Can't fight City Hall- eBay protecting their large sellers (probstein content)

[drcy]

My answer is more straight foreword and simple: Shilling is illegal, and well known hobby executives are in or soon will be in prison in part for the practice.

To be candid, it blows my mind a dealer would post on a public chat board that he thinks an illegal practice that involves deceiving customers out of their money is okay and justifies the practice. I mean, irrelevant to what are your personal thoughts on the ethics of the practice (and I understand there are honest differences of opinions and viewpoints on the practice), how stupid can one be? It's like a tax accounting posting on a board that an accounting fudging income numbers if fine with him, or a new restaurant owner posting on the local foodie board that he doesn't understand what's wrong with a cook spitting on the raw pizza because if because its cooked at 500 degrees. "Explain this to me: You're using social media to try and convince people to come and eat at your restaurant?"

For me, I think shilling is unethical and it's illegal-- a double whammy for me. I also know that an auction house or dealer does one deceptive practice, more than likely does more than one. You may not know what are the other unethical practices (alterations? deception in the sales descriptions?), but if you identify a seller as using a unethical (or worse) practice, you have identified an ethical seller. If that's not enough to convince a collector to bid elsewhere, there's nothing else I can do. But don't cry to me Argentina if a seller you know breaks the law by shilling also turns out to have sold you an altered item or overembellished the description, because I'll say "And you're somehow shocked that an unethical seller would act unethically?"

I point out that well known hobby executives in the news were prosecuted for shilling AND not disclosing at sale that items were altered and that independent scientific evidence pointed to certain items not being authentic.

My opinion is that the people who boast on a chat board that they, as bidders, have control over shilling going on and it doesn't effect or bother them because they do their homework or bid only what they're willing to bid or whatever, most likely don't have a clue. To me at least, such posts show ignorance and my guess is most of those posters are "buyers" whose opinions about been shilled will change when when they sell their collections.