posted on January 21, 2001 07:43:04 AM new
TANSTAAFL: "There ain't no such thing as a free lunch."
For a seller to make money, they have to sell items. To sell, the listing site has to attract buyers. To attract buyers, the site has to ADVERTISE, and that costs money.
So, if you want FREE listings AND sales, you will have a very hard time finding it.
And if you find it, but are unwilling to keep it in business by paying for the services you use, it will go under. The days of a site supporting itself with banners ads are over. And nobody has enough spare cash to keep a large auction site running out of the goodness of their heart.
posted on January 21, 2001 09:39:43 AM new
There is no Real Dilemma of free auction sites all that sellers need to find is a service that ties all your sales on all auction site togeather indirectly.
The free sites veiws and bidding will at
frist go up inderectly sites like Auction watch Goto Auction Smoothsales auctiva are beinging to tie many auction sites togeather with Auction searches of many sites at once some not only offer the search tools but also offer personal stores on there site with your Item displayed in a gallery.
Some offer these services for free other offer them for a small fee but for the seller that wants to sell in volume signing up for one or more of these types of sight and adding items to some fee free auction sight can help incress sales and lower costs of selling.
I dont think anyone who has been in online sales for any amount of time is truely looking for a free ride here no more. but with fees on the rise to list on auction Sites and FVF and credit card payment fees Postage cost and insurance incresses not only that all things are going up includeing inventory costs the now Riseing cost of Evevelopes card board and other packing good due to the cost of fuel and other factor they are looking at incressed cost of over $2.00 or more per item listed with a bid.
Any business not watching the pennies will not be around very long remember if you watch the pennies the dollar will take care of them selves.
A free listing and no FVF on a auction site can reduce the cost of a single sale .50 or more. every .50 you save is a dollar more made for every two sales.
Many of the new and old free to list auction sights thanks to yahoo are growing by leaps and bound many are working hard to get listed in universal searches and galleries some are already part of one or more.
The days of riseing fees and FVF for auction sales is slowly comeing to an end were not asking for a free lunch just a fair shake Right now of most of the Auction sites Chargeing fees ebay gives the best deal for your money I dont think Most will argue with that But also cant have all you eggs in one basket Either Yahoo for one isnt for me worth pay $80 to $100 a month too for $7 in sales a month and its the same for many so out Of yahoo will in time come one or maybe two new sites worth dealing with.
posted on January 21, 2001 09:49:07 AM new
Well I keep looking for other auction sites, have tried the most well known and none have compared to ebay. Most had none or very few bids, but lots of sellers.
The other day on one of these threads I saw a few good comments about eHammer, so decided to go look. I was surprised. I only looked in three categories, and there are not a lot of listings, but, there were quite a few bids on items in all three categories that I checked. And multiple bids at that.
Their fee structures seem to be comparable to ebay. So I am going to try them. I have been through yahoo, golds, bidbay and dutchbid, with very poor results, but I keep trying.
If any of you have had bad experiences or good with eHammer, please let me know, as I have not listed anything there yet, but plan to next month.
Thanks
posted on January 21, 2001 12:01:01 PM new
I agree with Abacaxi. And I believe it extends not just to auction sites, but to all kinds of free sites online. The ones who depend on banner ads to cover their costs will slowly disappear, since banner ads won't make you rich. Some small sites with only a few employees can make a decent living off banner ads and that will probably come to be the typical makeup of the free site that survives. No big sites will stay free, because they can't afford it. They will charge or die off (or both). That includes AuctionWatch. (they have already told us this is so, to their credit).
Right now we are still in a period where people are not accepting this and entrepreneurs are still starting up free businesses, so at the moment it's still possible to say "oh, well---A is charging, I'll go use B which is still free". But at a certain point I believe this type of behavior will no longer be possible. Getting people used to free-everything was understandable, but years from now in business schools it's going to be seen as the reason so many online businesses failed.
I've certainly benefited from this. Right now I'm wearing a pair of name brand, high-end hiking sandals I bought from MVP.com for $16.95, delivered. Retail on these sandals is 60-80 (i've priced them). Which means that if MVP is using keystone pricing (typical of retail) they probably had a wholesale cost of about 20 dollars....which means I got them below cost. Whole sites exist to seek out these types of deals and thousands and thousands of people use them. In traditional bricks and mortar, some people are bargain seekers while a balancing number will pay the full price simply because they don't like bothering with coupons, they're in a hurry, they're there and don't want to wait any longer, they don't think the price is too bad, their kid is screaming, etc. etc. etc. So the great sales are balanced out by the full price buyers and the store stays solvent.
Online, the shopping is different. Most shoppers go to the internet looking for a deal. (Don't pay full price for that car, Dad---let me look on the internet and see what I can find. I'm not going to buy my airline ticket right now, I'll see what kind of deals I can get on the web. I wonder if I could get this book cheaper on Half.com? I've said it myself hundreds of times in various situations.) They want convenience, but they also want to pay less than if they went to a store. This dynamic is excellent for consumers but it's also what brings so many dot coms (including the one I worked for) to crash and burn. It's a strange situation of imbalance. I think ultimately it will result in a negative for the consumer. But I'm still thinking about all this. More to come....
posted on January 21, 2001 02:40:04 PM new
thanks, soldbyj. welcome to the inside of my head.
BTW I should have said "tristone" pricing which is typical of retail, not "keystone".
Keystone is where you mark up the item by doubling what you paid for it. Tristone is when you mark it up by tripling it. Depends on the product, but dept. retailing tries for a tristone...pay $20 charge $60, then mark it down to 50% off eventually and you still make $10 profit (theoretically). Tristone tends to give a better long term sellthrough profit than keystone in the areas I worked in.
posted on January 21, 2001 04:43:56 PM new"For a seller to make money, they have to sell items. To sell, the listing site has to attract buyers. To attract buyers, the site has to ADVERTISE, and that costs money."
The suggestion of an eBay boycott was scoffed at, even ridiculed. No point in listing items at free sites? This attitude apparently ignores the problem of eBay's monopolistic strangle-hold on the online auction industry.
I acknowlege the importance of eBay for my business. In fact, I am grateful to eBay. However, without competition, eBay is free to recklessly provide any level of (poor) customer service, charge any fee and apply rules haphazardly. Unless there is an alternative auction site, we are all at the mercy of eBay.
I'm not married to eBay and I have a right to run my business as I see fit, including seeking alternatives. My impression of eBay right now is that we small-time sellers, we who built eBay, are all minks, living in tiny cages, waiting for the day when eBay cashes us all in. Does anyone still believe in the eBay "community?"
While eBay provides services, it is the sellers who bring customers to the site. Without us, eBay is nothing. I will repeat my earlier suggestion. What we need is a CO-OP free site where profits return to the sellers. The site can be administered by salaried members. I pay $500 per month to eBay. If 10,000 sellers were to donate $500, that would be $5,000,000, enough to start up an alternative site. I believe sellers would FLOCK to such a site.
Another option would be an auction-based service like Napster or Gnuzilla, which would allow sellers to bypass a host site completely. All that would be needed is an inexpensive i-escrow service. Certainly worthwhile for big-ticket items.
We built eBay and we can do it again. eBay may be the only game in town, but I am not ready to simply hang my head and succumb to eBay's whims. It's only a matter of time before eBay gives small- and medium-sized sellers the boot. Half.com and targeted banner ads are only the beginning. The time to prepare is now.
posted on January 21, 2001 05:25:19 PM newIf 10,000 sellers were to donate $500, that would be $5,000,000, enough to start up an alternative site. I believe sellers would FLOCK to such a site.
Why would ANY sellers (much less 10,000) "donate" $500 on the premise that they are going to build a site which other sellers -- their competition -- can use for free?
posted on January 21, 2001 05:48:52 PM new
Come on, Amalgamated. The $500 is a one-time fee. Compare that to the alternative of paying the same $500 or more MONTHLY to eBay. Of course the start-up "investment" could be refunded. Anyway, who says it would cost five million to start a new site? That figure was for your benefit, I personally don't think it's necessary.
There's nothing magical about Pierre or eBay. In fact, we can learn from his mistakes and build a BETTER site. Any auction site run by corporate fat-cats (like Yahoo) is only biding their time until they can jack up fees. You're right about that. I'm getting tired of being "nibbled to death by ducks."
eBay started out as a message board where collectors could share information about Pez candy dispensers. eBay wasn't built in a day. Think about it. Sellers want everything handed to them on a silver platter. That's why there's so much whining and no real progress.
It isn't about giving a free ride to one's competitors. It's about starting an auction site run by sellers, for sellers. It's easy to sit on one's high horse and say it won't work. Even a half-baked site would present competition for eBay, which is what we need most. At least I'm making a suggestion.
posted on January 21, 2001 06:22:38 PM newAt least I'm making a suggestion.
OK, here's a suggestion. If you want to compete with Ebay, forget about building a "site."
I think the only way to build a viable alternative is by developing a new technology -- peer-to-peer, person-to-person online auctions.
If you've used Napster, you've used peer-to-peer technology. The idea is that there is no central site that hosts the data. It is housed on each user's computer. And each user runs the software that ties the entire thing together.
If this client software were open-source, anybody that wanted to could design plug-ins. Maybe there would be a plug-in for feedback systems. Maybe one for payment systems. And another plug-in for automating auction managment. Companies could make money by developing and selling the plug-ins, in much the same way that auction management software works today. Users could choose which (if any) of the plug-ins they wanted to use. The possibilites are endless.
But no one could ever impose any mandatory fees, becuase there is no "site" that could be controlled by any single entity or group.
Now for something like that, I might be willing to "donate" 500 dollars.
posted on January 21, 2001 06:27:28 PM new
My problem is that if I pay to list I expect service - and it is not there. I spend close to $1,000 a month in fees this last year and when I have a problem and write power sellers some snot nosed kid that is not trained and has no knowlege of the categories and system
answers me off the top of his head with some sugary sweet non-answer that says go away and stop bothering us. I pay for this?
posted on January 21, 2001 07:09:45 PM new
"I think the only way to build a viable alternative is by developing a new technology -- peer-to-peer, person-to-person online auctions."
That is exactly what (one of the alternatives) I suggested above. The only option necessary would be an i-escrow service, and that is readily available. Most of the inexpensive items I sell would not require escrow. For sellers offering pricier merhandise, the fees would be negligible, perhaps divided between buyer and seller. It doesn't need to happen overnight. But we need to take the first step.
Look, Napster was created by a 15-year old kid on his summer vacation break. Gnuzilla is free. Although it's beyond my programming abilities, a peer-to-peer auction system is feasable. A programmer could distribute the first few thousand copies free, then continue to sell the software for a reasonable price. This is not rocket science.
All things said, and apart from the feedback forum, eBay is merely a warehouse where we display our goods. Nothing more. Although eBay may be fine for now (or it may not), many are comparing sellers' position to that of a frog in slowly boiling water. eBay's profits are way up and that means more fee increases coming and more entrance to big business on the eBay site. Mom-and-Pop sellers are already being squeezed out with nowhere to go. Simply packing up and moving to an eBay clone is not an option.
eBay is not looking out for our interests. We can either cry in our cornflakes, or start taking steps to insure that we, the people who built eBay, are not left out in the cold, while Meg and Pierre retire as billionaires. Let's stop looking for the next Gold's / Yahoo / Whatever site and take matters into our own hands. Nobody's asking for a donation. This is a matter of our own self-interest.
The programmer that comes up with the next generation of auction software will be more than fairly compensated.
posted on January 21, 2001 07:22:29 PM new
I really like your idea, Amalgamated2000. I'd been thinking along the same lines, but my ideas were much vaguer (I'm technologically-impaired) as to how it would work.
posted on January 22, 2001 02:54:10 AM new
This is the most EXCITING concept I've seen yet! Some of us helped build eBay, then left with the implementation of "It's Only A Dollar" reserve fees and spent the last 18 months building Yahoo, only to find ourselves "homeless" once again. Yahoo's fees are too high for their level of bidding activity, and eBay's are too high, going higher and higher (not to mention all their seller-UNfriendly policies).
I don't expect totally "free", either, but I expect to get a reasonable value for my money. I have to keep lowering my prices to make sales (with ever-increasing competition and less bidder interest), but higher shipping costs, payment service charges, auction fees as well as higher merchandise costs are eating into my shrinking profits. I'm SURE I'm not alone.
It appears that ANY online auction site, *once established*, decides it's time to start squeezing blood out of the sellers' turnips. And this turnip's about dry.
The idea of each seller hosting his own auctions/fixed price items on HIS OWN computer, linked to potential bidders/buyers through a website with a "Giant Search Engine" is INTRIGUING. You could set your own auction perimeters (length, day-ending, time-ending, bid increments, gallery, number of photos, on and on) or have fixed-price offerings, you don't have a company VEROing you when you're LEGALLY selling their product (or cancelling your auctions for violating some rule), you don't have to file for fees when the buyer deadbeats or the "site" goes down.
You're right that eBay is only necessary for FEEDBACK....but it also provides BUYER TRAFFIC. If sellers had only to buy software that would
1) turn their own computers into "mini-auctions" and
2) "attach" them to a HUGE network of fee-free auctions and fixed-price listings,
they would JUMP AT THE CHANCE!!! And where the SELLERS go, the BUYERS WILL FOLLOW. Buyers who are wary of sending money to sellers could do the same thing they do on eBay---look at feedback and decide whether to trust the seller with mailing the payment, use an escrow service, or rely on payment service "insurance". Ebay was thriving LONG before they started "insuring" buyer purchases against fraud and misrepresentation, and this "site" could thrive as well.
Napster didn't spend millions of dollars to be "found" on the internet. I don't think it would be long before a "site" such as this would be "found" by buyers, either, especially with enthusiastic sellers spreading the word. That would solve the problem of TRAFFIC.
I wonder why Bill Gates hasn't come out with something like this. Is this not really feasible?
posted on January 22, 2001 04:53:38 AM new
Nice ideas, but you need to be more realistic about the technological and personal problems you will encounter:
1. how to get rid of (or prevent) scam sellers and buyers? A napster-like technology would bring the sleazeballs out of the woodwork in droves.
2. how to COLLECT the fees you need to keep the site running? And yes, Virginia, because there is not Santa Calus, you NEED FEES!
Twinsoft -
"What we need is a CO-OP free site where profits return to the sellers. The site can be administered by salaried members. I pay $500 per month to eBay. If 10,000 sellers were to donate $500, that would be $5,000,000, enough to start up an alternative site. I believe sellers would FLOCK to such a site."
Are you volunteering to set it up and get it running? Or are you waiting for someone else to wave a magic wand and make it happen for you?
"who says it would cost five million to start a new site? That figure was for your benefit, I personally don't think it's necessary."
And have you researched what it DOES take? Online, real-time, interactive databases are RESOURCE HOGS! And keeping them up and running takes technical personnel 24x7 ... a competent IT staffer can pick and choose their job at salaries approaching 100,000K ($50/hour is not considered unreasonable).
GRANEE -
"The idea of each seller hosting his own auctions/fixed price items on HIS OWN computer, linked to potential bidders/buyers through a website with a "Giant Search Engine" is INTRIGUING"
And who pays for the search engine? Do you know what it takes to keep a search engine up and running?
And have you any idea of the abuse potential of napster-like programs? The porn spammers have already figured out how to jam the requests with their ads ... now imagine the reaction of a collector of pottery who opens a file that is supposedly a jardiniere and finds copulating humans instead. Do you think they will EVER be back?
posted on January 22, 2001 06:11:24 AM new
I have read some of your ideas here this morning and while I think they're very good - I really don't think we need to reinvent the wheel.
For the past year (as eBay has continued to grow) have felt that it was just a matter of time before they would raise the fees.
How many times have you heard Meg say that eBay is a "Hybrid" - combining the Internet with person to person transactions. - Well that only 2/3's right. They seem to miss the fact that it's a sales organization. We (as sellers) are really salespeople and when a fee gets raised it's like taking a cut in pay. Anyone who has ever been part of a sales organization knows that Incentives motivate people versus taking something away from them.
eBay has a ZERO team concept for us (sellers) and they know that most of us despise their corporate structure.
I suggested a year ago (I thought fees would increase in the first quarter of 2000) that if they were to consider a increase... it should graduated one. Meaning that the casual seller would pay more then the people that post items on a continual basis. This way the only ones that could #*!@ about fees were the ones who did little to increase eBay's bottom line. The fair-weather sellers would scramble to post/sell more to reach a level where the fees are less.
I (and most would agree) that there is nothing fair when 1 person posts 50 items a year while the "Powerseller" posts 10,000 and the fees for both are identical.
I also suggested to eBay to give a car/trip/cash away in a contest every month. Ex: everyone who posts/sells 100 items a month put their names in a hat (a big hat) and motivate people to sell more.
Do you think if it was well publicized it could encourage people to get off their dead butts a sell a few more items? I think so - look what the free listing days generated.
I've been doing this auction thing for 5 years on eBay and sure it has grown - but only by more people getting online. Our friends at eBay have done very little to motivate me to sell any more then I did when I started.
When Sears & Kmart were the only stores in town they had the same arrogance as eBay does today - learn from the lessons of the past, or before they know it, a new sheriff will be in town.
It's the little things that will build a great auction site.
posted on January 22, 2001 08:59:14 AM new1. how to get rid of (or prevent) scam sellers and buyers? A napster-like technology would bring the sleazeballs out of the woodwork in droves.
That would be a problem. One solution would be the third-party plug-in feedback systems that I mentioned above. It would even be easy to verify and import your feedback from Ebay or other sites.
2. how to COLLECT the fees you need to keep the site running? And yes, Virginia, because there is not Santa Calus, you NEED FEES!
Actually, you don't. Have you ever heard of Linux? That's the type of thing I'm talking about -- open source. It will just take one person, or one group of people, devoting some time to developing the technology initially, then anyone can add on anything they want. People can charge for these plug-ins if they wish. Companies could set up support systems and charge for support. Payment systems could be integrated into the sytstem and continue to charge just like they do now. But there would be no need for fees to support "the site" because there is no site.
posted on January 22, 2001 09:24:19 AM new
amalgamated2000 -
Yes, I have heard of Linux, used it, and written documentation for it ... and I am also aware that it took it YEARS of development before it was feasible for companies to actually make money selling compilations and support. It was the choice of geeks who rolled their own for a long time.
To get the bulk of the internet buyers and sellers, the software MUST be secure (distributed processing has some horrendous security problems that would be quickly exploited by scammers), the software must be downloadable ready to use with minimal configuration or able to configure itself (we're talking a user base that can barely log on and find their email, for the most part).
"It will just take one person, or one group of people, devoting some time to developing the technology initially" ... and as I asked twinsoft: May we assume that you are volumteering to get this done? Or are you waiting from some knight in shining armor to rescue you? And who will support this person or team as they do the development?
And how will this distributed auction site be able to protect it's users from "malicious plug-ins" if it does noty have an official site where downloads are made available ... I can envision some disastrous scenarios where a plug-in can be written to install BackOrifice or other spyware, then report account names and passwords to it's creator.
posted on January 22, 2001 09:37:50 AM new
If some sort of centralized control is required, what about a management contract that expires every 24 months? Members would pay fees to cover the cost and members would also vote on whether to renew the contract or to give the new contract to someone else. Perhaps the centralized site could have a message board for members to discuss the problems and concerns and even have banner advertising to help defray the cost of the management contract.
posted on January 22, 2001 10:38:13 AM newMay we assume that you are volumteering to get this done? Or are you waiting from some knight in shining armor to rescue you?
I agree that it's pretty unrealistic that this will ever get done, and I sure as hell won't be the one doing it.
I was just suggesting that if people are going to put lots of time, effort, and money into developing an alternative to Ebay it would be a good idea to look at some other options instead of building "just another web site."
posted on January 23, 2001 04:01:22 AM new
I think there's an ENORMOUS group of online P2P sellers right now who are disillusioned with the auction sites, very reluctant to invest their EFFORTS and LOYALTY to any one existing auction for fear of being used and abused yet again.
Ebay has treated its sellers like dirt almost since its beginning, in spite of its claims of "community" and "caring". The only *community* eBay ever had was among sellers and buyers, NOT between auction staff and users. They don't even *try* to hide their superior attitudes anymore, wooing big business as they continue to beat the small seller down with MORE rules, restrictions, and fees in the face of increasingly POORER service. Ebay gives less "bang for the buck" now than they did two years ago, and it was poor THEN. Every single "improvement" they make to their Auction is an attempt to capture more of your money, and it sure must be working because they just keep right on doing it. They tell you to use reserves to protect your investment against their outages, then start charging you for placing a reserve. They tell you to run long 10-day auctions to compensate for inexcusable 36-hour search indexing and "unavoidable" downtimes, then start charging you for 10-day auctions. They dilute the categories so badly your pageviews drop, then let you list in additional categories for another fee. They copy Yahoo's gallery, but charge to be included. They copy Yahoo's "buy price", but charge for it (IT'S COMING---and so is the fee for photo hosting). They offer your potential buyers enticements to shop *elsewhere* through banner ads and search results at their affiliates. And on. And on. And on.
Ebay is date rape without dinner and a movie. It's the abusive husband to our battered wives. We keep coming back for more slaps across the face because we can't find any other eligible men to marry.
So what kind of "spouse" has Amazon and Yahoo been to us???
Like father, like son. They're just like Dear Old Dad, only younger and less experienced....but catching up fast.
It's time to get a divorce but we're too FINANCIALLY DEPENDENT to make it on our own. We have to find someone else to "marry" before we can "cut the ties", and there's no auction out there WORTH MARRYING at this point. Not to mention anyone worth TRUSTING.
After being treated like flea-market, garage-sale lowlifes by our "spouses" for several years, is it any wonder we're skittish about "remarrying"???
That's why any means to sell that's BY the sellers and OF the sellers and FOR the sellers is such an inviting concept, a breath of fresh air. We need to replace the dictatorship we have now with more of a democracy.
posted on January 23, 2001 08:50:45 AM new
Granee
To quote you if I may,
"After being treated like flea-market, garage-sale lowlifes by our spouses for several years, is it any wonder we're skittish about remarrying???"
The part garage sale flea-market low lifes is apparantly the way eBay sees us to.
This is one of the reasons eBay raised it's rates to weed out the trash sellers, that what it is called on a recent interview of her highness.
posted on January 23, 2001 09:55:23 AM new
UNFORTUNATELY no one will try.they wont try new sites ,they wont try web pages,they wont try new venues.people are like cattle they do the easiest thing and follow their noses.when a change occures it ruffles the feathers then they go right back to the same ole same ole.while ebay is the best site going even for the money,competion is healthy but not in ebays eyes,they want it all or your out!people wont stick together is the other problem with a new site.to many people would just rather take less money for the same thing then try and keep the market stable.we are listing at 6 sites while its ebay that makes us most of the money we are still trying to keep them from being a total monoply.i think if more sellers tried other sites ebay might see this and change their ways but if and until that happens expect the same treatment until others try other sites.
posted on January 24, 2001 03:24:48 AM new"A napster-like technology would bring the sleazeballs out of the woodwork in droves." That's already happened. The sleazeball pranksters are already at eBay. I get 50 or more deadbeat bidders a month at eBay. eBay overlooked the obvious solution of providing the ability to block certain bidders. Their solution: bidding by invitation only.
"2. how to COLLECT the fees you need to keep the site running? And yes, Virginia, because there is not Santa Calus, you NEED FEES!" Okay, so it could be credit card-only. A similar suggestion has been repeated, specifically that Paypal could host auctions and collect the fees in one fell swoop. (I am NOT suggesting that Paypal administer a hypothetical site, only that credit card-only transactions are a possible answer.)
As for the question of whether I'm waiting for someone with a magic wand to fix things, the short answer is "yes." I'm throwing out an idea that is feasible, if some interested programmer would pick it up. Multiply a $50 software program by a million sellers, and I think such an effort would pay for itself. For the sake of argument, call it a membership fee.
"PS. I'd sign up in a minute to help." Agreed. (In fact, I'm beta-testing a product now, simply in exchange for free use of the product.)
Take Napster as a model. It was free, is free, and no doubt will remain free. Who pays their salaries? Heck, it's not even a for-profit model, yet it's trouncing just about every commercial site on the Internet. Just replace music files with antique lamps and you've got your free auction site. At any given time there's a minimum of 10,000 people on Napster. Forget about all the feedback and the escrow and the plugins and the crap. We're talking about a real-time bulletin board, nothing more. So how does Napster do it?
amalgamated2000, the Linux example is excellent.
"It was the choice of geeks who rolled their own for a long time." Hey, this is sounding better and better. Especially when you compare the alternative, aka Greedbay. Remember when they used to be about Pez candy dispensers? Who knew?
Look, abacaxi. You're taking my suggestion and trying to shoot holes in it, but there is another way of looking at this besides accentuating the negative. I am trying to make two simple points:
1) The only significant change I am suggesting is to replace "for profit" with "co-operative." That's all. Period! It can't be that hard to start up an auction site, they sprout up overnight like weeds. The ONLY difference being that at a co-operative auction site, a board of directors would be salaried, and profits would bo BACK to maintaining the site and surplus would simply go back to the sellers.
2) Sellers would flock to such a site in an instant. No one would gripe about fees that were in line with the amount of goods sold. Heck, we're already at the mercy of eBay, and our fees only buy us poorer service. But if you take the billion-dollar profit model out of the equation, I think running such a site would be cheaper than anyone realizes.
There might be some hacking or some abuse, but if you're talking about instant credit card payment, I think there'd be far less abuse than at eBay or Yahoo. Most vandals draw the line at credit card fraud. OTOH, eBay maintains a "revolving door" policy vis-a-vis deadbeat bidders. They get booted, get a new email address, and they're back. Or they just pick another of their many AOL aliases.
It may be that such a hypothetical site would take two or three years to get up to speed. So what? One big consideration is that at some point, eBay would recognize that there IS competition out there. We don't have to displace eBay. We DO have to look out for ourselves.
The part that's hard for most people to grasp is that this is not about one guy becoming a billionaire overnight. It's about attitude. Unfortunately, most dyed-in-the-wool capitalists simply cannot comprehend what that means. We'd all rather elect or hire a crook, pay him several billion dollars to skirt the law and cheat some innocents, then follow in the path he cleared. We'd rather pay someone to do our dirty work. That is not what I'm talking about, and until there is a change of attitude and people realize that some things are worth doing simply because they are right, then the idea of a seller-based, co-operative network won't fly.
posted on January 24, 2001 05:06:33 AM new
Twnisoft:
"You're taking my suggestion and trying to shoot holes in it"
Exactly. Somebody has to play devil's advocate here.
"Take Napster as a model. It was free, is free, and no doubt will remain free. Who pays their salaries? ... So how does Napster do it?"
With Venture Capital, that's how, and those guys expect it to be a profitable venture real soon or they don't hand over money.
"Napster, Inc. recently closed a $15 million Series C venture capital funding round. The round was led by Hummer Winblad Venture Partners, with additional investments from Angel Investors LP and other existing investors. As part of the investment in Napster, Hummer Winblad partners Hank Barry and John Hummer joined the Board of Directors and Hank Barry assumed the role of interim CEO."
"Napster has developed a business model for a membership-based service that will provide Napster community members with high-quality file-sharing that preserves the Napster experience while at the same time providing payments to rightsholders, including recording artists, songwriters, recording companies and music publishers. "
Well, there went the FREE part, as soon as they figure out how to collect the money.
"It can't be that hard to start up an auction site, they sprout up overnight like weeds. The ONLY difference being that at a co-operative auction site, a board of directors would be salaried, and profits would bo BACK to maintaining the site and surplus would simply go back to the sellers."
Excellent ... but WHO VOLUNTEERS TO GET IT STARTED? If you round up the 10,000 sellers willing to pay $50 EACH up front, I can get the techno-geeks and server space AND the software for it. It's a lot easier to talk to geeks when you have $5,000,000 to talk with.
