posted on February 14, 2004 07:37:42 AM new
Ebay has determined that the Feebay game designer and website can be sued for defamation of corporate character.
No but seriously, the fatal flaw of capitalism is that each actors' (seller, buyer, and the mediums) desire to maximize profit and weaken the competition will always lead to the decline of the community as each private actor seeks to rationally maximize his/her returns.
So much for the myth that the private sector can create and maintain public goods. Just look at the debacle the information highway has become with law suits, viruses, pop-ups, porn, con artists, and the most despicable of types entrenched on the web.
posted on February 14, 2004 11:04:27 AM new
the most despicable of types entrenched on the web.....thank you for not mentioning my name
[ edited by classicrock000 on Feb 14, 2004 11:05 AM ]
posted on February 14, 2004 12:58:58 PM new
"...the fatal flaw of capitalism is that each actors' (seller, buyer, and the mediums) desire to maximize profit and weaken the competition will always lead to the decline of the community as each private actor seeks to rationally maximize his/her returns".
Right...The community declines because of the interaction & competition between the players? How quaint; 'ol Marx redivivus.
This inevitability would, it seems, have eliminated capitalism long before eBay.
Where is an example of an enduring community thriving without its constituent actors rationally (or not)striving to maximize his/her returns? ...how does it begin, in what form does it exist and under what rules does it flourish?
Or, is this simply as it appears, the tired lament of a boulevardier?
"I won't be wronged, I won't be insulted, and I won't be laid a hand on. I don't do these things to other people and I require the same from them."- John Wayne/The Shootist"(from the novel by Glendon Swarthout)
posted on February 14, 2004 01:05:17 PM new
If Al Franken could defeat the FOX network and the wrath of O'Reilly on their defamation suit against Franken's book, then the creator of Feebay should be able to do the same. Just like Franken, The creator of Feebay are satirizing Ebay in humor, just like we see on Saturday Night Live, on South Park, the Simpson's, in Doonsbury cartoons, Mad Magazine Comics, and other humor books.
I believe Franken said that FOX and their attorney's were literally laughed out of court.
posted on February 14, 2004 01:14:23 PM new
Last summer a staff member from ioffer called me and was asking questions and gathering information from sellers on the site. In the course of the converstaion he asked if I had seen the feebay cartoon created by another ioffer staffer that was proud to claim the creation of the cartoon. Actually I had seen the cartoon a long time ago when it first made the rounds on the AW message boards.
-------------- sig file ----------- *There is no conclusive evidence that life is serious*
posted on February 14, 2004 03:17:44 PM new
"Spinning"??? O'Reilly claims to be the "NO Spin Zone", yet all I see are opinionated rants about why Gays should be banned here, why scientists shouldn't be allowed to do that, why it is wrong that a liberal attacks someone elses stance, etc. The funny thing is that spinning is a tactic used to avoid debate. It is a method of convoluting the truth (or fact) by altering the story to favor one's opinion. I wouldn't have a problem with O'Reilly if he based his show on fact, not his raving mad lunatic opinion, or if he basically admitted he ran a right wing talk show based on his opinion like Rush Limbaugh. Your eyes are blinded by all the spinning.
"You can't have it both ways."
- Bill O'Reilly 2004
As for your opinions of Franken... No one, not even Franken himself claims he should be taken seriously. Yet, someone like O'Reilly did just that, and ended up being the joke of the judicial system.
And finally, what does your opinion of Franken matter anyways? This thread was about a lawsuit by someone who did something that we applaud and laugh at every day of our lives. The point is that someone created something to make us laugh, and gets sued by a multi-billion dollar company that makes tons and tons of dough each and every minute of the day. I believe the newspapers across America do political cartoons all the time as well. Imagine if the cartoonists were sued on a regular basis.
posted on February 14, 2004 04:33:50 PM new
Ebay capitalism works, long term, if and only if the buyers and sellers are cordial to each other and that there is a serious belief in the community values. That is long gone from ebay.
Capitalism worked in the US because of the wisdom of FDR and yes, his socialist ideas of the need to maintain fundamental fairness.
Ebay is not taking an active role in investing in its community, the buyers and the sellers. Instead, as the ebay game suggests, it is fundamentally uninterested in the buyers or the sellers. The buyers and sellers see this and as rational actors march in lock step.
We mock the buyer who is trying to reach live help. Have you sellers tried? The analogy here is you go into a store, purchase an item and want to return it, but you cannot get any cooperation from the merchant.
Ebay is like an ever shrinking pond filled with pirahna.
posted on February 14, 2004 06:49:14 PM new
Anthromorphosizing the market by insisting that it must reflect,reward or even acknowledge cordial behavior is a profound misinterpretation of market dynamics.
What, pray tell, does cordiality have to do with the market?..other than a wistful aside?
For that matter, what is your definition of community values?
Do unto others?
Simple as that?
You seem to argue for a well-ordered cosmos where the hierarchy of needs and wants is balanced by compassion. A compassion equally meted out and uniformly just..utopian, in a word.
We move, as does the market, upon a hunger for gain & survival. The market will, in part, upon occasion annihilate itself due to malfeasance, stupidity and their kindred progenitor, over-arching greed.
So it goes.
eBay is a glorified flea-market; nothing more. All of the characters therein would be easily recognizable to Dickens...some greedy, some honorable, some clueless yet all competing, each in their small way, for advantage.
What would you change in eBay that would not, perforce, require a fundamental reordering of human nature?
"I won't be wronged, I won't be insulted, and I won't be laid a hand on. I don't do these things to other people and I require the same from them."- John Wayne/The Shootist"(from the novel by Glendon Swarthout)
posted on February 15, 2004 03:26:00 PM new
"Anthromorphosizing the market by insisting that it must reflect,reward or even acknowledge cordial behavior is a profound misinterpretation of market dynamics."
I don't misunderstand market forces.. I know exactly how that works. And that is the problem. There is NO PLACE for cordial behavior in the market unless it is good for the bottom line.
I contend that collectively it is.. Ebay experience needs to be OVERWHELMINGLY positive or else people will go to the brick and mortar stores. Cordial behavior and custmoer service are important for the bottom line: it's called enlightened self-interest.
Ebay needs to build confidence in its system and install more live help. Being denied live help is unacceptable especially because we are dealing with cyberspace.
posted on February 15, 2004 04:32:30 PM new
Well, we disagree.
eBay will install live help when it can be empirically demonstrated to be competitively necessary.
So far, the market is quite rewarding to their business plan.
A positive experience is certainly to be desired, on-line or elsewhere. However, the marketplace for the last 20 years has "overwhelmingly" dictated only one sure thing...and that is that price is king.
A nation of predatory shoppers, while giving lip-service to customer service, is demonstrably more motivated by cost of goods.
If you are looking for a positive experience in bricks and mortar, you'd be well advised to acquaint yourself with how most, if not all, of the dominant players have tightened up dramatically on returns, etc...deferring such issues back to the manufacturers. Just-in-time inventory replenishment was the first shift; now you have a significant, like minded shift of after-the-sale responsibility being dumped in the manufacturer's lap.
This is how a retail monopoly is excercised..where else can the manufacturer's go for the volume required to meet the razor thin margins the market expects?
Essentially, we have demanded exactly what the marketplace is; both on-line and off.
"I won't be wronged, I won't be insulted, and I won't be laid a hand on. I don't do these things to other people and I require the same from them."- John Wayne/The Shootist"(from the novel by Glendon Swarthout)
posted on February 15, 2004 05:48:02 PM newEbay experience needs to be OVERWHELMINGLY positive or else people will go to the brick and mortar stores.
Total and utter nonsense, demonstrating your complete lack of understanding of today's marketplaces.
Do you even sell anything? I can't imagine you'd make any money *or* create any satisfied customers.
It's a socialist myth that capitalists sow discontent and misery. Been disproven time and again. Suggest you peddle that tired old tripe somewhere else. You're making me sleepy.
posted on February 16, 2004 05:00:41 AM new
I sell and noticed that the buyers are becoming less and less serious as the sellers have become meaner and meaner.
"It's a socialist myth that capitalists sow discontent and misery. Been disproven time and again." Really? What planet do you live on Mr. Greed is good?
