eBay woke up. What a concept! A real person answering your e-mails. Now, of course, the downside of this is that the e-mails will be answered in Bangalore and Mumbai, and will still be from controlled response scripts.

But still, it’s somewhat of a concession from eBay that they stumbled a bit…and that the response to the latest earning results may force them to re-think their end-to-end response.

Oh, and in case eBay missed it, the “Lincoln Fries” were auctioned at Yahoo! Auctions…And JupiterMedia is talking about alternatives to eBay. [here]

Re-invention is a wonderful thing. And the response from the community is likely to be…when will eBay begin encouraging its leaders and evangelists to take to the Blogosphere?

A Message from Bill Cobb

Since becoming the President of eBay North America in December, I’ve spent a lot of time listening to you, our Community. There’s a lot on your minds right now. I’ve been taking it all in and thinking hard about how we can make sure eBay remains a fun, safe place to trade, and a prosperous home for our many dedicated sellers.

One of the issues I’ve heard a lot about is our recent fee increases, particularly the increase in Store Inventory Format final value fees. I’ve also heard concerns about customer support, the amount of change we make to the site on a regular basis, and trust and safety. We’re listening to everything you have to say.

eBay has become a hugely successful marketplace as a result of the innovation, enthusiasm and hard work of our Community. The site has also become more complex as it has grown to meet many of your needs. So our challenge is to keep pace with the Community’s changing requirements, while preserving the things that make eBay so special. With that in mind, I’d like to give you a preview of some upcoming changes for the United States and Canada.

eBay has a fantastic Customer Support team, but Meg and I agree we haven’t invested enough in giving our CS reps the flexibility and tools they need to really take care of you. So, to start, within the next 90 days, we’ll shut down most of our automated email responses. Our users will get a “real” e-mail response to their questions - you’ll hear from a human being who will try to help you with your problem or question right off the bat. We will only use auto responses to acknowledge receipt of spam or policy violation reports.

We also think the time has come to expand phone support. Currently phone support is available only to Silver, Gold, Platinum and Titanium PowerSellers. Starting April 1, all eBay Stores owners also will have access to phone support. We’ll provide details on the benefits of phone support to Stores owners soon.

We know pricing is a critical issue for our sellers. While we stand behind our decision to increase final value fees on Store Inventory Format listings - because they make sense for items that list with insertion fees of two cents - I know this increase has been difficult for some of our sellers. To reward our eBay Stores sellers, we’ll be crediting $15.95 - a month’s Basic Stores subscription - in May to all sellers who operated an eBay Store for the month of April. Stores owners will receive more details on this soon.

We also want to do something for the rest of our sellers. I’m happy to announce that effective at midnight tonight, eBay.com and eBay.ca will reduce minimum insertion fees for Auction-Style listings, Fixed Price, Motors Non-Vehicle and B&I non-Capital Equipment Categories from 30 cents to 25 cents (CA$0.35 to CA$0.30). eBay Germany has always used this pricing, and users there have benefited from higher conversion rates on items with lower starting bids.

One of the great things about eBay is the candor and passion of our Community. Your input keeps this company focused on what’s right and important. Later this month, I’ll be hosting an online meeting to hear more from you. You’ll see more details on the Announcement Board soon. And I’ll periodically post notes like this one to talk about issues of importance to all of us.

eBay has never stopped listening to our users and we never will. I know many of you already have Meg’s e-mail address and frequently send her messages about things you care about. I hope you will do the same with me. My e-mail address is billcobb@ebay.com. I promise I’ll read every e-mail. And most of all, I’ll listen.

Sincerely,

Bill Cobb
President
eBay North America

Tags: API, app, blog, Canada, community, control, conversion, critical, current, EAD, Germany, HTML, HTTP, IE, IM, IP, Issues, it, media, North America, Om, One, online, pr, president, review, spam, United States, users, web, Yahoo!

Joi Ito pointed me to the post about Ogilvy & Mather doing “bullshit marketing” for American Express.

American Express is a company I have a lot of respect for. But when they start treating their techno-savvy customers as complete doufi (plural of doufus), then they slide down into the morass of spam-spewing card purveyors that flood my snail-mailbox daily.

And Joi Ito gets asked to pimp stuff in his blog. I never get asked to pimp anything.

This is still circulating around the next. See more here.

*LCD Marketing == Lowest Common Denominator Marketing

Tags: ASP, blog, customers, HTML, HTTP, IM, it, marketing, Om, pr, spam

Rick Heller on Blog Name Hijacking.

When my Blogger space was hijacked (after I had abandoned it), someone else took it over, name and all.

Just sad to see that this is going to become an issue.

Tags: app, blog, HTML, HTTP, IE, it, Om, One, spam

• I have never used OSX or owned a Powerbook
• I don’t own a tablet PC
• I don’t own a sexy cell phone
• I have never owned/started a company
• I have never had my own column/tv show
• I haven’t had to hide my true identity to protect my job/family/unnamed federal agency
• I have never written my own Internet Standard or protocol
• I have only been quoted by the mainstream media once
• I have not written a book
• I only go on one business trip every 2-3 months
• I have never had comment spam

I am sure there are more reasons; I will add them as they come to mind.

Addendum

• I am not in a band
• I think podcasting is vain and useless
• I don’t own an iPod/Zen Micro/Digital Player
• My digital camera is worth $60
• I have never mixed my own music
• I have never written a desktop application

Tags: app, application, blog, book, business, cro, desktop, Internet, IP, it, media, Om, One, pr, spam, tv

Spent all day in bed.

Now before you go off the deep-end and start saying how decadent, you have to realize that I spent most of the time unconscious, sweating, and having very unusual vivid dreams. It was actually kind of nice to have vivid dream again; I don’t have them very often, as a result of the Paxil/Seroxat I take.

On the whole, it was a truly unpleasant day. Managed to crawl out of bed long enough to help put the boys to bed, and I am functioning mainly with the help of Advil (Curse of the CNS AGAIN!).

Samantha has hit her Holiday Season stride, and is slapping up "Canadian Pine" garlands, lights, bows, and pine cone highlights around the Embassy. I am settled in the command chair, knowing full well I better be healthy by Monday, or the whole trip to West Coast will be in question.

Ugh. Nice disease.

On a happy note, I sent my first 419/Nigerian Scam mail to spam@uce.gov. Seems that someone wants to hear about these things.

Tags: app, ASP, blog, curse, dreams, HTTP, IM, IP, it, LAN, Om, One, PAXIL, pr, spam