[OT] eBay tale (Was: Re: flea markets (was Re: Vintage Computer Festivals???))

[Fred Cisin]

On Wed, 20 Apr 2016, Mark J. Blair wrote:
> accounts. I did that, and was vocal about it (not that many people heard 
> me, though, as I'm hardly an influential person online).
> PayPal very quickly amended their TOS based on the very loud backlash 
> online,
Sounds as though you are more influential than you realize.

> All that being said, I've gotten the impression that eBay is more 
> anti-seller than anti-buyer.

An assumption that the situation is eBay+sellers V buyers,  or
eBay+buyers V sellers is faulty.  It is eBay V buyers+sellers.

Another obvious example of that was during the decline of the West Coast 
Computer Faire.  Previously, at "closing time", all attendees were to 
leave immediately, but show staff and exhibitors would remain for about an 
hour, to permit shutting exhibits down, putting stuff away, locking up, 
etc.  Without warning, the policy was changed to: at "closing time", 
attendees AND exhibitors must leave immediately, and only show management 
permitted in the hall.  Exhibitors were no longer allowed to enter 
even minutes before "opening time".   (setup and shutdown must be done 
DURING attendee presence)
At SOG, we presented Jim Warren with a pair of skates and told him that he 
had to come back out of retirement.


> account, I tend to think that neither eBay nor PayPal are safe for 
> anything but casual buying and selling with entirely disposable amounts 
> of money.

quite true.
There are reasons for certain policies, but neither provide reasonable 
recourse in the event of erroneous application.

--
Grumpy Ol' Fred     		cisin at xenosoft.com