Power Sellers Unite

elgato · Joined: 24 Feb 2005 Posts: 17241 Location: Texas

Roughly 2 billion items a year pass through eBay, and the company is looking to outside partners and ISVs to help push that number even higher.

The Internet auction Goliath now counts 30,000 members in its developer program, and a quarter of its listings come through third-party tools tapping into its Web services interfaces. But eBay wasn't always so eager to open its platform and build a channel.

Just ask Vendio. The first time that the eBay Certified Solution Provider tried to build tools to tap into the eBay marketplace, it nearly got sued.

"There was a fair amount of saber-rattling," Vendio CEO and co-founder Rodrigo Sales said, reflecting on Vendio's early days in 1999. Then doing business as AuctionWatch, Vendio created a site that scraped listings from various auction Web sites, including eBay, and offered a universal search. EBay called the service an illegal infringement on its platform and ordered AuctionWatch to stay away from its listings. The two companies exchanged legal threats.

Two years later, Vendio signed on as eBay's first partner in its "preferred solution" program. The about-face came when eBay realized that outside partners would generate more business for its auctions than they pulled away.

more.. link to news article

2BOYSandTOYS · Joined: 14 Mar 2005 Posts: 10095 Location: Kansas

Elgato:

Thanks 4 sharing.....can we say --- they are scrambling yet, or is it too soon? :roll: :roll:

Pipphoe

I'm waiting for the day when third-party developers really get flexible and smart and realize that eBay is not the only game in town. Plus, if eBay keeps on with the draconian fee hikes and messes like the one that started on the 19th keep happening, eBay will not be there forever, or -- if it is -- it will devolve into just another site or may become altogether irrelevant.

BTW, there was a report on our local news about the upcoming back-to-school and holiday shopping seasons. It was very, very gloomy :roll: There were many sellers on the boards last night talking about having to keep stores open for the great holiday season. Last year was not great and if this year is worse, keeping that store open and paying those fees on eBay could put a lot of people in very, very big trouble.

I think a lot of people were hoping that higher fuel costs would bring more people shopping online last year. It wasn't completely dismal, but it wasn't great either, and it depended on where people spent their online bucks.

I think at this point there's just more and more people that have paychecks that barely cover three weeks of the month now and the credit it tapped out. There's a lot of Mercedes, Jaguars, Cadillacs and BMWs parked in our local Wal-Mart everyday alongside us common folk. The everyday items that fly off the shelves are the Wal-Mart and lower-priced brands, not the products like Tide or Clorax.

I really hope I'm wrong.

mojavelyn · Posted: Tue Jul 25, 2006 12:42 pm Post subject:

Quote: › docWrite("quote")"Anything that helps accelerate trading is good for our users and good for our market," said Greg Isaacs, who joined eBay in 2001 and now serves as director of its developers' program. "We want to be an online trading platform where anyone can trade anything, and our developer program is a critical part of that."

EBay's epiphany came in 2000, when it surveyed the growing landscape of startups scraping its listings and cobbling together tools for eBay sellers. It decided to join the throng rather than fight it. EBay released its first open API beta test in 2000 and soon after created a formal program to encourage outside application development around its platform.

Isn't this basically what Microsoft lost tons of lawsuits over? Not allowing outside programming to be compatible on the windows playing field?

Cathy, I buy my Tide at Walmart! Its less expensive and closer then the two grocery stores.

Pipphoe · Posted: Tue Jul 25, 2006 12:58 pm Post subject:

mojavelyn wrote (View Post): › docWrite("quote")
Isn't this basically what Microsoft lost tons of lawsuits over? Not allowing outside programming to be compatible on the windows playing field?

Cathy, I buy my Tide at Walmart! Its less expensive and closer then the two grocery stores.

Hey, I still can't afford Tide even at Wal-Mart prices. Of course, that might be because I have kitties and I tend to put a lot of faith in bleach and Borax.

I was thinking of Google Checkout and eBay in the context of the Microsoft caes. Of course, Google has the entire web and not having Google Checkout is more likely going to be a loss for Ebay. It might just be another miscalculation on eBay's part, just like the seller store miscalculation. I still don't think they saw that coming :twisted:

"Anything that helps accelerate trading is good for our users and good for our market," said Greg Isaacs, who joined eBay in 2001 and now serves as director of its developers' program. "We want to be an online trading platform where anyone can trade anything, and our developer program is a critical part of that."

Anyone can trade anything as long as it doesn't have the words "fee hike" in it :lol: