John
I have held back emailing you because as you may have been told by some staff members my
personality doesn't allow for excuses or game playing with other peoples lives so it's
better a lot of time for me to just keep quiet. I spent the first half of my life in the
corporate world and I am fully aware of the games that people play with other peoples
minds and it doesn't go over well with me. I am upset and I would ask that as you read
through this email you keep that in mind.
I can appreciate Ebay's safety concerns but I think I am reading political-corporate
double-speak babble in your email to me and the others.
I just reassured +- 2000 Cricket Jr users that Ebay did not have a problem with
programmers developing 3rd party programs to assist them to bid when they _want_ to bid.
These assurances were based on what your earlier emails to me and the other sellers in
that they directly stated and as the copy of the email the bottom of this email I received
today again states.
From you dated 8/13:
"Unfortunately, though we are free to notify you of the timing of changes, we are
unable to provide you with details about their substance. Doing so may imply a partnership
or endorsement relationship that does not exist between Ebay and you. In order to not
favor any one user more than another
we will not assist any one particular set of users to gain a competitive advantage at this
time."
This was in response to the developers of these tools asking what the change would
include. We wanted a fix in our users email boxes prior to the harm to our users this was
going to cause.
8/22/98 in response to a user complaining about being Sniped:
"Posted by >SUPPORT STAFF MEMBER@ebay.com< (???) on 08/22/98 at 11:09:21 PDT
>EBAY NEW USER< at 11:00:38 PDT,
Please check our Announcement Board for recent posts concerning this type of bidding
software. Ebay always recommends that users place their maximum bid as soon as they make
their buying decision. By using our proxy-bidding system, explained in the bidding screen
itself, they only need make one bid during the entire course of the auction, and not worry
about being outbid within their spending limit."
What is the message here?
Ebay through you believes that these tools give users the competitive advantage, said so
by yourself and as shown above. A week or so later an Ebay staff member points a
complainer to the announcement board wherein the wording emphatically states the bid tools
are "being" made useless.
As you know several of the bid tool developers have been working together in the best
interests of our users to develop our individual programs to best serve their needs and at
the same time not allow a rogue Ebayer use the tool to be destructive.
I myself have spent the last two weeks recoding a compiled program to make sure that _it
is NOT possible_ for a rogue user to _NOT get caught_ abusing Ebay with my tool. I have
programmed the new yet unreleased Cricket Jr to send in all standard headers including the
From:email, user-agent:Cricket Jr, and actual ISP and host addresses. I also coded the
program so that no more than one instance of the program could be launched and have not
given the program the ability to bid bomb.
The anti Snipe whiners push Ebay every day to extend the auctions to eliminate the Snipe.
What the whiners do not understand is, it is not the Snipe that is saving the Sniper money
but rather it is bidding late in the auction. In the final analysis however, the seller
perceives they lose money to the Sniper but the Sniper gives the seller what the current
market says the item is worth.
Why is Ebay so quiet about the Snipe?
To this day Ebay fails to use the word Snipe in their bidders tips pages or anywhere on
their site for that matter. The complainer who will remain anonymous, major complaint was
that Ebay does not warn a new user of the Snipe. The Staff member response I quote above
was in response to this complaint:
"Posted by >NEW Ebay USER< (0) on 08/22/98 at 11:00:38 PDT Auctions
My message is in reference to buyers using a software to outbid high bidders at the last
possible second. I have only started using Ebay in the last 7 days and already I have been
outbid twice not by a person but by acomputer. Why are we not warned when we first sign up
about unscrupulous operators using SNIPERS!Ebuy or Robo-Bid that wiil be able to give
certain individuals the advantage over every one else. I have already sent Ebay a letter
of complaint against a specific buyer and don't know if concrete action will be taken
against that person as he/she is operating in direct violation of the User Agreement. And
who knows how many other people have the advantage of using this software ? I found it
available for sale on Ebay item#25452590 and there were 150 programs offered. This goes
against the integrity of this website which advertises itself as safe and honest. Well
whatever it is , it isn't fair to all of us and I would like to know how Ebay will handle
the problem. You know it exists."
This is the typical perception of a bidding tool. Ebay's crime is that they allow this
perception to become born to begin with. Anybody that has been with Ebay for a few months
knows there is no truth in the complainer's email above except for one. The unsafe
condition this user perceives to exist is that Ebay fails to educate the new user about
bidding strategies used by other bidders.
Ebay attacks the auto bidding tool. This attack is made under the disguise of
"Community Safety."
This complainer calls Ebay not safe because another user bids late in an auction and uses
a software program to push the button and Ebay concurs with this users misguided logic.
What this new user fails to recognize is, anybody can push a bid button any time they
want. The fact of the matter is, if this Ebayer had been properly educated by Ebay, they
would understand that it's not the tool that creates this false perception that makes Ebay
unsafe but rather the ability to bid anytime a user wants. The fact that the Sniper uses a
tool gives the new user an enhanced false perception of unfairness and Ebay fails this
user, thus the community at large by tacitly agreeing with their silence.
Every seasoned Ebayer knows they do not need a tool to bid late in an auction and
statistically, very few Ebayers are in possession of an auto bid tool compared to the rest
of the Ebay bidding population.
An auto bid tool is nothing more than a timer and when two clocks show the same time a bid
goes in. The bid tool doesn't do anything that any user with a wrist watch can do
themselves.
The demand for these tools is simply over the fact that Ebay's most avid bidders... the
ones that make sellers the most money... Want to bid the way they want to bid and
sleeping, work, going out of town or on vacation makes it hard to do so due to busy lives.
In the spirit of keeping Ebay safe due to hte ill conceived perception of lack of safety
for its users I am seconding the original proposal to Ebay that the developers of these
tools comply with some guidelines.
In addition to the limitations, Ebay could make a rule that requires the developer of any
type of auto bidding tool to register their tool with Ebay.
Your emails to me and the other developers of these tools have stated that Ebay is not
willing to discuss the issue beyond notifying the developer of the approximate time a
change is about to happen and if we have a problem with this you would be happy to have
our emails to you forwarded to counsel. This is silly. Do you honestly believe that any
developer here is questioning Ebay right to change their system? Or that Ebay can make
life very difficult for the developers including but not limited change the policy to sell
these tool on Ebay/
The stated reason of not cooperating with the developer is over an endorsement issue. The
fact of the matter is, the endorsement issue is bogus and this view can be held by the
simple fact that Ebay through you as Ebay agent, has endorsed the developing of the
product. When our government regulates something this is not construed as an endorsement
of a product.
It does not make a bit of sense to me that you say the programs can be developed but on
the other side you _NOW_ say Ebay is going to do everything it can to stop the use of the
bidding tool by notifying the developers that Ebay is going to continue to create security
schemes to stop the tools from being made. You didn't say this directly but no other
inference can be made.
It would make more sense to me if Ebay were to accept the offers of the developer to make
a bid tool that Ebay could view as "Safe" to the Ebay community given the fact
that Ebay can't be stopped from being made.
Ebay has falsely surmised that it's the tools that have to be stopped. In reality, Ebay
has to stop the ability to bid late in the auction to stop the tools development. You may
stop the honest developers of these tools if it comes to a hack situation, but you will
never stop the rogue programmer and by taking the actions that you are taking now you send
a personal invitation to real hackers.
I believe the bid bot issue is bogus in the context that Ebay would like to persuade their
users into thinking they exist. A bot is a bot is a bot whether it be a bot that collects
links, email addresses, prices or bids. Ebay will always have to be on "Bot Look
Out" so why has Ebay chosen to suddenly invent the word Bid Bot and make it a scary
enemy of the community?
I am not saying the threat of a harmful bot is not real. I am not saying that at this very
moment being created in a hackers dark room somewhere in the deepest reaches of the
Internet underground an evil bidding monster robot is being programmed and Ebay shouldn't
do something to protect the community from the evil bidding robot monster. I am saying
their are Robot rules that have been developed by the Internet community at large and that
these rules could or should be followed and more importantly Ebay should make a provision
for the kind of software that really does Ebay no harm as this type of software benefits
Ebay in that the most avid bidders are attracted to them.
Today Ebay is planning to put several thousands of Ebayers out of even more several
thousand dollars and what is worse is we get the Ebay textbook, "Sorry for the
inconvenience" excuse.
Do what you will and throw dust in the eyes of your community members. Tomorrow a
programmer will make a program that will morph an existing browser into their program and
push the button for them. Do everything you can to stop the auto bidding program today
because tomorrow they will just go on the black market and the price will just go up. When
that happens, then a user will have something to whine about because obviously if it gets
to this point in their development there will be _no_ rules to guide their development and
the programs will have the power to do damage.
The anti Snipe whiners and some sellers cry for an extended auction. All of us developers
agree that nothing is going to change the fact that the reason these tools exist isn't so
much for the Snipe but in reality it is a solid bidder strategy that requires bidding late
in an auction. I have yet to hear one Sniper cry too loudly over the fact that Ebay might
someday extend auctions to eliminate the true Snipe. This is because the Sniper that
understands the game does not really care about 10 second Snipes and in order to bid late,
the competitive bidder has to be there to compete.
Was your first notification bogus? And your second email now... Just an email to alert the
developers that Ebay won't be satisfied until there are no "SAFE" auto bidding
programs being offered? On 8/13 in reply to a question that in effect asked you by another
developer, Is Ebay trying to stop the auto bid programs because if so, we as developers do
not want to waste our time and our customers time.
From you:
"This change is not being made in order to disable sniping programs. However, it may
have that effect, and we know that this will impact some of our customers who sell and use
such tools. Your program may not be effected, or you may be able to modify your program to
work with the changes that are being put into place. You are not prohibited from selling
such programs on Ebay."
You now sound like a General telling his subordinates that we have a million solders so we
can afford to lose ten thousand soldiers in this battle but oh well, we won't lose the
bridge doing so.
We developers did just as you suggested. We modified our programs to work with the new
Ebay security update. 2 weeks later you tell us that your fix wasn't good enough and oh
what the hell, you guys might as will stop making them because Ebay is going to keep
making security updates and that these updates will be periodic and unannounced from now
on?
John, your emails caused all of us developers that showed you we cared to mislead many
thousands of users and subsequently post new ads announcing the fix... not to mention the
huge time and money investments by the developers and the purchasers of these programs.
The seller of Snipes has taken it upon himself to take total advantage of what has
happened here and created more fear from the users.
Your offer to request a billing credit isn't good enough. If Cricket Jr is put out to
pasture, I will make a case that Ebay is responsible for misleading us in these last few
weeks. Any refunds that become due because of being mislead should be refunded by Ebay.
So what now John? We continue to look for ways around your system with your blessing? We
succeed and Ebay makes a policy that this type of tool can't be sold on Ebay? Is Ebay
going to find a reason to suspend one or all of us because we disagree with some aspects
of Ebay's thought process?
Clearly none of us develop our software unaware of the risk of an Ebay change. Several
months ago I was I that was warning users of the potential for software getting broke.
Some very strange happened John, my users demanded I produce the product that exists today
regardless of the risk. However I must call an ace an ace and a spade a spade. Clearly
Ebay has taken many steps now over and above what we developers would call reasonable
meaning, Ebay is doing this to stop auto bidding software and using safety to the
community as their political platform.
I suppose in the coming months Ebay's cards will be laid out on the table and the truth
will be made known. I personaly am going to take the negative approach. I am going take
the position that Ebay has a hidden agenda.
Ebay has either wittingly or unwittingly made my word to my customers worthless. My lively
hood and my family's personal financial security has been attacked. In typical Ebay
fashion, no answers are provided to any questions, just political babble. I hope Ebay
doesn't expect that I just sit here and just say, Ok, crush me. Ebay's going public and it
sounds like Ebay has taken the position to learn about what public companies must deal
with when unpopular decisions are made with little regard to the thousands of users that
made Ebay what it is today. To be frank John, the time and money that has been dumped into
this type of software by it's developers and the users of this software runs into tens of
thousands of dollars. I know, pocket change to Ebay.
Dave
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