Career Opportunities: Choosing Between Ebay, Ebay Alternatives, and McDonald's

[sneakymagenta]

Dear Sneaky's Career Advice Column For OAI Sellers

Q. Dear Sneaky, I am a Feebay gently soiled children's clothing seller who grosses $750 monthly.  I work on my business 40 hours per week and use the money I earn to buy special treats for my family.  My kids love french fries!  I want to diversify beyond Feebay because they're big bullies and their fees are too high.  What would you suggest?

A. You're grossing under $5 per hour.  Your best alternative to Ebay is a counter job at McDonald's where you'll make over $7 per hour and as an added bonus you'll receive free french fries when you're working.  Option number two for you is to stop whining and rewrite your business plan.  The one you have is obviously not working. You do have a business plan, don't you???

Q. Dear Sneaky, I sell on Ebay alternatives and grossed $25 last month.  I work on my business 10 hours every week and spend 6 hours every day chatting on PSU.  I'm currently listing on 5 alternatives and would like to add a few more sites.  Which alternatives would you suggest?

A.  You're grossing under $1 per hour.  The average Chinese sweatshop worker earns more than you.  Your best alternative is checking yourself into your local mental hospital because you're obviously in need of professional help.  Only a complete moron or somebody who flew off the cuckoo's nest and is missing a few screws would willingly work for under $1 per hour unless they live in a 3rd world country where $1 hourly wages are the norm. 

[BellisimaJ.]

[bargainbloodhound]

I sell on Ebay alternatives and grossed $25 last month.

$25 would qualify as an alternative powerseller on most rinky dinks. 

You're grossing under $1 per hour.

PHP Pro Bid would go out of business if sellers ever did the math and figured out how little they were making per hour by listing on these tiny sites.  :blinkie:

[sarah_9]

Hello,

Hey buddy i think online auctions like ebay or ebay alternatives are better option than MC`Donald.


Regards,
sarah_9

[bargainbloodhound]

My plug for MickeyD's: there's less chance of having your identity stolen at McDonald's then there is if you're using an eBay alternative like cybershoppers.org that asks users to register over an unsecure http connection. 

Steps to creating an eBay alternative: spend $172, add a crappy logo to the stock PHP Pro Bid, hide the WHOIS with Domains by Proxy, share an IP address with YourHighBid.com,and suddenly a rinky dink alternative to eBay is born....if the only thing buyers were looking for was a logo the site might have a chance.

edit: I forgot one of the essential ingredients for any eBay alternative: an owner who is not afraid to lie through their teeth while spewing a line of bullsh.it to prospective users...case in point:

In short, since CyberShoppers' founding it has become one of the world's largest place to buy and sell, a community of hundreds of millions of regular people, small businesses, and even big businesses from all of the seven continents. Millions of items of every kind imaginable, in every condition imaginable, change hands every day on CyberShoppers for prices ranging from one cent to hundreds of thousands or even millions of dollars (or pounds, or other forms of currency).

According to CyberShoppers' mission statement, "CyberShoppers' mission is to provide a global trading platform where practically anyone can trade practically anything."

By nearly any measure, CyberShoppers has succeeded at its mission beyond its wildest dreams, and it has done so almost entirely in the online universe. But don't take my word for it. Visit CyberShoppers and explore one of the largest success stories of the Internet. Then join CyberShoppers to start shopping for great deals on your favorite items or to start turning your old junk into fresh cash. 

About us page: http://www.cybershoppers.org/content_pag...e=about_us

Based on that quote, Alex Ewaey has finally met his match in the BS department (or maybe not since Alex once claimed God had chosen Ewaey over other auction sites).

edit 2: from the privacy policy

We may collect and store the following personal information:

* email address, physical contact information, and (depending on the service used) sometimes financial information, such as credit card or bank account numbers;

The site might collect credit card or bank account numbers and yet it doesn't have an SSL.  How nice.

CyberShoppers Online Auctions | The Marketplace You Can Trust

The hidden WHOIS and complete lack of contact info/address on the site definitely makes me want to trust it.

Except as explicitly stated otherwise, legal notices shall be served on CyberShoppers's national registered agent

I'm assuming that anyone serving a legal notice would first have to hire a psychic to determine the name and location of the "national registered agent" since there is absolutely no contact info or names on the site.

We store and process your information on computers located in the United States

Ummm, you better alert DNSStuff, RIPE, and DomainTools that their Tracert and GeoIP scripts are screwed up because they all show the server's (and IP's) location as the BlueSquare data center in Maidenhead, UK
http://private.dnsstuff.com/tools/tracer...oppers.org
http://private.dnsstuff.com/tools/ipall....110.170.18
http://private.dnsstuff.com/tools/whois....110.170.18
http://whois.domaintools.com/cybershoppers.org

[mandy]

About us page: http://www.cybershoppers.org/content_pag...e=about_us

Cyberhoppers.org's About Us page is a word for word plagiarism of the About.com article "What is eBay" by Aron Hsiao.

http://ebay.about.com/od/gettingstarted/...isebay.htm

Cybershoppers is off to a good start: no SSL and copyright infringement.  It's no wonder they hide their ownership information. :

Welcome sarah_9, link spammer for cybershoppers.org

----------
Their MySpace page contains the same plagiarized article:
http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fus...iewProfile&friendID=435552097

CyberShoppers.org is the world's online marketplace;

Besides its blatant copyright infringement of the About.com article, Cybershoppers.org is also violating eBay's registered trademark on the use of the phrase "the world's online marketplace":

Word Mark  THE WORLD'S ONLINE MARKETPLACE
Goods and Services IC 035. US 100 101 102. G & S: on-line trading services in which seller posts items to be auctioned and bidding is done electronically, and providing evaluative feedback and ratings of sellers' goods and services, the value and prices of sellers' goods, buyers' and sellers' performance, delivery, and overall trading experience in connection therewith. FIRST USE: 20000509. FIRST USE IN COMMERCE: 20000509
Mark Drawing Code (1) TYPED DRAWING
Serial Number 76184962
Filing Date December 22, 2000
Current Filing Basis 1A
Original Filing Basis 1A
Published for Opposition January 29, 2002
Registration Number 2634266
Registration Date October 15, 2002
Owner (REGISTRANT) eBay Inc. CORPORATION DELAWARE 2145 Hamilton Avenue San Jose CALIFORNIA 95125

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A December 10th (free) press release issued by the site:

http://www.prlog.org/10153504-cybershopp...rsorg.html

----------------------------------

Cybershoppers.org's owner on Rent-A-Coder:

Auction Website Marketer
Bid Request Id: 1073297
Posted by:  CyberShoppers (0 ratings)

First of all, I would like to thank everyone who is taking interest in this project. This project is only for serious Internet marketers. I am looking for a freelancer that specializes in getting people to sign up for websites.

I am the owner of CyberShoppers.org. I am in need of someone who can get 100 people to start stores on my website. I will pay you three dollars for each person you get to sign up for a store. Although I am requesting someone to get 100 people to sign up for stores, if you can get more than 100 then that is fine too. No matter how many people you get to start stores, you will get paid $3 for each of the stores.....

http://www.rentacoder.com/RentACoder/mis...Id=1073297

[mandy]

I thought Cybershopper's user agreement and privacy policies sounded familiar

Using CyberShoppers

While using CyberShoppers, you will not:

* post content or items in an inappropriate category or areas on our sites and services;
* violate any laws, third party rights, or our policies;
* use our sites or services if you are not able to form legally binding contracts, are under the age of 18, or are temporarily or indefinitely suspended from our sites;
* fail to deliver payment for items purchased by you, unless the seller has materially changed the item's description after you bid, a clear typographical error is made, or you cannot authenticate the seller's identity;
* fail to deliver items purchased from you, unless the buyer fails to meet the posted terms, or you cannot authenticate the buyer's identity;
* manipulate the price of any item or interfere with other user's listings;
* circumvent or manipulate our fee structure, the billing process, or fees owed to CyberShoppers;
* post false, inaccurate, misleading, defamatory, or libelous content (including personal information);
* take any action that may undermine the feedback or ratings systems (such as displaying, importing or exporting feedback information off of the sites or using it for purposes unrelated to CyberShoppers);
* transfer your CyberShoppers account (including feedback) and User ID to another party without our consent;
* distribute or post spam, chain letters, or pyramid schemes;
* distribute viruses or any other technologies that may harm CyberShoppers, or the interests or property of CyberShoppers users;
* copy, modify, or distribute content from the Sites and CyberShoppers's copyrights and trademarks; or
* harvest or otherwise collect information about users, including email addresses, without their consent.


Abusing CyberShoppers

CyberShoppers and the Community work together to keep our sites and services working properly and the Community safe. Please report problems, offensive content, and policy violations to us...

http://www.cybershoppers.org/content_pag...page=terms

Using eBay

While using eBay, you will not:

    *      post content or items in an inappropriate category or areas on our sites and services;
    *      violate any laws, third party rights, or our policies such as the Prohibited and Restricted Items policies;
    *      use our sites or services if you are not able to form legally binding contracts, are under the age of 18, or are temporarily or indefinitely suspended from our sites;
    *      fail to deliver payment for items purchased by you, unless the seller has materially changed the item's description after you bid, a clear typographical error is made, or you cannot authenticate the seller's identity;
    *      fail to deliver items purchased from you, unless the buyer fails to meet the posted terms, or you cannot authenticate the buyer's identity;
    *      manipulate the price of any item or interfere with other user's listings;
    *      circumvent or manipulate our fee structure, the billing process, or fees owed to eBay;
    *      post false, inaccurate, misleading, defamatory, or libelous content (including personal information);
    *      take any action that may undermine the feedback or ratings systems (such as displaying, importing or exporting feedback information off of the sites or using it for purposes unrelated to eBay);
    *      transfer your eBay account (including feedback) and User ID to another party without our consent;
    *      distribute or post spam, chain letters, or pyramid schemes;
    *      distribute viruses or any other technologies that may harm eBay, or the interests or property of eBay users;
    *      copy, modify, or distribute content from the Sites and eBay's copyrights and trademarks; or
    *      harvest or otherwise collect information about users, including email addresses, without their consent.

Abusing eBay

eBay and the Community work together to keep our sites and services working properly and the Community safe. Please report problems, offensive content, and policy violations to us...

http://pages.ebay.com/help/policies/user...trksid=m40

Privacy policies:
http://www.cybershoppers.org/content_pag...ge=privacy
http://pages.ebay.com/help/policies/priv...trksid=m40

I give them 4 weeks tops before the first lawsuit hits.  tolensmiley:

[sneakymagenta]

Only a braindead moron would be dumb enough to copy Ebay pages word for word and think their lawyer's wouldn't notice.