RedRoller, provider of an eBay compatible application, filed a voluntary petition for relief under Chapter 11 last month, and accepted the resignations of Michael Tribolet, CEO, and Andrew Brooks, Principal Accounting Officer, Assistant Secretary and Treasurer of the company. The company provides on-demand, shipping comparison tools and said it would continue operations with no interruption of service.

Founder Bill Van Wyck said Friday that part of Tribolet's job had been to make sure the company was adequately funded. He said he found out about the financial situation in early August and began to actively raise money. "The problem is, with the financial meltdown that occurred in the banking industry, it made raising money that much more difficult."

When the company went public last November, it had closed on a $6 million round. "So the fact that the company ended up running out of cash and (Tribolet) had not made arrangements for financing for the business was really inexcusable on the side of the management team and the Board of Directors."
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eBay Layoffs - Executives To Get 4 Years Pay

Barrons is reporting that eBay's business is deteriorating and that the company is planning to layoff approximately 10% of its 15,000 employees. Many of "Meg Whitman People" are retiring. Rajiv Dutta, president of Paypal is gone and Bob Kagle, the Benchmark venture capitalist who has been on the Board from the beginning, stepped down from the Board in June, another indication that something major is happening.

The Independent Association of Online Merchants said that it would be interesting to compare the severance packages of "regular employees" and managers with those of eBay's top executives.

Like in many companies, eBay's has Golden Parachutes for its top executives. It appears from SEC filings that some top execs will receive two years' target cash compensation, defined as annual base salary plus target annual incentive bonus. That "bonus" is usually 100% of salary, so it would be like getting 4 years' worth of pay if they are laid off.

Meg Whitman, who has retired from the company will be on the payroll through the end of the year. Whitman also gets office space and IT and secretarial support for 3 more years and will be at on the Board at least until June 2010. Rajiv Dutta, who retired recently, is working with his replacement Lorrie Norrington on the transition until October 2008 and will subsequently act as a consultant through the end of the year.

Here's one example of a Golden ...

A powerful and vocal group of large eBay merchants has blasted the e-commerce giant for changes it has implemented this year, saying they have done more harm than good.

The Professional eBay Sellers Alliance (PESA) on Tuesday published a scathing indictment of eBay, charging that most merchants have been hurt by recent modifications to the online marketplace.

Changes to the way buyers rate sellers, to eBay's fee structure for listings and to the search ranking functionality have been flawed and have led to a substantial deterioration of the marketplace for merchants, according to PESA.

In an interview Thursday, PESA Executive Director Jonathan Garriss reiterated the complaints. "The sentiment of most eBay sellers is that 2008 has been a very difficult year, and they're really nervous because they're not seeing any of the changes eBay is implementing improve their business," he said.

eBay didn't immediately respond to a request for comment.
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Imagine you're sitting in front of your computer, sweating and panicky. No, the air conditioning is not broken. And no, you didn't forward an inappropriate e-mail to your boss. Instead, you're in the final few minutes of bidding in an eBay auction. As the clock ticks down, the tension mounts. Will your last bid put you over the top? Can you defeat your opponents and claim the prize?
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Economists have known for years that people tend to overbid on items up for auction. But experts did not know the reason behind our seemingly irrational behavior. Economists and neuroscientists from New York University teamed up to study this classic economic problem, and they published their results Thursday in Science. Using brain imaging along with carefully constructed games, the paper's authors discovered a "fear of losing" may lie behind our propensity to overbid.

Researchers began by giving 15 people opportunities to win money in auction and lottery games, each time competing against another person. In the lottery games, participants decided whether to take part in different lottery rounds. Auction competitors, on the other hand, chose their bid before each round. During the games, scientists watched the responses of the subjects' ...

The Foreign Office has confirmed that police are investigating the sale of a digital camera on eBay said to have contained MI6 images of terror suspects.

A bidder, who bought the camera for £17 on the auction website, discovered photos of terror suspects, their names and fingerprints and even snaps of rocket launchers and missiles, The Sun newspaper reported.

The unsuspecting 28-year-old from Hemel Hempstead, Hertfordshire, only found the secret images when he downloaded his own holiday snaps from the Nikon Cool Pix device.

He told local police about the find and was shocked when Special Branch officers arrived at his home days later to seize his new purchase.

Officers have made five visits to his home in the last week to quiz him and his family, the paper reported.
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Earlier this month eBay rolled out a new version of its eBay Pulse portal that shows popular products and searches. New modules display the most popular searches in each of eBay's main categories, as well as the biggest movers. But after receiving feedback that users wanted to view the data in subcategories as provided by the old version, eBay said it would update the Pulse page and re-launch the portal early next year.
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