posted on October 29, 2002 03:42:49 AM new
Hi i remember it was a few sites..i feel bad people are afraid to do this..or that it will make it disappear..i imported mine a few times over the years..i think they are thinking it transfers it..or if there are worried a good idea is to print out every page of Your feedback..
here is what the www.auctionguild.com tagnotes newsletter said about this..good luck everyoneiOffer.Com has launched a new free downloadable tool that
looks as if it will allow sellers to have their cake and eat it too.
The tool, called Mr.Grabber, is designed to import your ebaY
listings (auctions and fixed price) from ebaY to iOffer. On auction
items, the item will be listed on iOffer as a "make an offer"
listing. This way the seller can have an auction active on ebaY
and also have a "make an offer" listing on iOffer. If the seller
sells the item on ebaY, they just remove the item from iOffer, as
they have to agree to a sale before anything sells there. If the
seller makes an acceptable deal at iOffer, they can end the
auction early, or predicate the sale on iOffer contingent on the
auction ending on ebaY. Since there is no listing fee on iOffer,
this will cost the seller nothing.
If it works as advertised, this tool appears to have lots of
potential for warehousing and moving items around for sale on
the net, in addition to selling directly on iOffer. It is also
supposed to have other features, such as allowing sellers to
import their feedback numbers from ebaY, and dynamically
update that number. Since this program is downloaded on the
seller's computer, it is the seller who controls when and if it is
used, and since it is the seller using a program to access his or
her own information, it is also (currently) ebaY legal.
ebaY would probably argue that sellers have agreed not to use
their ebaY feedback elsewhere, but most users justifiably feel
that they earned the feedback independently of ebaY, and
therefore their hard earned reputations belong to them and no
one else. TAG's guess is that a court of law would see it the
same way, especially as ebaY's user agreement is so one
sided
as to be no real agreement, and therefore ripe for challenge
anyway. In addition, the media storm that would be generated by
ebaY suspending users for using their hard earned reputations
elsewhere on the net, would not only alienate more sellers, but
would be a net sum loss to ebaY. TAG surmises that this is why
ebaY has made no attempt to enforce the feedback issue in the
past, as most other sites allow users to import their ebaY or
other auction and trading site feedback, if the seller desires.
Mr. Grabber is available for download at -
http://www.mrgrabber.com/MrGrabberSetup.exe
Unfortunately, it is only available in its current form for Windows
based operating systems and for use on ebaY. TAG was told
that iOffer was working on MAC versions, and maybe even a tool
for WebTV, along with making it compatible with other selling
sites such as Ubid, Yahoo, Half, and Amazon. This tool could
make iOffer the ideal place for sellers to use as the hub of all
their online selling. When partnered with iOffer's unique
searchable profile page, and iOffer's flexibility about linking,
iOffer could well become a very viable framework for online
auction and trading industry sellers.
