Thoughts.com Blogs

(originally posted on 1st January 2008)

And a Happy New Year to you all! I've decided to start this blog out of the growing discontent that many sellers, like myself, are having with ebay. So if you're a fellow ebay trader, or even a buyer, I'm sure you'll empathise with some of the things I have to say. I'm doing this as a new year's resolution, so I'm not sure how long I'll continue with it, but I should be able to cover most of what's being forced on sellers at the moment before I get bored.

I should start by saying that I chose the username "Mr E Bayer" just for this blog, because it's a fairly decent play on words (if a bit lame). It's not my username on ebay. I know that there is a mrebayer on there, but that's not me, so I don't want to deface that guy. Besides, he lives in the US while I'm in the UK. He's been a member since 2001, whilst I've been on ebay slightly longer (before the UK site was opened). Strange, though, that he's the only one that has a name like that. So if anyone is looking for a decent ebay name, you'd do well to go for variations on it such as "mr_e_bayer" or "mre_bayer" or whatever. Depends if ebay will allow it now. But I digress...

Ebay hasn't been around for that long, but since it's founder Pierre Omidyar first sold a broken laser pointer on his website in 1995 (the Pez story you've all heard is a myth started by ebay in 1997 to cover the fact that it's founder sold damaged goods to gullable buyers) ebay has grown from strength to strength into the money-grabbing internet monster we all love to hate. But Omidyar was lucky, if he tried to sell anything like that on ebay today, he'd probably get negged, reported, suspended, and have a paypal dispute opened against him:

THE FIRST EVER FEEDBACK RATING!

Maybe then he'd know what we sellers have to go through, and how bad ebay really has become due to the insane ideas implemented by ebay's middle management, and perhaps try and do something about it. Jeffrey Skoll (one of the first employees and CEOs of ebay) wouldn't really be much use. He's too busy flushing all of his ebay billions down the toilet by making crappy movies in Hollywood.

I've been an ebay member in the UK for quite some years (seems like an age!). In that time I've seen it change from a simple, yet perfect, auction site, to a place that's been warped and twisted by so many pointless rules, regulations, and features. In recent years it's turned into an Orwellian nightmare, perpetually stamping it's jackboot on the face of any seller trying to make an honest living out of it.

And we sellers really don't like it.

I may not know everything there is to know about ebay (It's a sad person who does), but I do know enough to start writing a blog like this.

I chose this blog site, because it did (at the time, before the entire account was deleted!) seem the best one available, meaning it doesn't have the tedius, childish gimmicks other popular blog sites have. It's straightforward, and easy on the eye. I only hope that the administrators of this site will allow my rantings on here, considering that they're aimed at ebay, who are worse than Disney when it comes to litigation! But then, these are my opinions, and not the opinions of Thoughts.com and I am entitled to them, whether they are right or wrong.

It's only a poxy blog!