PC Mag - EBay Accused of Padding Listing Numbers
PC Magazine published their article on the eBay inflating listings on their site: eBay padding listings on their site
It’s a good summary of what was happening over the past weekend. The most interesting part of that article however is they way eBay spokespersons explained this test/bug/glitch/accident/incompetence. Here is a short digest of that:
EBay on Tuesday admitted that a “bug” in its system had accidentally placed listings from eBay-owned shopping.com onto eBay.com late Friday night.
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, 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.”
….
A comment on a Tuesday Appscout post suggested that forum posts critical of eBay’s policies had been deleted.
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”
AuctionBytes further reported Lieberman said fewer than 35,000 listings were affected by the glitch.
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. One seller claimed on Saturday that he had captured screenshots that showed there were many more Shopping.com listings on eBay.
Lieberman said eBay has always been conservative without a hint of financial scandal in its life. eBay reports the number of registered users and number of listings to the SEC on a quarterly basis. Of the accusations of listing count manipulation, Lieberman said, “To think that we’d do that now is outrageous.”
It appears that
eBay lied about the cause of the mystery listings, first t was a test, then it was a bug….
eBay lied about how many listings were affected in this incident: first if was 5,000 now it is 35,000 while there are screenshots showing hundreds of thousands of listings.
eBay lied about censoring MANY forum posts calling this an accident…. how do you delete multiple threads on this subject by accident? As this eBay user indicated here: Boy ebay sure has a lot of “glitches” and “If any posts were taken down “it was accidental,”. Rbay sure has a lot of “accidents” lately. “We’re not afraid of hearing from our community and allowing them to post and discuss things and be angry on our boards.” Another lie from ebay, the comment below was posted my me on there forum it was pulled, so I re-posed it, Censored out idiot, and John Donhole, I more then made sure it did not violate any of ebay’s “polices” and they still pulled it a second time. Screw you ebay, I started taking my business to Amazon back in July of 2006 when you pulled your stunt with the ebay stores, you did not learn then and I know you will not learn not, put all the spins on things you want, lets see you fix the “bad Press” that you have gotten, let’s see how soon you get my $88.00 plus per month business back, stock holders are you reading this.
“Somewhere in this world a village is missing it’s idiot, if they look for him they can find him on ebay, he’s the guy running the company John Donhole”
eBay lied about when the listing glitch happened. According to eBay this was a glitch/test/bug that surfaced on the weekend of March 1st and 2nd: so why are listings on this screenshot dated 2/22/2008 ?
It appears that there are plenty of Videos documenting the usual eBay PR lies.
Update 3/17/2008 This Event Horizon Blog Has an eccellent compilation of The eBay SDC_PROD Affair
[...] highlighted in the past post here, eBay spokesman said regarding censored eBay forum posts on the subject eBay padding their [...]
Pingback by Oooops, another eBay forum post censored accident | eBay Fraud Scams exposed — March 9, 2008 @ 11:44 am
It is not true about free speech on their boards! I am suspended for 7 days because of sharing information and they have deleted most of my posts since my suspension. By the way another user got suspended for telling everyone on the boards that I got suspended. That too is against there boards policy. They monitor everything and delete what they don’t like! We have gotten very good at copying and pasting because we know it will disappear if we don’t!
Comment by reineeos — March 9, 2008 @ 12:09 pm
Here is one of my comments, which was pulled. I placed it on multiple treads all our gone but one. Tell me what is wrong with this (It broke policy because I have links). It is completely factual, just easier to understand!
This information is for all the people who have just found out about the changes on Ebay or do not know about the changes on Ebay. After all the changes have taken effect this will be your world of selling on Ebay:
A 4% to 67% increase on final fee’s. (varies depending on price structure, check charts.)http://www.powersellersunite.com/ebayfeechart.phphttp://www.hammertapresource.com/forum/index.php?topic=73.0.
All the years you have worked on keeping and growing a Positive Feedback percentage : GONE. It is now a 12 month rating period. (Although your entire feedback history will still be able to be seen when accessed.)
Unbalanced feedback: (Seller’s can only leave a positive. Buyers can give a positive, a neutral [neutrals will count towards your 5% dissatisfaction rate] and a negative)The potential of abused negative feedback by a competitor, unknowledgeable buyer or a retaliatory buyer will have an effect on your account in these ways:(Good Buyers do not be offended I am not referring to you. These other buyers do exist and must be acknowledged)
The Small seller who sells fewer items per year will be impacted on their percentage rating far greater compared to the much larger sellers who sell 1000’s of items per month.If your percentage drops below 5% due to neutral or negative feedback or a DSR (Detailed Seller Rating) of 4.5 this is what will be required of you:
What Pay Pal will require from you:
PayPal will require sellers to accept either PayPal or a merchant credit card and will have a 21 day hold on you account if you meet this criterion:
(21 day hold means shipping your product without the money from that purchase or risking receiving a negative due to poor shipping time.)
Seller’s Dissatisfied Buyers more than 5% in the last 30 days
Seller’s Detailed Seller Ratings in the last 30 days less than 4.5
Final price for the item (high ticket items, not based on feedback rating)
Shipping & handling fee (to much charged, not based on feedback rating)
Seller’s tenure as an Ebay member less than 6-months (not based on feedback rating)
Seller’s total number of Feedback less than 100 (not based on feedback rating)
Seller is listing items in higher risk categories (and sub categories) (not based on feedback rating)
(Pay Pal has reserved the right to make an exception per individual basis. For more info please use links provided)
What Ebay will require from you if you meet this criterion on your feedback rating:
Sellers will get a decreased exposure in Best Match. (Buyers will have a harder time finding your auctions because other sellers will be placed above yours first)
Your Auction page will have a note embedded by Ebay which will contain a red warning message in the Meet the Seller section indicating the Seller has a low Detailed Seller Rating (DSR rating.) This will happened when your DSR is a 4.1 or lower (4.1 is considered below the average and therefore not a good rating).http://www.ebaychatter.com/the_chatter/2008/02/a-test-of-a-new.html
Sellers will not be allowed to qualify to be a Power Seller and/or will lose their Power Seller status. (Below a 4.5 DSR [12 month average] or 98% feedback rating [30 day average])
Power sellers will lose all discounts if they do not maintain a rating of 4.5 or higher in all four DSRs within a 30 day period.
Power sellers are judged differently in many areas. For more info go to:http://pages.ebay.com/services/buyandsell/powerseller/criteria.html
Further information can be found at Ebay site:
http://pages.ebay.com/sell/update08/rewardsfaq/
Are you ready for these changes?
By the way, I ship for free and/or exact shipping amount charged by the post office which is printed on the label for the buyer to see. I do not charge for supplies or handling. I have not achieved a 5 on my DSR. I believe buyers are uninformed when it comes to the DSR system and do not understand anything below a 5 is detrimental to the seller on Ebay.
The time to make them listen is now.
Comment by reineeos — March 9, 2008 @ 12:13 pm
I have two IDs on ebay for selling and for buying and both of them are now suspended from not only writing, but also from reading a feedback forum. Some of my threads were completelly deleted. And I have received emails from ebay for both IDs suspentions. No specific reason given-just blue water-I didn’t follow Community board policy-Which, I assume, is freedom of speech:)) So, there is no bug in the system, it is all intentional.
Thank you
Comment by Nat Geary — May 26, 2008 @ 9:59 pm
eBay discussion boards are a by-product of private enterprise….that being eBay of course.
Do not get your rights on the ebay discussion boards mixed up with first amendment rights!
The first amendment doesn’t cover what a private enterprise does and doesn’t allow on their own web site.
You can share a lot of info on the ebay discussion boards except things like other places to sell on, this is called and pulled for: Advertising and Solicitation
Also the link to Power Sellers Unite is considered Advertising and Solicitation.
It would be nice if everyone could share and talk about other places to sell, but you aren’t going to be able to do it on the eBay discussion boards since they are not governed by the First Amendment.
Just an FYI, I got slapped around a couple of times over there myself.
Comment by Jerri — June 11, 2008 @ 11:09 pm