The Inevitable Demise of eBay....

[yawie99]

Originally Posted by bcornell

There's an easy explanation, although it sucks for collectors.

Collectibles are fundamentally different than commodities, because the supply & demand of the two are completely unalike. eBay is now religiously focused on commodities, the stuff that everyone knows the 'value' of. BINs makes sense for this stuff - if I want a DVD or an appliance, I know what I'm willing to pay and I don't want to wait 3 to 7 days to find out if I won it. I want it now.

Unfortunately, they've blanketed the whole site with the same model, and this hobby has suffered for it. We're now stuck with collectibles that have crazy BIN prices because the sellers have no idea what their merchandise could realistically sell for, or they're horribly greedy, or both.

It's nearly killed the site for collectibles. And for those who always say that "eBay doesn't care", you're now correct.

I fully agree with Boccabella that eBay isn't going away. Bringing together buyers and sellers is a hell of a lot tougher than most people imagine. eBay has done that.


Bill

Well said. I suppose I'm still grateful for the presence of a relatively democratic marketplace like eBay, but the site's shift away from the auction model that made it such a great venue in the first place has probably sucked as much vitality from the hobby as has the flagging economy.