eBay vs. Craigslist Courtroom Fisticuffs Start Today

davekleiman writes with news that former eBay chief exec Meg Whitman took the stand today to kick off the battle that has been brewing between Craigslist and eBay. The waters are further clouded by Whitman's upcoming bid for governor of California. "eBay wants to shed light on the 'coercive plan' that it has said Newmark hatched with Craigslist Chief Executive Jim Buckmaster to dilute eBay's ownership stake, ultimately stripping eBay of its seat on the Craigslist board. Craigslist has hit back that eBay used its board seat to glean information to launch its own classified site, Kijiji. Craigslist also claims that eBay used deceptive tactics to direct traffic away from its site."

Comments

Re:Cross Ownership

[Trepidity]

It does happen in some industries, and the law on it is pretty complex and murky (and varies by country). When it's below a certain threshold, so the minority stake doesn't exercise control over the company, and has representation basically only to ensure its rights as a minority shareholder are respected, it's considered a "passive investment" and not subject to the usual antitrust scrutiny that would ensue if, say, eBay actually tried to buy Craigslist (or buy a stake considered controlling). A lot of economists are a bit skeptical of just how passive such passive investments are, though. The keywords +"passive investment" +competitors bring up a whole pile of writing on the subject...