"eBay Live! 2008 disaster sellers upset over policy change
"
This is the title of a YouTube video that was on the top page of Google when I put in "eBay Live 2008" as a search term. I thought it would be interesting to see the top links for the conference.
The link is:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IHY0r3Sn9rc
Part transcript I found on an eBay board:
SPEAKER: You know what? We can't do anything (garble) we're giving
them the level of transparency that we can.
EBAYER: They're gone! They're real (cut off). Look around your room; the room's empty! ebay live's
empty! The sellers are leaving!
SPEAKER: Ok, uh, everyone's got their opinion and you can either (garbled)
EBAYER: Look around with your eyes! Ebay live's empty! There's not even a line at registration.
Look at the empty seats in this room! Sellers are leaving because you're putting them out of business,
OVERNIGHT!
***
Hmm..so this is one of the more dramatic exchanges that came out of the convention. I found out more about this seller on Henry Blodget's blog..to wit:
"Meanwhile, we spoke to the seller/protester in the video. Here's what he had to say:
* He sells $300,000 a month of stuff on eBay
* eBay's changes almost put him out of business overnight--until he figured out how to game the system
* eBay's changes will put thousands of sellers out of business
* eBay has taken a formerly democratic system and made it a police state
* If there was any viable auction alternative to eBay, sellers would leave en masse. As it is, many sellers are throwing in the towel, setting up their own sites, and buying Google and Yahoo keywords.
* The eBay Live 2008 conference was a ghost-town: In previous years, it has been standing room only. This year, cavernous conference rooms, banquet halls, and concerts were practically empty
* A Chris Isaak concert capped off the eBay Live event. The room was so empty, the seller said, that he had a table for 10 right at the front all to himself. "It was like having Chris Isaak play in my living room." "
**
My comments..I think the descriptions of how "empty" eBay Live 2008 was are an exaggeration. Still, attendance clearly seemed to be down from last year and previous years.
I will be blogging more about this soon, but to try to strike a positive note, there were a few issues on which eBay execs seemed to be willing to correct course, such as giving sellers back a way of removing negative feedback (if warranted, presumably); more details on the Links policy, and more information about or changes to dsr's and the counting of a neutral as a negative.
- Julia, also at http://www.yardsalers.net
