posted on December 27, 2002 02:55:39 PM new
Dear Sellers:
Yesterday was a frustrating day for many of you trying to take full advantage of eBay's Free Listing Day. For this, we are truly sorry. It was a frustrating day as well for the AuctionWatch team. Our hardware and software handled the extra load flawlessly, but due to capacity limitations with eBay's API, not all listings were launched on time.
Much of what we all experienced yesterday is similar to what people experience when trying to purchase tickets online or over the phone for the World Series, or for a sellout concert: a form of "brown-out" where some sessions are dropped because the receiving end just cannot keep up.
In fact, all major auction management providers experienced similar issues yesterday getting listings placed onto eBay. Even sellers listing directly through eBay's listing services reported difficulties throughout the day.
eBay is aware of the API's capacity constraints and worked throughout the day to increase throughput. As the largest auction management provider, we are working closely with eBay to address these issues.
Your business is very important to us, and are truly sorry for any difficulties you had during yesterday's Free Listing Day. We wish you the best this Holiday season.
posted on December 27, 2002 09:36:26 PM new
I would like to thank the staff at AW for their extra effort to successfully keep the AW web site up through the Ebay Free Listing Day period. Also thanks for answering our questions in a timely manner through that hectic period. I was able to get all my auctions listed even though I had stay up late that night to relist those that were "hung up" in processing. Thanks again-many of us sellers count on the anticipated Ebay Free Listing-they don't come that often!
posted on December 27, 2002 10:40:14 PM new
I too was able to get all of mine launched. I started early and the auctions that got hung up actually started coming through in prime time. Some were as late as 10:30PM, but bidders have 10 days to place their bids if they don't want to stay up late. The total auction count on Ebay at midnight on Dec 25th was about 5,300,000. By midnight on the 26th, the count had increased to 9,400,000. More than 4 million listings in one day. This volume of traffic could very well be compared to the DOS attack against Ebay and Yahoo 2 years ago. I'm surprised the system didn't crash around noon on the 26th. I think the staff at AW is to be commended for keeping everything running smoothly at this end. Maybe next year, Ebay will be better prepared to handle the volume associated with a FLD. Keep up the good work AW. You did a helluva good job holding everything together yesterday!!
The light at the end of the tunnel will turn out to be an oncoming train.
