think it was an accident, do you?

abr***  (5774 )         Mar-02-08 19:37 PST       272 of 287
If they choose to give 30 day auction style core listings numbering in the MILLIONS FOLKS, then that is perfectly legal for them to do. eBay has rules by which its members must operate, but these may be members of a DIFFERENT eBay club, and their rules may be much different than ours...

fre***  (6704 )         Mar-03-08 00:12 PST       323 of 367
I found something unusual. A new wrinkle. If you go to some of the big categories and show listings, select ending soonest and at the bottom you see, say,