| April 20, 2007 |
 eBay Considers StumbleUpon Buy and Other News |
| By: Ina Steiner |
| Fri Apr 20 2007 020:05:29 |
eBay UK will appear on the BBC Working Lunch program today, according to the video report filed Tuesday that covered UK sellers' reduced exposure on eBay.com. According to Andrew Titcombe, after the piece aired on Tuesday, eBay closed down the discussion boards on the subject with a promise that it would re-open on Friday after the broadcast. He told AuctionBytes:
"A close reading of the discussion boards show a growing backlash against this "experiment" with 99% of poster complaining of greatly reduced sales and Powersellers complaining that they will soon lose their status because of this. It seems to be clear from those who are still getting sales in the USA are saying that US buyers are unaware of the advanced feature in the search facility where eBayers have to click the worldwide button to be able to see a true picture of the international items available. UK buyers are listing in dollars on the USA site to counter this and direct buyers to their UK items."
The Wall Street Journal reported on Thursday that Ticketmaster has sued eBay and its StubHub subsidiary (paid subscription required to read WSJ articles). I could not find the court documents, and Ticketmaster declined to comment. An eBay spokesperson said eBay had not yet been served with the Ticketmaster lawsuit so could not comment.
TechCrunch reported that eBay will buy StumbleUpon (not confirmed), while Om Malik noted that Google has released a StumbleUpon competitor.
Regarding eBay's move into micro-financing, here is the response from eBay spokesperson Catherine England to my inquiry for more information:
"Microplace is an eBay-like platform for individuals to find and invest in microfinance organizations around the world and was acquired in May 2006 as part of eBay Inc.'s efforts to build out our Global Citizenship and Development initiative. This ongoing initiative is focused on maximizing our corporate resources to continue to drive social good through a variety of innovative programs. Examples of these programs include the successful Giving Works program available on the eBay Marketplace, which has generated millions of dollars for thousands of charities since 2000 and the eBay Foundation, which has contributed more than $13 million to non-profit organizations."
Darren Dittrich, CEO, sell.com classifieds, wrote to say sell.com will donate all proceeds for the remainder of the month of April 2007 to the Virginia Tech Hokie Spirit Memorial Fund. "As a Virginia Tech graduate, I (and my wife!) felt the need to do something more."
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