Forgive my ignorance, but did Probstein carry his own inventory or is (was) he a consignment-only seller?
I saw one comment alluding to the fact that many of Snype's first auction items were recently 'sold' on ebay and are still showing as such. Does this mean that consignors had items they consigned with Probstein for eBay that went unpaid? Were these items then transferred to the new platform with the consent of the sellers?
Thinking more about this and there is a LOT of pressure on new auction platforms to 'perform' (ie, sell at comps or higher) and especially early on. All the incentives were there for Rick to (allegedly) shill the hell out of everything, even items that weren't his.
Ebay consignment is very much a questionable business model in the first place. I get the argument that "people don't want to deal with listing/shipping themselves", but it really just creates the perfect environment for self-bidding. None of the major consignment companies currently ask for the consignor's eBay account name at intake and consequently can't stop shilling programatically. I'm surprised that at a minimum eBay does not require every consignor to open up an eBay account personally in order to issue 1099-Ks directly when thresholds are met.
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