Recently eBay sued Craigslist when Craigslist reduced their ownership percentage below 25% thereby negating eBay's seat on the Craigslist Board of Directors. Earlier this week, Craigslist fired back by filing a 26 page complaint against eBay alleging anti-competitive behaviour, trademark infringement and business interference among other complaints.

The details are somewhat complex, but the case is really simple.  Back in 2003 an unnamed shareholder of Craigslist wanted to sell his minority interest (about 26%) in Craigslist. eBay wanted to buy the interest but Craigslist founders were concerned that the stock be sold to someone who held their same values. Talks dragged on until July of 2004 when Craigslist CEO Jim Buckmaster met with Meg Whitman who sold them on the idea by citing eBay's community values and code of conduce. It went back and forth a bit but in the end eBay ended up buying the stock and getting a seat on the board. Per the agreement, Pierre Omidyar took the board seat.

According to Craigslist's complaint problems started immediately when eBay started seeking what Craigslist felt was confidential and proprietary business information. Later Pierre resigned from the board and was replaced by a fellow named Joshua Silverman. Silverman who would later end up running Skype, was at the time in charge of launching Kijiji, a classified advertising site that would compete directly with Craigslist.

I am leaving out a lot of details but you can read the full complaint by Craigslist at: http://blog.craigslist.org/etc/craigslist.vs.eBay.pdf.  But what it boils down to is that Craigslist alleges that eBay used their position on the board to gain information about Craigslist's classified advertising business that they could use to launch Kijiji which competes against them. 

Another interesting aspect of the case is Craigslist assertion that eBay violated their trademarks.  You have to read down through most of the complaint but apparently what eBay was doing was a form of Keyword Spamming --a practice eBay forbids sellers to do.  Craigslist alleges that eBay purchased  keywords and phrases with the word "craigslist" in the Google AdWords Network and taking out ads with Craigslist in the headline but that had links to eBay and Kijiji.com. Here are some of the Google ads Craigslist allages eBay took out:

Craigslist.org 100% Free local classified site! Compare Kijiji and Craiglist.org www.Kijiji.com	Craigslist.com 100% Free local classified site! Compare Kijiji and Craiglist.org www.Kijiji.com
Craigslist.org Browse a huge selection now. Find exactly what you want today. www.ebay.com	WWW Craigslist.org Vast selection at affordable prices Deal with Canadians and save money www.ebay.ca

I don't know about you, but that sure looks like Keyword Spamming to me?

The case is interesting because it is essentially a David and Goliath battle of cultures -- Its the Goliath  eBay corporate culture against Craigslist David.  Craigslist is a huge presence on the web, but compared to eBay it is quite tiny. Craigslist has about 25 employees while eBay has thousands. Craigslist basic classified ad service is free, but they make money by charging for apartment and job listings. Although Craigslist has a huge web presence, eBay makes more in a day than Craigslist makes in a year. And like eBay Craigslist has a very loyal community.

Of course there are two sides to every story --and every lawsuit. eBay also released details of their complaint against Craigslist, but it was apparently highly redacted whereas Craigslist released their entire complaint. you can read about the eBay lawsuit at this link: on Cnet: http://www.news.com/8301-10784_3-9933088-7.html

I don't know the law in cases like this and eBay may be in a strong legal position here, but I used to live in California and have served on juries there. If Craigslist can get this in front of a jury they stand a pretty good chance of winning. This might be a case where eBay's duty to their stockholders could best be served by reaching a settlement out of court.

eBay could easily afford any financial judgement levied against them, but these kind of legal battles are not good for your image which is an area eBay is already struggling with.  This case is a nit for eBay but represents absolute survival for Craigtslist. Juries rarely vote to kill the little guy.   eBay's only hope is to win on some sort of technicality or point of law --but I am not sure that would represent a real win. This one looks like a lose-lose for eBay no matter how it comes out.

I was a bit shocked when I saw these numbers.  I expected eBay's numbers to be flat versus the same quarter last year, but the new Nielsen numbers showed a sharp drop.

Page Views fell over 11% from about 42 Billion to 37 Billion over the same period last year.

Unique audience (visitors) fell over 12 million users, 186 Million to around 170 Million - a drop of almost 7%.

Looking more closely at near term numbers, page views fell off a cliff in January and February and rebounded a bit in March but not back to the December levels when they were over 14 Million.

There was one positive number. Stickiness to the site improved.  eBay users spent on average about 12% more time on the site than in the same period last year.

These are very troubling numbers for eBay sellers.  I realize that the first quarter of this year was a period of turmoil with the new fee  and policy announcements coupled with the new search algorithm. Frankly that is why I was expecting flat or no growth in these important metrics, but I honestly didn't expect a drop this large.  We won't know the full impact of the new policies until the end of the third quarter of this year (September) as it will take that long for the new policies to have an effect. 

eBay announced that their shareholders meeting will be in Chicago just before the opening of eBay Live on June 19th. If you are a stockholder, you can get an invitation. The meeting will be held in the Grand Ballroom of the Hyatt Regency next door to the conference center. Typically eBay gives a little more insight into their numbers at the annual meetings than they do at the quarterly investor meetings.  This should be an interesting meeting.

On May 19th the eBay feedback changes announced in January will go into effect on eBay US. Some highlights are:

• Sellers can no longer leave negative or neutral feedback.
• The positive feedback rating (percentage) will only be based on the last 12 months of transactions.
• Neutral feedback will be counted as -1 for the purposes of calculating the positive feedback rating percentage.
• Repeat feedback (weekly) will be credited in your feedback score (this will be retroactive back to 1996).
• Members will have 60 days (not 90 days) to leave feedback.
• If a buyer doesn't respond to the Unpaid Item Process, their entire feedback (not just it's impact on your rating) will be removed.
• Buyers will have to wait to leave neutral or negative feedback for sellers "with a track record."

On this last point, they had originally said 3 days, and have just changed the waiting time to 7 days. They also finally defined "track record" as active PowerSellers with over 12 months on eBay. This has sparked more unrest from smaller non-PowerSeller sellers who feel that they are being pushed out to make room for the huge corporations.

Another change is to the Mutual Withdrawal from Feedback program. Many sellers predicted that the "alignment of Mutual Withdrawal from Feedback to the new feedback system" as announced in January would mean the program being cancelled.

We (at least I) had hoped that at the same time they would introduce a way for buyers who accidentally left the wrong type of feedback to be able to change or delete it. This was one critical use of the MWF program. Unfortunately, when eBay announced yesterday that the Mutual Withdrawal from Feedback program was indeed being cancelled (effective May 19th), they did not implement any program or procedure to cover these "accidental" negatives and neutrals.

SquareTrade dispute resolution will no longer be allowed either. I think SquareTrade has seen this coming for a while. Their business has moved far further into the warranty business and away from online dispute resolution which is now a much smaller part of their overall product offerings. In fact, it's barely featured on their homepage. It remains to be seen if the SquareTrade Seal program will continue.

Instead, eBay plans to hold a series of small events around the country during 2009.  The cities have not been announced yet, but will be announced at eBay Live 2008 in Chicago.

In the announcement Lorrie also said:

"In 2009 we are focusing our energy on smaller venues to facilitate more face-to-face interactions with our customers and community. While I can’t yet name all of the places we’ll be visiting in 2009, I can say that we intend to spend more quality time with more of you in 2009 than we have in recent memory. So while eBay Live! will not be held in 2009, we will be back with eBay Live! on August 12-14, 2010 in Orlando, Florida at the Orange County Convention Center."

 Lorrie have you ever been to Orlando in August?  Do you have any idea how crowded, hot and humid Orlando is in August?

As most of you know, eBay no longer allows the sale and delivery of digital information directly on eBay.  But think for a moment: What happens when an auction ends successfully?  What is the first thing you do after you receive payment?  In our case we send an email thanking them for the payment and telling the buyer when we will ship the item.  Then, when we ship the item, we send another email with the tracking information.

You may not realize it, but there is nothing wrong with offering the buyers something else you have for sale in this email.  It is quite common for eBay sellers to include a tag line in these emails that includes an invitation to visit their website to see their other products.

The trick is to have an information product related to what you are selling on eBay. The key to making this work is to sell in an eBay niche market. It won't work if you are selling different categories of products each week.

Here is how it works:

What if you are selling chef’s knives? The auction closes and you send an email to the customer with shipping information. The last paragraph of the email says, "Would you be interested in my book, The Care and Use of Fine Kitchen Knives?” You can read about it by Clicking Here." (The words, "clicking here," would be a hyperlink to your web page where you display sales copy about the book)

The book is nothing more than a 15 to 25 page PDF file (e-book) about knife handling and care techniques. If you don't know anything about knife sharpening or care, just go to the library and read up on it –or find information on the web.  Now, don't plagiarize some one's copyrighted material, you just want to learn the techniques and then write about them in your own words and style.

It doesn't matter what kind of product you sell, there is always a market for information about that product or product category. Just use your imagination to think up a connection that would interest someone looking at your category of product. Here are some examples:

• If you sell pet-related items you can write a book about dog training tricks, pet health or review the best dog foods on the market
• If you sell designer clothing, you could write a guide to locating outlet malls that carry designer items and where each designer's factory outlet store is located.
• If you sell any type of collectible, you could research and write articles about your collectible topic.
• If you sold bird feeders or bird houses, you could write about how to attract song birds to your yard.
• If you sell any kind of garden item, you could write a small book with instructions for building a simple bat house to attract bats that eat insects.

But what if you don't have a product or can't write an eBook. You can look on the various public domain source websites such as the Library of Congress or visit the US Government Printing Office online where you can buy copyright-free books.  The other source is ClickBank.

ClickBank lists thousands of information products on hundreds of topics that will pay you a commission when you sell them. For example, let’s go back to pet products. If you sold a dog bed, in your email to the customer you includes a ClickBank link on a video program about dog training.  If someone clicks on the link and buys the videos, ClickBank will pay you a commission. The same goes for golf. If you sold a golf club, there are eBooks and videos on ClickBank about improving your golf game.  Some of them sell for $37 and pay a 50% commission so you can actually earn as much as $18 on each sale.

Admittedly this may take some creativity on your part, but this is a great way to make some extra money from eBay and a little work and effort can pay big dividends.

We have tried to follow US news while we are on our vacation in Italy. Although I have seen some stories on it, the global food crisis seems to be bigger news here in Europe than in the US.  I know that the poor in the third world have always had problems affording food, but in the past year alone, basic food grains such as corn, rice, wheat and soybeans have risen 30% and are up over 60% over the past two years.  The main culprit is worldwide bio fuels production and specifically US corn-based ethanol.

Stay with me a minute –I will get to how this all relates to eBay.
 
For years the US Government has been subsidizing the production of Ethanol with the total subsidies now exceeding a billion dollars –and ethanol is still not economically viable. Meanwhile the price of corn over the last few years has risen from $3.00 bushel to now over $6.00 and the futures market is forecasting $8.00 by this time next year. 

The huge profits from corn entice farmers to grow less wheat, rice and other grains and shift production to corn thereby causing shortages of these other grains –the very grains that the third world subsists on.  According to the World Food Organization, about 25,000 third-world people starve to death every day so we can burn corn in our cars. And the really horrible thing is that it accomplishes nothing. Burning ethanol contributes just as much to Co2 emissions as burning oil –actually more, because ethanol is 15% less efficient than gasoline.

You can make ethanol efficiently from high-sugar plants such as sugar cane –Brazil has cut their oil imports by over 75%. But we are not allowed to import plentiful sugar cane so we can protect the small handful of sugar beet and cane farmers in the US who produce sugar that costs three times as much as it does in the rest of the world. So, since the first presidential primaries are always held in Iowa, we use corn.  I wonder: If the first presidential primary was held in Washington or Idaho, would we be making ethanol from potatoes instead?

Now on to carbon offset certificates.  This is fast becoming a larger scam than ethanol.  The theory is that if you do something that creates CO2 emissions –such as driving your car, heating your house, producing goods in a factory or flying a plane –you can purchase a carbon offset credit from someone who saves or reduces CO2 by engaging in activities like planting a tree or helping African farmers practice low-impact farming.  And yes you can buy these on eBay.

Here is an auction description from one such auction listing:

This auction is for 1 metric ton of CO2 equivalent (CO2e) greenhouse gas offsets to offset your carbon footprint. The purchaser of these offsets will be recognized by Clean Air Action Corporation (CAAC) as paid in full for greenhouse gas reductions and will be issued a certificate as shown below.

Multiple tons may be purchased by selecting the quantity desired when you "Buy It Now". You have the option of receiving a PDF certificate via email, or a paper certificate via postal mail. There is no shipping or handling charge for email certificates.

These offsets are created by subsistence farmers in East Africa and India, participating in the programs of The International Small Group and Tree Planting Program (TIST). TIST is sponsored by the Institute for Environmental Innovation and Clean Air Action Corporation. For more information on TIST activities in these countries, visit http://www.tist.org.

This auction is not only a scam; it also violates several eBay policies. Let’s deal with the scam and I will leave it to you to spot the two major policy violations.

I suspect the Clean Air Action Corporation is the brainchild of someone who wants to make money selling the certificates. I don’t know about tist.org –maybe they are legitimate, but increasing subsistence farming does nothing to lower Co2 emissions.  Yes plants consume Co2 and produce oxygen as they grow. But when you harvest, process and eat them they produce not only Co2, but other greenhouse gases such as methane.
Now, can you tell which eBay policies the listing violates (hint: there are three). Please don’t write me with the answers. We only have limited internet time while traveling.

Here is another listing.  

Just type 290224110464 into the eBay search box and you will see the listing if it has not been cancelled by eBay. This seller is planting trees in his backyard for each certificate purchased. I couldn’t put this description here because the seller copyrighted it, but this one violates at least two policies.

Both of these listings are from overseas sellers but I have seen them on eBay US from American and Canadian sellers.  I friend of mine tried this once just to see if it worked. He sold a certificate you could put on your SUV that offset you carbon emissions. He planted a tree (cost 30-cents each) for each $10 certificate sold. He had a 100% conversion rate.

If you are a regular eBay buyer or seller, you can relax because you are probably doing more to conserve energy and reduce Co2 than any of these efforts.  When you buy or sell online you are saving gas and reducing carbon emissions by the very fact of your activity. When I buy a camera on eBay or a book on Amazon that is one less trip I have to make. Since my nearest shopping mall is about 22 miles away, that is two gallons of gas I save with every trip.

So Go Green --Shop on eBay!  Oh yes – Let your congressman know you are tired of the ethanol scam. It might actually save some lives.

Skip McGrath

Karen and I are closing in on the end of our vacation in Italy.  Yesterday we drove from Florence to Sienna and then on to Rome.  Didn't know it but, Friday was a big national holiday. We arrived in Rome right in the heart of Friday holiday weekend rush hour.  I am dodging traffic, motor scooters and pedestrians trying to find a tiny little street with nothing but a crummy little map that only listed major boulevards. It took two hours, and lots of arms waved and finger gestures given at us but we finally found our hotel.

We put the bags in the room and went straight to the bar where I ordered a double scotch. It was 9 Pm and we hadn't eaten since noon, so we then set out to find a meal. All of the restaurants in our neighborhood were full and had lines of people waiting.  After an hour of hunting we went back to the hotel and ordered room service and crashed.

It's Saturday morning now. We are rested, refreshed and in ROME.  Four more days and then we are headed home. If anyone is interested we have some new photos uploaded on Photobucket.  Here is the link:

http://s303.photobucket.com/albums/nn142/SkipMcGrath/?special_track=nav_tab_album

Now - on to eBay.  We were checking the eBay Live boards this morning and there is a hilarious thread on the eBay Live discussing, You Know You are an eBay seller when...

Several of these are wonderful and worth keeping, but I can't steal people's posts and put them in my blog, but you can read the whole thread here:

http://forums.ebay.com/db1/thread.jspa?threadID=1000677328&tstart=0&mod=1208730564803

Unless something important happens on eBay in the next few days this will be my last post until I get back. We didn't do a mid-April newsletter, but the May newsletter will be out Monday, May 5th.  We will have details about the eBay Live meet and greet and my speaking schedule at eBay Live.

Ciao - Skip McGrath

Markdown Manager is a very popular option for eBay Store sellers that enables them to put inventory on sale, and market it as such. eBay says this is "the most highly-adopted Stores feature."

Now they've added another level to it. Store sellers can now have a free shipping sale. This makes it possible for store sellers to put auction-style listings on sale, whereas previously it was limited to Fixed Price and Store Inventory listings. Using Markdown Manager, this free shipping sale can be done in bulk.

eBay sellers who do not have a store still have the option of promoting items with free shipping. The selection is made in the Sell Your Item form, as usual, but you will now automatically get a free shipping icon on your listing to help grab buyer's attention.

Obviously, it is in eBay's best interests to have you offer free shipping because the shipping cost is not included in the Final Value Fee calculation. So from their perspective, they are not losing anything (in fact they may gain, because most sellers who offer free shipping just include it in the starting bid so eBay will get fees paid on that additional amount).

One issue I have with this free shipping, and this is an ongoing one, is that often sellers of heavy or bulky items select free shipping when they actually mean pick-up only. This can be very frustrating for buyers who automatically ignore the pick- up only items when they know they are nowhere near that location.

They must look through all the "free shipping" listings to see if it really means free shipping, or if it is actually a pick-up only item that has been mis-tagged. I think that with the introduction of the free shipping icon, we will see more of these pick-up only items listed as free shipping.

This one may be a stretch, but I thought my readers might get a chuckle from it --as well as making an important point.

I am not sure if it is for environmental reasons or just due to the high cost of energy, but every Italian bathroom I have been in for the past week has no light switch –they are instead controlled by motion sensors.  It took a few days but I finally realized that when you use the rest room in a restaurant, it doesn’t pay to sit or stand still. If you do, the lights go out and you are literally “in the dark.”  As most Italian bathrooms in public buildings don't have windows --it is really, really dark.

For some unknown reason, the motion sensors work very well when you first walk into the rest room. The light comes on immediately.  But once the light goes out, you really have to wave your arms and jump around to get them to come back on.  It can be quite disconcerting --being in total darkness and wildly waving your arms. Even though no one can see you, you feel a bit silly.

The experience got me to thinking that Italian toilets are a bit like eBay. Unless you keep moving –you can quickly find yourself in the dark.

We are approaching our 10th year as eBay sellers. If I have learned one thing over the years it is that eBay is always changing. In recent months it has been changing so fast that sellers have to keep moving or the lights will go out on your business. 

Unfortunately, unlike in an Italian toilet, just jumping up and down and waving your arms doesn’t help. Yes --the little guy or gal can still make money on eBay, but you have to be nimble and able to adjust to change --and most of all you have to stress business basics such as good communication and customer service. And most importantly you have to select products that are less competitive --and therefore more profitable.

eBay Live Auctions is a section of the site where sellers can take items to local major auction houses (Sotherby's, Christies, etc.) and they run a live auction from their location, including bidders from eBay.

This program has it's niche following, but it's not really the "core eBay" that we keep hearing about. As of the end of 2008, eBay will be discontinuing this part of the site.

According to Jim Ambach, "...we need to make sure our resources are aligned with our priorities. In the case of Live Auctions, maintaining and improving this platform falls outside our immediate focus."

You can read the full annoucement here. I don't think this will impact too many eBay sellers or buyers since most of these major auction houses maintain their own website where bidders can participate in the auction.

Karen and I are taking a long vacation in Italy this month. We have been planning and saving money and airline points for this trip for over two years.

Our first stop was Venice --easily one of the most beautiful and interesting cities in the world.  Venice is a true gem or geography, history, art and visual impact.  While we were here we learned a lot about the history of Venice.  History is all about lessons --Lessons learned and not learned by those who live it. One lesson, struck me as being something eBay could learn from the history of this great city.

Venice was originally found by refugees fleeing the invading hordes from the Lombard North.  In the 6th century refugees fleeing the Lombard invaders of Northern Italy sought safety on the largely uninhabited islands. The communities organized themselves (697) under a doge --an elected leader. Venice was perfectly located for handling seaborne trade between East and West, the communities grew, and by the 9th cent. they had formed the city of Venice.

Beside its perfect location, the early Venetians has a novel idea to attract trade.  In the 7th and 8th centuries, Roman and Byzantine ports levied high duties or tariffs on imports through their ports as well as other fees. The second Doge of Venice had the novel idea, that if you lowered tariffs and fees it would attract business. For over 700 years Venice offered traders the lowest cost of any trading port in the Mediterranean. Venice grew in trade, power and wealth.  From about 900 to the early days of the Renaissance, Venice was the leading economic power in the western world. And it all started by lowering fees.

It is difficult to pinpoint the exact year Venice started into decline, but the eventual decline of Venice was also due to fees and taxes. 

Around 1400 the Muslim Caliphate (Ottomans) controlled the spice trade between China, India and the Mediterranean. They began charging high fees on all the spices and goods that moved through their territory.  At the same time in Venice, the publicly elected Doges started giving way to an Aristocracy.  To fund their lavish palaces the aristocracy began raising the tariffs and fees for use of the port and the warehouses.  They also began issuing laws and regulations without input from the merchant class that had ruled the city in a democratic fashion for 700 years. Venice started into a decline that did not reverse itself until it became a tourist destination in the 20th Century.

There are many similarities to the story of Venice and the founding and growth of eBay. Early eBay sellers were essentially economic refugees;  Ordinary people looking for a way to make a buck trading with others. eBay was essentially an electronic Venice --a port that attracted trade with low fees and very little regulation.

Little-by-little however, eBay moved into its own Renaissance period.  Fees were raised little by little each year. Every year saw new regulations.  Many of the early regulations and policies were sorely needed to tame some of the wild behaviour on eBay by everyone from rogue sellers to outright fraudsters --but the regulations and policies and the new fees just kept coming.  At first they were manageable and sellers felt they had some input into the system.  But just like Venice --no one can pinpoint the exact date --at some point an aristocracy took over. Unlike the early Venetian Royals --this modern aristocracy owed its loyalty to the Kingdom of Wall Street and soon forgot the merchant class that founded and nurtured the city.

it is still early and we are not yet at the point of no return. With the number of listings declining and more and more sellers becoming multi-channel sellers, eBay seems to be listening.  I am not sure if the democratic doge has returned, but I think eBay may have figured out that you not only need the merchant class to succeed --you also need to listen to them. 

Karen and I have been in Venice, Italy attending the Venice Media Festival for the past four days. (Festival is what they call a conference here). But this post is not about the festival -it's about the trade in ilicit famous designer goods.

Like most people, I have always assumed that fake designer handbags and other goods were cheap knockoffs made in China and shipped around the world to end up being sold on the streets.  There is some of that, but today I learned the real story: It involves the Mafia (which is far more active in Italy today than in the US), corrupt local officials –and the famous names in designer fashions.

Venice is a walking city. There is not a single car in town –not even a bicycle or motor scooter. You either get around on foot --or by boat. Even the police are on foot or on the water, and this is not a small city. The numerous canals are crossed by hundreds of bridges. The main streets leading to San Marco Square or the Rialto Bridge are lined with the top fashion shops in the world.  All the big names are here; Channel, Prada, Gucci, Ferrogamo, Bruno Magli, Fendi, Hermes, Valentino and any other big name you can think of (I hope I spelled all of those correctly). But as you cross the many small bridges you have to step over and around literally hundreds of aggressive North African street vendors selling the same designer goods. Mostly they are selling handbags, but many also have belts, wallets and other accessories. One fellow even had Gucci shoes.
 
Now here is the interesting part: The goods they are selling are not really fake! Unbelievably they are the real thing –well, sort of.
 
I met a woman today who is knowledgeable in the Italian fashion trade (she is not personally in the trade but her family has been for generations).  When I asked her about the vendors and why the police just don’t round them up, she became very embarrassed, but agreed to tell me how the system works.

Here’s the way it works:  A famous designer will design a new line of handbags (for example).  They will give several of each design to different manufacturers and ask them to make a small production run. The selection of these manufacturers is “influenced” by the Italian Mafia. The contracts are let in an auction format designed to make sure that each of a dozen or so manufacturers all get a piece of the pie.

So you have several manufacturers making hundreds of the same bag.  Now the manufacturers all submit their work to the designer   The designer picks the best production quality manufacturer of each design and that manufacturer is selected for the large production run of the goods that will end up in the designer boutiques selling for 1000 Euros or more. 

So what happens to all the hundreds, or even thousands, of other bags from the manufacturers who weren’t selected?  You guessed it.  They are distributed to the North African street vendors by the same Mafia that arranged the auctions. They are not fakes, they were actually made by the same manufactures who make the real goods. The bags have the authentic holograms and identity cards from the big name designers. And, when you pick them up and examine them, the quality from the stitching to the materials is excellent. About the only difference is that the final authorized run of bags will have correct ID numbers and often a secret little mark hidden in the bag so a store can tell if it is an authorized bag if someone tries to return one or brings it in for repair. So the bags are not cheap knockoffs –they just aren’t the “final authorized” version.

You would think that in a city like Venice this trade would be easy to shut down.  If the tourists have to step over and around the vendors, the Carabinieri (the very efficient and professional Italian police force), or even the local Venice Polizia, could easily put a stop to the street trade? They could –if they were allowed. But they are not –and this is where the local government corruption comes in. It seems the famous designers who have a lot of clout in a city like Venice don’t really want the trade shut down.

Here is how silly it is. The city fathers of Venice recently enacted a law that says “any tourist buying an item from the street vendors can be fined 50 Euros (about $75).”  So instead of simply dispersing the vendors or arresting them, they pretend to watch out for tourists buying from them.  And the famous designers –they are part of this deal too. It is so bad that one vendor was selling Channel handbags right outside the front door of the Channel botique -literally less than 6 feet from the front door. If someone looked like they were about to enter the store he would accost them and offer his goods.
 
For all the noise the designers make about fakes –including keeping us from selling either real or fake goods on eBay, they are just as implicit in the illicit trade of their own goods. My friend, whose family has worked in the Italian designer fashion trade for generations, told me that the famous name designers actually like the fact that fake goods are on the market as it creates demand for the real thing. They louldly complain about the counterfiet trade but it is just a sham.
 
To be blunt –and very un-PC;  If you lived in a trailer park in New Jersey and saw your neighbor walking out of her doublewide sporting a Hermes handbag, you would probably assume it was a knockoff. But if you saw the same woman step out of a Mercedes, wearing fashionable clothing, you would most likely assume it was the real thing.  When folks who live in Beverly Hills or on Park Avenue walk around wearing or carrying Gucci, Prada or Fendi –it is usually the real deal. They know it and you know it –and that is what the famous designers are banking on. They don’t really care if Paula from Pittsburgh carries a fake bag to the Thursday Night Elk’s Club Dinner as long as Martha from Manhattan drops her whole monthly paycheck on a real Gucci bag so she can impress her friends.

So eBay –if you are listening; When Gucci, Fendi, Hermes or Prada files a Vero report against an eBay seller for listing a designer handbag and you shut down the seller’s auction, you are unintentionally doing your small part to help perpetuate this worldwide scam.

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On another side note from Venice; Last night we discovered the best hamburger in Italy.  No – I didn’t come to Italy looking for hamburgers. I love Italian food and plan to eat my way across the country trying every local dish I can.  We discovered this amazing hamburger quite by accident.

Karen and I are staying on the Island of Lido, about 1 mile across the lagoon from Venice. It is connected by an hourly boat service from our hotel. After an exhausting day of touring Venice yesterday, we decided to return to our hotel and have dinner in the small village of Lido. There are some great little trattorias here and the prices are about ½ what they are across the lagoon in Venice.  Walking down the street we passed a small outdoor kiosk-type café with a few bar stools and a tented area with a few seats.  I smelled the most wonderful smell and stopped to look.
 
The owner (a young fellow named Lorenzo) was cooking up what looked like the most wonderful burgers and the smell was incredible.  As I watched him he loaded the burger up with lettuce and tomato, poured some olive oil over it and then a few dashes of Tabasco. Next he puts the burger together and places the whole thing in a Panini press. I couldn’t resist so Karen and I ordered a pair of burgers, a half-liter of red wine and took a seat. Within a few minutes Lorenzo brought us what turned out to be one of the best hamburgers I have ever had. Instead of a hamburger roll, the bread was a cross between Italian bread and a ciabatta roll --firm and delicious. One of my Christmas presents last year was a Panini press. I can’t wait to try this when I get home.

If you ever get to Venice, visit the island of Lido and look for Lorenzo at a place called Bella Biglia just after the traffic circle as you enter the main street of the village of Lido.

Today is the last day of the Venice Media festival so the business part of our trip is over and the vacation part begins. We are now off to the little mountain village of Asolo.

In my next post I will tell you what eBay could learn from Venetian history.

eBay tries things out there to see how they work and how loud members howl before rolling them out in the US.  Here is an interesting email I received from one of my readers.

Hi Skip

Just on the odd chance another Aussie fan of yours hasn’t brought this to your attention already.

If you sell on eBay or run a small website business you know that eBay wholesale product sourcing is one of the biggest challenges. WorldWide Brands is the most respected source of true wholesale information, training, research and wholesale sources for eBay and small website sellers.  Pay one lifetime fee for access to this great service.  They are offering a special discount for my readers through the end of April.  Use this link and you can save a total of $50 on the only wholesale sourcing service I currently recommend. www.worldwidebrands.com/skipmcgrath.

Karen and I are leaving for Italy tomorrow so I won't be doing a mid-April newsletter, but I hope to do the occasional blog post.  For those of you who may want to travel vicariously with us, I will be posting some photos on Flickr.  I will provide the link in my next post.

At the present time if you offer worldwide shipping and check the box to add a country, you listings will show up on that country's site --but not very well.

In May, eBay will offer sellers who list on US and Canada sites a better option for international exposure by introducing the International Site Visibility listing upgrade. With this listing upgrade, eBay US sellers will be able to list on their local site and pay a small upgrade fee so that their listing also shows up in the main default search results to buyers on eBay.co.uk.

In the US, the new eBay fees to use this optional upgrade are as follows:

Start Price -$0.01 -9.99
International Site Visibility Listing Upgrade Fee -10 cents

Start Price - $10 - 49.99
International Site Visibility Listing Upgrade Fee - 20 cents

Start Price - Over $50
International Site Visibility Listing Upgrade Fee - 40 cents

The International Site Visibility listing upgrade offers eBay sellers who want to expand their international business  the ability to show up by default for international buyers in the market selected in addition to the buyers in the seller's own market. This makes international listing economical and easier to manage than listing separately for international sites.

Data shows that depending on the category and start-price, it only takes one or two extra bids from international buyers to make up the cost of the International Site Visibility fee.

For PowerSellers, using this feature also ensures that these UK sales are counted towards their Final Value Fee discounts.

UK, Ireland, US and Canada International Support Only

At launch, the International Site Visibility listing upgrade will only be available for eBay UK, eBay Ireland, eBay Canada and eBay.com. US and Canada sellers have the upgrade option to list on eBay UK, and UK and Ireland sellers have the upgrade option to list on the North America sites.

I don't understand why eBay is only offering sellers this option in one country. It would make more sense if my listings would show up in any English-speaking country (Ireland, UK, Canada, Australia, etc.)

Skip McGrath