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$150 is too low. I didn't think they would make $250, but that's awesome they did. The only problem I see is $10-15 for classic games. That's a little steep for software that's older than some of its users. How about $2-5 price point? Those games aren't even worth that much now.

Most definitely is fake. In fact it's a scam.

http://forums.ebay.com/db2/thread.jspa?threadID=20 00117763&tstart=0&mod=1156813029715

You see they get these sewing people all scared, work them up into a lather and then direct them to the "Amnesty Program" here:

http://www.embroideryprotection.org/Amnesty_Progra m.pdf

Where they procede to take $300 a piece from unwitting cross-stichers.

You can do this with your legal subscription. A iso programmer is around 10 bucks. If you buy an unlocker then is expensive but you'll only need one if you want to pirate stuff. But like I said you can do this with just your sub card just to watch the channels you subscribe to. And since you just want to read all you need is an iso 7806 card reader which you can buy in ebay for $5.99 plus $3.99 shipping. just search ISO-7816 in ebay. http://cgi.ebay.com/NEW-SCM-SCR111-ISO-7816-Smart- Card-Reader-Writer-Serial_W0QQitemZ330027502087QQi hZ014QQcategoryZ51082QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZ ViewItem?hash=item330027502087

Why not just get one of these:

G4 Mac Mini on ebay for under $150 used but in great working condition.. not my item just a search result.

No viruses, runs a great OS... has a combo CD burner DVD drive, etc. etc.

"pay to place a video on YouTube's popular front page."

Oh the vanity! People really do that??? If I want you to see my video I'll put it on my own site and mention it somewhere, maybe even slashdot and it it's interesting word will get around, if it's not, my ego won't be crushed. I will be pissed if those weasels at thinkgeek steal it for another merchandising product

snicker. Listing Upgrade - Home Page Featured Examples. Look under "Example 3": Home Page Featured fees vary depending upon the type of auction and number of items. Please refer to the Fees page for more information.

What high-quality items are currently featured?

AUTO!!_BOOT_UP_ALL_COMPUTER!_FIX_AN...
Die Heilige Schrift GUSTAV DORÉ 18...
CASINOS HATE ME $1000/DAY SLOT MACH...
4BR/2.5BA House- JUST SELLING FOR P...
N0438-29(Free,Beige Hemp Tiger-Prin...
LeGrandMerde.com - Own theBigCrap.c...
______________________________________

There's no reason why they couldn't amend the video directly to put ads 'around' the content, such that they'd still be visible in an embedded player

This is how the World Cup was generally broadcast in the US during '86. I don't recall how much earlier that started. I just remember when I was playing for a club and the refs would stop the game during the next opportunity when they saw later teams' members showing up, cautioning (generally, with a smile) them that if they overheard any discussion about any Cup game activity (and not just the outcome, thankyouverymuch) as they had their VCRs running and would find a creative means to punish offenders. I think this is when people would recall "take out the ref" plays (which were said to occur with some college teams; e.g., a chip shot just high enough to make a header possible and body check the ref. Thankfully, that stuff could only happen in hockey).

The media knew soccer would eventually become "must see" (and some are still waiting) and was trying to find ways to get some ad compensation without cutting to an ad and saying, "While we were away, you missed a forty yard goal with a bicycle kick" and move forward. (These were the same morons who didn't know what nutmeg is. So they started scrunching the pitch a little and run ads in all four margins (usually Budweiser), then restore the pitch's image size. How times have changed (for this year's Cup): "Due to time constraints and little play activity, we'll move ahead into the game." And start the game at 6:37. Fortunately, the Jose +10 ads were outstanding. Worth teaching kids' teams about playing on pared pitches, even to playing walkthrough.

That's 2/3 66% baby! The article is still winning! :)

Here is a good reference for Ethernet cards for old macs: http://resnet.uoregon.edu/docs-old/maccardlist.htm l - try emailing reshelp@resnet.uoregon.edu for more info since their shopping cart is down. I think you just need one of these: http://cgi.ebay.com/NEW-APPLE-MAC-ETHERNET-CARD-4- LC-PDS-Slot-RJ-45-Softwr_W0QQitemZ220022046501QQih Z012QQcategoryZ25436QQcmdZViewItem

While this is a cool accomplishment does it serve any real useful purpose? I have had no need for MS-DOS since Windows XP came out since you can create a DOS boot disk easily if you need to and all of my old games that I still like to play every once in a while and old apps run file using the XP compatibility mode. Since I have upgraded to XP I use XP on my machines that I just want to use to play games/web browse/code Windows Apps and Linux on servers and machines I want to code Linux apps on. No MS-DOS needed. If I really wanted to load MS-DOS on a machine and couldn't find my old installer disks then I noticed sealed, brand new copies of version 6.22 can still be bought on eBay like the following: http://cgi.ebay.com/Windows-MS-DOS-6-22-Operating- System-W-Sealed-Floppies_W0QQitemZ260027371141QQih Z016QQcategoryZ11685QQtcZphotoQQssPageNameZWDVWQQr dZ1QQcmdZViewItem

So, while I find the freeDOS project cool in a nerdy sort of way I do not see how the amount of effort that went into it was worth the actual usefullness of the project.

I can't simply go and pick up another one at the dollar store.

There is no way that this money can be converted back into RLC (real life currency.) If there was a way, and he did, then he could easily be punished under fraud/racketeering laws. But again, IANAL.

Yes, there is. ATM the bid on 1 billion ISK ~100$, so 700 billion ISK is about 70000$!

What was the name of that MMORPG that would let you move game currency into the real world and vice-versa?

Second life.

Nothing but Printer included.
*This Item is being sold AS/IS however, a test page has been tested to verify it still worked. *From an office clearance.

Almost new Samsung Laser printer. I bought it a few years ago and used it until the toner ran out. I didn't bother buying a new one since I already have a faster printer at home and an inkjet. No problems at all, comes with a power cable. I can probably find an extra USB cable for it. Plug it in, ready to go! Go online, buy a toner refill for a few dollars!/

Nothing but Printer included.
*This Item is being sold AS/IS however, a test page has been tested to verify it still worked. *From an office clearance.

Almost new Samsung Laser printer. I bought it a few years ago and used it until the toner ran out. I didn't bother buying a new one since I already have a faster printer at home and an inkjet. No problems at all, comes with a power cable. I can probably find an extra USB cable for it. Plug it in, ready to go! Go online, buy a toner refill for a few dollars!/

In the record store i worked at we would fit about 7500 discs in two of these stacked on top of each other: http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item =7543505009&category=3299 (i'm not sure this is the exact model...) we would buy cases of individual cd sleeves to keep our discs in: http://www.shop4tech.com/item2161.html number them sequentially with a sharpie at the top, one disc in each side of the sleeve and you could fit 7500 discs in a shelving system that's about 3 ft. wide and 18" deep... throw a label on the front of each drawer to say the number range, and keep a database of what is where. i think that's the smallest storage area you'll achieve in a very organized manner. but as said above, you'll probably want an intern to do this for you. -joe

Then go buy one!

Well, now you can just buy positive feedback and save yourself the trouble.

Maybe use it as a ringtone or something.

How about getting screwed as a seller?
My wife recently logged in to her eBay account (Member since '99, 1400+ transactions, 99.9% positive feedback) and low & behold it had been suspended for being linked to another suspended account "nwbker" of which she has no knowledge. eBay states in this link: http://pages.ebay.com/help/tp/programs-investigati ons.html
The eBay Investigations team tries to resolve reported cases of inappropriate trading behavior. eBay will consider the circumstances of an alleged offense and the user's trading record before taking action. Disciplinary action may range from a formal warning up to indefinite suspension of a user's account. However, out of fairness to all users, if a complaint cannot be proven with certainty, eBay will not take action.
Yet in email received from eBay: Your eBay registration has been suspended indefinitely with no plans for reinstatement. Our records show that this account is directly related to the following suspended account: nwbker
The mail goes on to say: Before we can review your account for possible reinstatement, you must first clear the suspension of your nwbker account. To do so we ask that you write from the same email address that is registered on that account.
  Guess what - it can't be done. She has no idea how/who created this account and she can't access her information because she has been SUSPENDED!
eBay seems to have created a perfect Catch 22, her emails get standard server replies, there is no support number to call and quite frankly my wife is pissed!
Does this look like identity theft?
Has someone cracked into eBay?
Has anyone here ever had this happen?
If so, how did it get resolved?
Is eBay truly so big and uncaring that losing someone after 7 years and making money from each of those 1400 transactions gets you nothing but a run around?
As always your comments and suggestions please.

http://www.ebay.com/

That's insane, this one even has a $1000 bid already!

Not quite $10000 but still a lot of money http://video-games.search.ebay.com/wow_Video-Games _W0QQfsooZ2QQfsopZ3QQsacatZ1249QQsbrsrtZl

Meteors are bits of dust or rock that plunge into the Earth's atmosphere and burn up, making bright streaks in the sky.

Don't worry, I've found the original Moon film on ebay!

I knew NASA's funding was desperate, but I didn't know it was that desperate!

"Very pleased again, until I received Studio 8 in the mail. I popped the CD in and... *GRIND GRIND GRIND GRIND Eject*"

I'm pretty sure that Studio 8 only came on floppies. Trying to put a floppy disk in your CD drive is a bad idea... Besides, MacBooks don't support System 7 anyway, so how are you going to run it? :^) :^) :^)

Seriously, though, I assume you've tried other CDs, right?

Since I love a good bit of irony as much as the next guy, 50% of the proceeds from this sale will go toward the Electronic Frontier Foundation, which has worked relentlessly to protect our online privacy.

Not a problem. I'll just get an Apple label and stick it on my PC :).

You even get a choice between single-color and old-school six-color stickers like the ones that came with my IIe back in the day. :-)

Not a problem. I'll just get an Apple label and stick it on my PC :).

You even get a choice between single-color and old-school six-color stickers like the ones that came with my IIe back in the day. :-)

http://cgi.ebay.com/GENERATOR-5-9MW-EMERGENCY-BLAC K-START-GAS-TURBINES_W0QQitemZ140012900386QQihZ004 QQcategoryZ106437QQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

that's 30 gigs right there. Not too cost effective there.

Not cost effective? You can get a 30Gig harddrive for $21.99

I would highly recommend considering a second hand printer. By that I mean something like a printer that is ex-lease, and may have only been running for a few years. In New Zealand I'd source something like this from TradeMe. I guess in the US you might look somewhere like eBay.

Remember. Reduce - Reuse - Recycle.

Considering how little the average internet user even pays attention to SSL, one could very easily imitate a bank, ebay, paypal, etc...

And since you can be at the mercy of the open WAP users own DNS server, instead of being tricked by a bogus:

http://127.0.0.1/www.ebay.com/

or:

http://www.ebay.com.bogusserver.com.ru/

You'll see:

http://www.ebay.com/

and possibly be even less likely to notice it as being bogus.

Well that's the last time I do all my plaintext internet banking through some strangers open WAP!

Not that I would advocate spending money this way, but what is the difference between this and the people who buy equipment/characters/accounts for Diablo/Guild Wars/WoW type games on EBay or such like? I would think that this community would be more supportive of people paying to learn the skills to play the game through rather than buying a pre-built account online for 100's of bucks. (I just did a quick check on EBay and a Lvl 60 Rogue is going for $560).

Or is it just the thought of giving an 8 year old $25/hour to teach you anything that pisses people off so much?

Personally I'd rather buy a bunch of good beer, get drunk and have my ass kicked in a game for an hour than bust the cash on in-game items

When they mentioned a hybrid scooter and ethanol, I thought they were talking about something like THIS Scooter .

Too expensive. OpenOffice.org costs only 90 cents.

Not a problem.

Well, thank god terroists on eBay won't be able to use Google Checkout to buy terrorist equipment.

We may, however, have to keep an eye on Canadian Tire Money

Eh? eBay isn't an auction site? What the heck are they, a corn fritter? Why does it say "Live Auctions" right there on their front page? And how do they explain this? It explicitly says "auctions" and "bidding." If they're not an auction site, we seriously need to think about the definition of the term "auction site."

http://developer.ebay.com/join/pricing/

As I posted last week on that Google Checkout story ( http://yro.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=189880&cid =15630137 ), eBay explicitly bans ALL payment services that eBay hasn't reviewed and approved; and I guarantee they're either going to take years to 'review' Google Checkout, or they'll find some reason "for your protection" to permanently ban Google Checkout.

The interesting thing is to see how strictly eBay will enforce this rule - if they're really going to focus on forcing Google Checkout out of eBay, or if it'll be yet another rule that is only enforced from time to time.

The company I work for is an eBay PowerSeller, and we've noticed there's basically three types of policy violations in eBay's eyes:

1. those that eBay checks for when you list an item (try listing an item with 'pearl' in the title sometime to see what I'm talking about) and then either denies your listing or displays a warning message and flags your listing;

2. violations that eBay only acts on when reporting by another user (usually NOT a buyer, it's almost always a competitor);

3. violations that eBay is worried enough about that they write a program to automatically scan all open listings looking for violations.

Right now, it looks like Google Checkout falls into the second type - there's over 3,000 active listings that mention accepting Google Checkout (ref. http://search-desc.ebay.com/search/search.dll?sofo cus=bs&sbrftog=1&catref=C6&from=R10&satitle=%22goo gle+checkout%22&sacat=-1%26catref%3DC6&bs=Search&f ts=2&fsop=1%26fsoo%3D1&coaction=compare&copagenum= 1&coentrypage=search&sargn=-1%26saslc%3D2&sadis=20 0&fpos=75050&ftrt=1&ftrv=1&saprclo=&saprchi=)

So eBay obviously hasn't stepped up enforcement of this rule. However, if the number of current listings that mention Google Checkout drops suddenly, then it will be obvious that eBay has started treating Google Checkout like an item in the third type, not the second. This would be a policy shift to explicitly combat Google Checkout, instead of just discouraging it.

I don't think PayPal would be around today, or would have the market share it does, if it wasn't for eBay buying them out and then cramming PayPal down everyone's throats. The stories I could tell about how PayPal really "protects" both the buyers and the sellers and how completely they've managed to brainwash so many buyers and sellers.... But as long as eBay is "not an auction" and PayPal is "not a bank" and "not a credit card", I don't see anything changing any time soon. eBay has already shown that it is all but unbeatable in the auction marketplace (look at Yahoo Auctions, and they're -free- now; Overstock.com auctions are another competitor that is all but defeated) - they've so completely tied PayPal into eBay and integrated it into so many of their requirements (there's certain buying and selling requirements that force you to establish a PayPal account, even if you never plan to accept or use PayPal) that I don't see anyone defeating PayPal, at least in the auction marketplace, any time soon.

Google's best remaining chance to take PayPal on, head-on, would be to setup Google Auctions, and even then, eBay really has captured a frightening amount of loyalty and dedication from hundreds of thousands of buyers and sellers...it would be an interesting fight.

Can I use canadian tire money to Buy canadian tire money?

Does this mean that someone like me who REFUSES to use Paypal can never buy anything on eBay, because I must go through their payment system?

No, because they explicitly allow a number of other payment options, including credit cards, personal checks, money orders, cash (but only for in-person transactions)... and even a number of other online payment systems. Bidpay comes to mind.

Additionally, all the wording doesn't actually say the transaction can't be completed that way -- just that the seller can't offer it. The buyer could offer to send cash through the mail, but the seller can't request it. In theory, if the buyer offers to pay via Google Checkout, the seller isn't violating the policy, as long as the seller isn't the one to suggest it. Take this with a grain of salt, though, as I have no intention of testing this interpretation myself...

"where's the $250 educational mac"?

You can find that here: http://www.ebay.com/

http://listings.ebay.com/_W0QQsocmdZListingItemLis t?sofocus=pf&sbrftog=1&from=R2&catref=C3&socmd=Lis tingItemList&sbrbin=t&satitle=&sacat=3736%26catref %3DC6&fsop=3%26fsoo%3D1&coaction=compare&copagenum =1&coentrypage=search&fgtp=&a14=-24&a26444=26556&a 12=26564&a25710=-24&a10244=-24&gcs=1504&pfid=1810& reqtype=2&pfmode=1&alist=a14%2Ca26444%2Ca12%2Ca257 10%2Ca10244&pf_query=&pf=Show+Items&sargn=-1%26sas lc%3D2&sadis=200&fpos=ZIP%2FPostal&sascs=2&ftrt=1& ftrv=1&saprclo=&saprchi=

You spend 150 to 200 bucks on the machine and 50 on the crt or 150 on the lcd. If you use Ubuntu you can even save the 50 bucks for XP.

You get a total of 200 to 350 bucks minus the printer. I would use something that you can refill. Old sturdy inkjets or laser printers that now have cheap cartridges come to mind. You should really be able to stay below 400 in total and installing ubuntu is easier than to install windows nowdays. Especially because a computer illiterate would have problems installing all the anti spyware tools.

Does Slashdot get money for advertisements for Apple machines? Seeing how much they charge for a machine I suppose they have the spare money.

Here is a representative example of what I was talking about. 14 Miyazaki films on 4 dvds, region free for $20? Something tells me that's not legit, even if the box looks believable. The seller has over 30,000 transactions, and some random sampling of recent transactions would lead me to believe that this guy doesn't sell anything but bootlegs (from what I understand, region free discs with more than 4 half-hour episodes on a disc are almost always bootlegs -- someone please correct me if I'm wrong about that), and he's been selling things for over a year. I don't know if it would be hard to catch the seller and convict him of a crime, but ebay could easily shut down his account if they received complaints. This seems rather public and blatant, not some shop in Chinatown with a hidden back room.

The real mystery is why anyone would bid on boxes like this one. What is a $3,000,000 mystery box? Does it contain $3,000,000 worth of gold and jewelery? To get just some idea of how this particular seller is profiting, just take the $50,000 cash back you get just for making a $500,000 bid. How is this person a power seller?

The question is... who has the mental disorder... the people creating these auctions or the people gullible enough to participate?

> SHIPPING IS $12 FOR SOMETHING THAT WEIGHS 1 POUND

That's small change. Try $134.97 to ship a Golf Pouch which costs less than $20 to Singapore.

Maybe if you buy stock in UPS or FEDEX, because they look like they are making a killing.
$19 to ship a saw blade? Are you fucking kidding me? (and yup, that's from a power seller)

Before the apologists chime in saying "OMG GAS IS SOO MUCH AND I HAVE TO PAY FOR PACKING MATERIAL AND THAT IS WHY SHIPPING IS $12 FOR SOMETHING THAT WEIGHS 1 POUND" - USPS will provide (and even deliver) free boxes, packing material, tape (ok, no tape anymore, people sort of abused it, but then again, they did send you 24 rolls at a time) and will pick up your packages from your doorstep if you ship priority mail. A one rate envelope ships cross country for under 4 bucks.
You can't defend abusive shipping or handling costs. I'm surprised that ebay hasn't made a serious effort to get rid of these sellers, but that's probably because they make enough on paypal fees to make up for what they don't get in listing and closing fees.

Nothing, really. Although ebay wants the name of your unborn first child in addition to a ton of other related financial information. If someone in organized crime wanted to do it, it would be almost trivial.
Problem is that for the rest of us - IIRC, only one feedback counts per account (per time period?) - this was different in the begining, until people started boosting their feedback with false purchases (a week? ;)

That all said, I hate the vultures on ebay who charge bullshit shipping prices and I've bid on some products with the sole intention of ruining their 100% feedback ratings with a negative feedback in the past few years. In exchange, I get a NPB or 3 on a throwaway account - something that leaves me crying at night.
I know, I know, it is ultimately a small thing, but I get a teensy weensy sense of satisfaction by knowing, no matter what they do, they will never get that 100% again.

Before the apologists chime in saying "OMG GAS IS SOO MUCH AND I HAVE TO PAY FOR PACKING MATERIAL AND THAT IS WHY SHIPPING IS $12 FOR SOMETHING THAT WEIGHS 1 POUND" - no assholes, USPS will provide (and even deliver) free boxes, packing material, tape (ok, no tape anymore, people sort of abused it, but then again, they did send you 24 rolls at a time) and will pick up your packages from your doorstep if you ship priority mail, so die in a fire. I really have no fucking patience for people who blatantly and openly commit fraud.

Besides, ebay loves the power sellers because they make tons of money on them (which is also the reason why ebay puts up with clearly fraudulent - and, may I add, quite illegal under several laws - auctions such as $12 prada handbags from Hong Kong with unlisted shipping fees. And look, the seller is a power seller!
Ebay (and paypal) makes a killing on each and every single sale, regardless of whether it is fraudulent - although they don't make any money on shipping fees. I'm actually surprised that ebay hasn't started going after sellers who inflate the shipping fees to avoid paying ebay their cut. I suppose that with the paypal fees (which are basically pure profit, it isn't like their buyer protection is worth a half damn to the defrauded purchaser, it all works out for ebay quite nicely.
Sadly, because of the obvious conflict of interest, fenceBay won't be the ones who put an end to this sort of behaviour.

1. Best way to make profit off eBay: sell short :-)

2. First of all... I think "profit" is meant and not "sales". I could sell $5000 worth of cash for $1000 and easily make more than $1000 in sales per month.

3. Why do people love to collect Mammy cookie jars?

4. What in the goddamn fuck is with those stupid, stupid "Mystery auctions"... where people auction off things saying "OMG OMG!! THIS BOX COULD BE FILLED WITH UP TO $10,000 in CASH!! AND YOU ARE BIDDING ON THE BOX, ANYTHING THAT COMES INSIDE IS MY GIFT TO YOU........" Did you know there is a seperate category on ebay for these? Why do people bid on that shit....

1. Best way to make profit off eBay: sell short :-)

2. First of all... I think "profit" is meant and not "sales". I could sell $5000 worth of cash for $1000 and easily make more than $1000 in sales per month.

3. Why do people love to collect Mammy cookie jars?

4. What in the goddamn fuck is with those stupid, stupid "Mystery auctions"... where people auction off things saying "OMG OMG!! THIS BOX COULD BE FILLED WITH UP TO $10,000 in CASH!! AND YOU ARE BIDDING ON THE BOX, ANYTHING THAT COMES INSIDE IS MY GIFT TO YOU........" Did you know there is a seperate category on ebay for these? Why do people bid on that shit....

Why this focus on a few people getting rich? In general, the economic benefit of the internet is spread across many people. Customers that have a slightly cheaper alternative one click away. Suppliers that gain access to markets that they could not access effectively otherwise. The overall effect on the economy is enourmous but only a few people are getting really rich.

How many are making a decent living off eBay sales? How many people's lives have been transformed by the ability to give up their day job and do what they like while getting paid for it?

For example this artist who left her job as a web designer nad is now making lampwork glass beads and selling them on eBat.

Disclaimer: I know her personally and this is a bit of promotion - but I think it's a valid example because it would be difficult for someone living in a remote place to have this kind of access to the markets that appreciate her art without eBay.

Sell the contents of your wastebasket - undreamed of profit!

I have all the faith in Google to come up with a kick-butt service, but it's not going to beat PayPal on eBay any time soon - why? Because PayPal gets to make the rules on eBay. Since PayPal is owned by eBay, it's in eBay's best interests to protect PayPal's near-lock on the online eBay payment processing market, so they've come up with what they call (I love it) the eBay "Safe Payments Policy". (See, they're protecting us and keeping us safe. It's for our own good, of course.) The details of the policy are here: http://pages.ebay.com/help/policies/safe-payments- policy.html

The policy lists, explicitly, what payment methods sellers are allowed to accept. The only non-PayPal online methods permitted (other than accepting credit cards directly) are "Sellers may offer to accept payment through Certapay and Propay."

The policy goes on to then list, explicitly, some specific methods sellers may NOT accept, and then ends with... "Not permitted on eBay.com: ... Finally, sellers may not request payment through online payment methods not specifically permitted in this policy."

So it eBay hasn't given a payment method their blessing, eBay sellers can't accept it or offer to accept it in their listings. Those that do, per the policy, may suffer:
" * Listing cancellation
          * Forfeit of eBay fees on cancelled listings
          * Listing cancellation
          * Limits on account privileges
          * Loss of PowerSeller status
          * Account suspension "

eBay does that that "From time to time, as new payment services arise, eBay will evaluate them to determine whether they may present trust and safety concerns and are appropriate for the marketplace." - so they'll evaluate Google's system and any other new systems, but the criteria they state (I'm shocked they stated criteria...their decisions are usually arbitrary) present a huge hurdle, even for a company like Google - some of the criteria include if the method might cause "the potential for confusion among eBay users" - which, as a PowerSeller, I can say that PAYPAL causes "confusion among eBay users". The phrase "First Class Mail" or "This item is new" has even caused emails from "confused" eBay users.

The best part - eBay bans new services. So if new services are banned, and services have to have a track record to be permitted...then eBay-focused payment services that would compete with PayPal will never reach the point that eBay might have to approve them. The rule states "the payment service has a substantial historical track record of providing safe and reliable financial and/or banking related services".

You can read the rest of it at http://pages.ebay.com/help/policies/safe-payments- policy.html but it makes it pretty obvious from even just these few excerpts that eBay wrote it to keep Google from competing with PayPal. I suppose because it's their sandbox, they can decide who plays in it, but this seems almost monopolistic to me. At least in the US, eBay is the default, standard, well-known auction website - Overstock, Yahoo Auctions, etc. have all tried to compete with eBay and failed; eBay has the vast majority of the traffic, and now they're using that position to limit who can startup online auction payment processing services - because if you want to have a successful, profitable online auction payment processing service in the US, it's going to -have- to work with eBay to generate any sizable levels of revenue.

Another case of "We make the rules, so deal with it if you want to buy or sell on our site" from eBay and PayPal. I miss the days when they were much more community-oriented and community-friendly.