Internet Auction Blog

I just looked at one of my completed listings, which I started as a “fixed price” 30-day listing, with Free Shipping. Now I go look at the completed auction and it is full of external links to other peoples stuff for sale.

Not cool, eBay. You are supposed to be helping us sell our OWN stuff, I still have other items on auction, but yet my completed listings have a huge box for “Check out similar items from all eBay sellers” and then below that another huge box of “Sponsored links” that take youaway from the eBay site entirely.

Then, under all that, is a huge box saying “Find more items from the same seller. Bid or Buy Now!”

Thanks eBay, that is lame.

Well, maybe I spoke too soon with my previous posts about Gozbay.com, as they are now back online, and will hopefully be here to stay. Here is a copy of the eMail I received from them.

Hello Everyone,

Great News! Very much has happened with GozBay since November 2008. We realized that scalability was an issue as our server was experiencing millions of hits and our site was dramatically growing. I’ve had a variety of people and companies approach me with resources and now I’m confident we have an outstanding management team that is ready to take on anything.

Shortly after we took the site down, the owner of a successful IT company contacted me about GozBay. We have put an exceptional team together capable of providing the security, scalability and resources required to make GozBay a successful auction website. This team consists of security experts and IT professionals, Attorneys, and expert programmers along with me. Each of these key people has a stake in GozBay and together we have been re-building GozBay and have released an extremely aggressive new GozBay.com. Our #1 goal and our attention will be directed towards site stability and usability, after which we will focus on design and feature requests. Rest assured we have the resources and capability to grow this site into a successful auction website which meets your needs.

We publicly went live with GozBay on June 1st of 2009,and would like to welcome everyone to chat in the new GozBay forum at http://gozbay.com/community/. If you have anything that you would like to see in the new GozBay please make a post in the forum, using the same username and password that you use on GozBay. If you have forgotten either of these please point your browser to http://gozbay.com/retrieve_password.php to retrieve your info.

We want you to know that even though this is a new site, we still have all of your information that you entered when you signed up for GozBay and if you were one of the first 2000 VIP users you will still have no fees for life. Your grass roots marketing effort is what made GozBay successful and our success is your success, as all of us build this into a powerhouse site.

There are many new features that you will have an opportunity to explore as soon as you log into GozBay. An important one, which we highly recommend using, is the ability to start your auctions on the first bid rather than when you list the item. When this feature is enabled your auctions will be live but the auction duration will not be active until the first bid is placed. This will ensure that your auctions will not end without any bids. We have additional features and functions that will come online over the next few weeks.

As a parting note, the site name may change in the next few weeks. Although our lawyers are confident we don’t have an issue with the current name, we are going to play it safe and change names. We have registered a few domain names and are in the process of choosing the one we want to go public with. We will announce the change before it occurs and the existing urls will redirect accordingly for a period of time. Thanks for your support and understanding.

I am fully aware that you may have moved on but I hope that everyone will try out the all new GozBay.com. If you have any questions please either post in the forum or feel free to contact us.

Thanks for your support,

Zach

I really want to see the website succeed, although it will be nearly impossible. Check ‘em out at www.Gozbay.com.

I saw this guys “About Me” page posted on a forum today. His eBay username is “noexcusebuyer.” He is easily one of the biggest idiots I have ever seen on eBay, and he’s obviously never had to run any kind of real business for himself. Also, he typed all this crap in just two paragraphs. I will paste this idiot’s rant below:

TO ALL MY SELLERS

I DO NOT CARE ABOUT YOUR PERSONAL LIFE, PERSONAL PROBLEMS AND ISSUES, THAT IS YOUR CONCERN! I HAVE PAID YOU PROMPTLY, IN FULL WITH US CURRENCY, THIS IS A BUSINESS TRANSACTION, WE ARE PERFECT STRANGERS, I WANT MY ITEM SHIPPED QUICKLY, NO EXCUSES, PACKED WELL AND DELIVERED SAFELY IN A PROMPT FASHION! I DO NOT WANT TO BE YOUR FRIEND OR HAVE A PERSONAL RELATIONSHIP, I WANT WHAT I PAID FOR, PERIOD. I DO NOT PURCHASE HARD TO FIND, RARE, COLLECTABLES OR ITEMS ON EBAY, I AM NOT AN IDIOT. EVERY ITEM I PURCHASE HAS MULTIPLE PAGES OF ITEM LISTINGS, EVERY ONE OF THEM! I AM NOT IMPRESSED WITH THE “BLOCKED BIDDER” LIST THREAT, LET’S BE CLEAR HERE, I AM A BUYER, I HAVE CASH TO SPEND, THAT CASH SPENDS EVERYWHERE, YOU AS A SELLER HAVE AN ITEM TO SELL, YOU ARE SEEKING CASH FOR THAT ITEM, I AS THE BUYER HAVE THE ABSOLUTE UPPER HAND IN THIS SITUATION, I KNOW IT, YOU KNOW IT, LET’S NOT WASTE TIME WITH WORD GAMES. When I pay for priority, And you send by first class, I will neg you because you pocketed the difference. I will also leave you 1s on ALL your DSR ratings. Sames goes if you send me a damaged or missing item and refuse to fully refund or replace the item, at your sole expense! I am deadly serious about this, I WILL NOT BE RIPPED OFF!! ABOUT FREE SHIPPING, PLEASE DON’T INSULT ME BY TRYING TO SHAME ME WITH YOU SENT MY ITEM, FREE SHIPPING. NO SUCH THING EXISTS UNLESS YOU ARE AN IDIOT AS A SELLER! YOU HAVE INCLUDED ALL YOUR SHIPPING COSTS IN THE PRICE OF YOUR ITEM. YES, I know ebay gives you enhanced search results when you offer free shipping, THAT is your choice and between you and ebay, has nothing at all to do with me.

I expect that you, my seller, will respond to my communications, that I can communicate directly with you through ebay, that you will provide me with a DC# for my purchase and if asked for it, will respond quickly. IF you say in your ad that you ship in ONE BUSINESS DAY, THREE DAYS IS NOT ACCEPTABLE. ESPECIALLY IF YOU DEMAND PAYMENT BY A CERTAIN TIME. When I buy, I AM NOT LAIDBACK and I DO NOT RESPOND WELL IF YOU HAVE MY MONEY AND GET LAIDBACK ABOUT SHIPPING MY PAID ITEM. SOME OF MY SELLERS ARE NOT TAKING ME SERIOUSLY, CHECK MY FEEDBACK LEFT PAGE, I AM AS SERIOUS AS A HEARTATTACK, REALLY! ONE FINAL THING, DON’T SEND ME ANY RELIGIOUS LITERATURE, TELL ME GOD BLESS OR WHATEVER, I AM NOT IMPRESSED, I DIDN’T BUY FROM YOU IN ORDER TO GIVE YOU THE OPPORTUNITY TO SHARE YOUR PERSONAL RELIGIOUS BELIEFS WITH ME, I NEG FOR THAT, BE AWARE. I DON’T WANT TO HEAR ABOUT HOW MUCH YOU LOVE GOD, JESUS, BUDDAHA OR WHOMEVER OR WHATEVER YOU WORSHIP, I DON’T CARE, I DIDN’T PAY YOU FOR THAT NONSENSE! YOU ARE PUSHY, OVERBEARING AND DOMINEERING WHEN YOU TRY TO INTRODUCE YOUR RELIGIOUS BELIEFS INTO A BUSINESS TRANSACTION, THERE WILL BE CONSEQUENCES FROM ME FOR DOING SO!TO THE SELLER WHO IS SO UPSET ABOUT THE NEG LEFT WITHIN HOURS, YEA I LEFT IT. FIRST OFF, YOUR PAYPAL EMAIL ADDY WAS UNREGISTERED, WHICH FOR A SELLER WITH YOUR RECORD WAS MORE THAN STRANGE. SO I PULLED YOUR CONTACT INFORMATION AND CALLED THE PHONE NUMBER THAT YOU HAD LISTED ON YOUR EBAY ACCOUNT, SEEMS THAT THE PERSON WHO ANSWERED HAS SPORADICALLY GOTTEN CALLS FOR YOU OVER THE PAST FOUR YEARS? SEEMS THAT EVEN YOUR NEW SON-IN-LAW WITHIN THE PAST 3 WEEKS TRIED CALLING YOU AT THAT NUMBER, ONLY THIS WOMAN AND HER HUSBAND HAS HAD THIS NUMBER FOR FOUR YEARS? YOU COULDN’T BE REACHED BY EMAIL. I HAVE THE PAYPAL EMAILS AND THE EBAY CONTACT INFORMATION EMAIL, AS WELL AS THE NAME OF THE WOMAN WHO ACTUALLY HAVE THE PHONE # YOU LISTED WITH EBAY. CRY ME A RIVER HERE, OK! Thank You!

John Donahoe is legitimately an idiot for what he has done to eBay…and I’m talking about as a whole, not just the “My Ebay” pages, which are what annoys me most at this minute. Thanks to the garbage new pages, I just left positive feedback for someone who has yet to pay for an item. I also had their item packaged up and put into another customers shipment, because the “Items I Sold” page is a piece of crap that runs together. Is it my fault for making this mistake? Sure it is, but it wouldn’t have happened if the idiots who are running eBay were more in touch with their customers (buyers AND sellers) and would quit changing what doesn’t need to be changed.

John Donahoe should really know that he is a miserable failure with his current company. Every idea he has implemented, from buyers not allowed to leave NEG feedback, to the new design of the website, have been some of the worst ideas known to the modern world and are all contributors to what will be the demise of his company.

If you live outside of the United States, and purchase an item from a U.S. seller on eBay, and they will only ship via USPS Priority Mail, they have a very good reason for it.

Personally, I print all my postage labels with Paypal, and Paypal only allows for international mail to be sent using Priority Mail, therefore I must charge $10.00 to ship an item outside of the United States.

Some people will write and ask “why can’t I just pay you $3.00 and you send it by regular mail?” — well, because that would actually cause me MORE work, and I don’t want to do it. My auctions are a business, and my business has routines, and it is just a hassle to break that routine.

If you buy something from a US eBay seller, and they don’t say how much they charge for international shipping, CONTACT THEM and ask before you bid or purchase the item.

I wanted to give Gozbay a chance, because the owner talked a good game, but ultimately failed. Sure, they might claim they aren’t giving up, but it doesn’t matter. Their website has been down since October, and the webpage directs you to some corny Yahoo Group if you “would like more info on what is going on”…LOL, then you have to sign up to join the Yahoo group in order to read anything. No thanks. I’m not doing that. I don’t care enough about what’s going on to sign up for a Yahoo group.

I posted about Gozbay.com a while back and said it looked “somewhat promising”… I admit I didn’t follow up with it much, other than an occassional search. However, now when you visit their website you are greeted with this message:

Hello GozBay Members,

As everyone has noticed GozBay.com has been off line for the past 6 days due to a series of issues affecting both hardware and software components of our auction site. In June of 2008, GozBay converted to a dedicated server to meet the tremendous demands of our exploding member base. This greatly increased our operational cost but I believed the expense was necessary for our continued success. We’ve been working at a hyper pace to meet the demand of our members and keep costs low.  In this environment testing and redundancy suffers and as we now know the possibility for serious issues are increased.

On Thursday November 30th 2008 initial errors were flagged and by Friday it was determined that a combination of software, OS and hardware issues were corrupting the integrity of the GozBay auction database.  A team of support professionals and myself spent days trying to minimize the damage to the operating system and salvage the integrity of our data tables.  It seemed that there were too many variables all occurring simultaneously to recover without loss of data.  OS and Hard drives had to be replaced. Live backups on the server were unreachable and when archive backups were evaluated it was discovered that backups were not occurring as intended and were unreliable.

Yes, the perfect storm, initially intermittent hardware failure corrupting data tables for days prior or longer corrupting current backups with archive backups not running as expected.  The team managing our server was unable to recover and also had not completed a total backup of the server.  All this comes several weeks short of a planned disaster recovery and penetration test scheduled for January 2009.

It is important to note that no Member information was compromised.  The end result was the loss of all auctions on the site that are unrecoverable in any form.  The majority of the Membership information, about 95%, was recovered from a remote backup from a short time ago.
Members who registered after August 2008 will need to re- register.  I realize this may shake the support of some Members and I can only hope that things will be taken in perspective both in terms of the cause as well as the relative infancy of the site.  Of course the lessons learned will only strengthen us for the future.  Your support is needed now more then ever.

These last few days were spent tracking down the issues and making attempts to salvage what could be salvaged.  I have also had numerous meetings with Jeff not only to assure his continued support and re-up of his efforts but also to formulate a carefully considered action plan.
Jeff’s scope of work for the site will expand significantly to expedite the re-launch.  The site will continue to be down for a brief time while Jeff and I and the support team work on the re-launch that will not only be faster but also safer and more user friendly with greater functionality and vastly expanded categories.  Other prior issues raised will be addressed at the same time or are already non-issues and there will also be significant user level testing prior to re-launch.

In respect to the hosting of the site we will improve all aspects of redundancy and backups along with disaster recovery testing and off site management to insure we’re never walking down this path again.

Cost? Many of you have asked about when we’re going to start charging and getting greedy. We’ll never be greedy! I may need to ask members for financial support sometime after you see the new site, posting a Web Advertisement on the site would be fantastic if you want to help.  We do plan to implement a structured fee program to create income as the site grows to cover our costs.  All VIP members will remain free for life, you’re the marketing team and you’ll be paid by no fees for life unless you choose to help out with a Web Advertisement.  Please!   It’s extremely important for you to understand that we need to be financially sound and as we become a larger delivery channel of auctions we plan to cover our cost from advertising and minor fees. I’m telling you this because I want you to know that with your support GozBay will be here to stay as an extremely low cost alternative for your business.

I understand that you’re a member of GozBay.com because you were looking for a great auction site.  We are a great auction alternative.   Please know, it’s not about becoming wealthy and taking your hard earned cash. I’ve spent plenty of my own money and huge amounts of time on GozBay.  I love this business and the excitement it creates for all of us. I enjoy building something that benefits all of us who enjoy the community.  I’m kindly asking you to stick with me, continue to support me while I get our community back on line, faster, safer and at a lower cost than any other for the functionality.

Thanks,

Zach

Man, I hope they get back up and running soon. I really want a new eBay to emerge from somewhere.

eBay continues to make really ignorant decisions. John Donahoe is an idiot. Yes, I know he went to Dartmouth and Stanford, but he must not have ever learned the saying “don’t fix what isn’t broke.” John Donahoe, you are an idiot. Starting in October, eBay will begin limiting what a seller can charge for Shipping & Handling. They will start in the “media” categories. The most a seller will be able to charge is $4.00 for shipping an item.

I often sell vintage record albums. The albums measure 12″x12″ inches in size. I buy specially cut-out cardboard to use as packaging material. I buy oversized bubble mailers to ship most record albums, or even specially sized cardboard boxes for more expensive record albums. Plus my postage and time, I will lose money by shipping these record albums for $4.00.

The US Postal Service allows for “media mail” to weigh as much as 70lbs! I also often sell large collections of books which weigh nearly 50lbs. These CANNOT be shipped for only $4.00 as eBay insists. So what are we supposed to do? eBay tells us to use the shipping calculator to charge actual shipping costs. Ridiculous. So sellers aren’t supposed to be compensated for their time and packing materials? Only shipping costs?

I know, I know, eBay says to raise my starting price. Are you kidding? I start all my auctions at 99 cents. If I start my auctions higher, eBay charges more. This is all a ploy by eBay to capture more of our money, and they think sellers are too stupid to realize it.