No More eBay ... Etsy all the way!

[DaBomb]

Recently I posted a listing about my fundraising efforts for my art project Ouija Says (http://www.ouijasays.com)with auction sales on eBay.

Effective immediately, Etsy.com is my exclusive on-line marketplace and store. I have decided to no longer sell through eBay because yesterday my listings were pulled without advance warning for the following reasons:

> your listing was in violation of eBay's Keyword Spamming policy and
> has been removed from eBay. We have credited all associated fees to your
> account and notified eBay users associated with the transaction that it has
> been cancelled.
>
> Your listing(s) contains the following information:
>
> cosplay
> raver

Because of these capricious and the seemingly arbitrary enforcement of eBay’s policies and the fact that they pulled my auctions for the second time without prior warning I will now only selling our items to support our art project entitled "Ouija Says" exclusively on Etsy.com.

My main complaint against eBay is the fact that they do not give sellers an opportunity to comply with alleged policy infractions prior to pulling our auctions. I also disagree that the words they deem to be spam keywords are indeed as such. It's unfair to pull my ad when if you run a search for these terms on eBay now, there are literally dozens of ads with those search words. Basically, we believe eBay is not seller friendly.

Please visit my on-line marketplace:
http://glamourbomb.etsy.com

I apologize if you were bidding on any items items and and for the inconvenience. I've had better, more positive, communal experiences on Etsy and I invite you to do hassle free business with us there.

Here is just one of the items I have listed on Etsy:

[Blade]

Geeze, how crappy, sorry to hear it!

[Scout]

I’ve already been to DaBomb’s new selling site and ordered a pink and white fuzzy hat. Why, you ask? Because everyone needs a pink and white fuzzy hat…..I thought it would be obvious.


Scout

[ChaCha]

Never cared much for ebay as a resource, for no good reason, just gut. now I have a reason.

Sorry DaBomb, though etsy may be a boon for you in the long run. How is the Quija project coming?

Cha ::

[DaBomb]

Thanks for your support my friends. The eBay listings and subsequent pullings have set back my cash flow a bit. I had scheduled to have listings every Wednesday, but it's been two weeks in a row that they've pulled my listings and so, obviously I'm two weeks behind in production.

I have almost everything set to go for the project. I need to send the file to the large scale media printer. This is the most expensive part of the project. I need about $900 just for this part. I'll wait and see how my hats and dreadies sell by the end of the month and see if I can afford to make up the difference between my sales and my out of pocket costs. The thing that kind of sits in the back of my mind is how much are gas prices going to cost to BM this year. With all the instability in the Mid East, I'm just wondering if I need to add a couple hundred dollars to the fuel costs since i'll be renting a cargo van. Hmmmm...

As for eBay...I can send you the whole e-mail they sent me. It was really f'ed up. They said I was spamming by using the words "raver" and "cosplay". Excuse me, but if you type in those search terms in eBay, literally dozens of listings come up! I really think it was a competitor out to close down my highest bidded items, because that's exactly what happened. There were also a two listings that they did NOT pull with the same words, so I really don't know why they are so arbitrarily enforcing this policy for some hats, but not for others.

Usually I get all up in arms and dispute this shit to the poor souls in Customer Services departments in whatever company I feel has done me wrong. But in this case, I don't really feel like fighting about. Just moving on to something better. At the time they pulled my listings, I stood to make about $250-$300 in sales, so I feel they really obstructed my ability to complete my art. It's just not worth getting angry about this. I'll just focus on trying to stay positive. However, to be honest, it really hurt my feellings.

[Chai Guy]

I hate eBay too! I once bought a golf cart for a Burning Man Project on eBay. I went to pick it up and it was NOTHING like the person advertised it as being. He said it had 4 good tires, they were in fact all flat and all unrepairable. He said the batteries just needed to be charged, they were in fact, dead, dead, dead. He said the cart was just recently running, there were cobwebs EVERYWHERE. The photo in the listing was NOT the actual cart!

I left negative feedback and he turned around and did the same, saying that I had taken 8 weeks to pick up the cart (I picked it up less than 1 week after the sale as agreed upon between us immediately following the close of the auction).


I protested with eBay explaining my situation and sending them copies of the emails where we agreed upon a pick up date.

Several other eBay customers also contacted me explaining similar problems with this seller.

It was so bad that eBay banned this seller. This seller then signed up under a different name, but one burned customer was so enraged that he tracked down all the "new" accounts and also had eBay ban those.

Here is the problem I had however:
Even after banning the seller, eBay would NOT remove his negative comment!!!! They said I had the option of PAYING a fee to have it investigated and then they would CONSIDER removing it!

What do you need to investigate??? You've banned the fucker! You've already investigated it!!

That and a whole host of other problems sent me packing. eBay wants to make as much $$$ as possible with as few people running it as possible.

[ChaCha]

Ebay = Smarmy!!! That's just wrong.


Two reasons.

[Scout]

My last attempt to purchase something over e-bay went poorly. Now the seller who says they sent is, but has no records of sending it and I are going back and forth over a cd that cost $7.50 and that included shipping.

Most times when I get stuff off Ebay I feel like I need to take a shower to get the slime off of me.

Scout

[DaBomb]

Well, overall I think people want something for cheap or better yet, free. I run my own business and people are always asking me for a reduced rate or businesses are asking me to give it to their employees for free. And yeah, if somebody offered me a free massage, can't I wouldn't jump too. But, who works for free? I got bills!

I think overall, eBay is a place for competitive bargains. And I also think sellers have the opportunity to remain incognito and sell you a crap golf cart or not ship a CD.

It's unfortunate. I thought it would be fun to auction stuff there so that some people who were unable to pay my asking price could possibly win at a price that they could. Oh well. I'm really enjoying Etsy. They sent me a message the other day advising me to check my listings and re-read their TOU. It was a nice note. I discussed it with them and they decided that I wasn't really violating their TOU so they let me stand for the time being. Nice place. Very happy.