Nickeled and Dimed at eBay

If you've been waiting to unload some of those gifts you just don't want, longtime eBay (Nasdaq: EBAY) fans know that today offers an opportunity to post them at a discounted listing fee.
All day today, $0.15 will serve as your insertion fee for fixed-price and more conventional auction-style items in most categories. Naturally, any successful transactions will incur the popular site's normal final-value fees. Yet it's still a good deal on the surface, especially since eBay charges as much as $4.80 in insertion fees throughout the year.
However, $0.15 is a new number out of the auctioneer's camp. Until a few years ago, the listings on a day that was typically the second day after Christmas were completely free. That changed when the company erected a tollbooth on the popular promotion to charge $0.10 for each listing on Dec. 27, 2004, instead.

Read more http://www.fool.com/investing/general/2006/12/27/nickeled-and-dimed-at-ebay.aspx

Tips for buying on eBay during the holidays

The combination of holiday shopping and America’s love for eBay means lots of people are keeping their fingers crossed that they submit the high bid on gifts during the holiday season. Sometimes, things on eBay don’t come together as smoothly as cyber buyers and sellers would like. There are several helpful things to remember that may help consumers avoid pitfalls when buying items on eBay.
The first thing to know is that when someone places a bid on an item, they are entering into a contract with the individual seller of that item. EBay is not a party to the actual transaction between you and the seller. The listing provides the conditions of the sale, and you must abide by those conditions unless they violate eBay’s User Agreement or are unlawful. Resist the urge to impulse shop; don’t press that “Bid Now” button until you’re ready to commit.

Read more http://www.news8austin.com/content/headlines/?ArID=176975&SecID=2

Billboard — Based on Real-Life Ebay Forehead Tattoo Advertisement Auction — Plays 59E59

Billboard, Michael Vukadinovich's play based on a true story of a woman who went on eBay and auctioned off her forehead as advertising space, will be presented at 59E59 Theaters Jan. 12-Feb. 4, 2007.
The world premiere production is directed by Tania Inessa Kirkman, and is a co-production of Reverie Productions and Overlap Productions. Opening night is scheduled for Jan. 18.
The inspiration for the play came from a 2005 article in the Deseret News, about a woman who went through with the auction to raise money to send her son to private school. Goldenpalace.com, an online gaming site, bought the space for $10,000.
What a idiot
Read more http://www.playbill.com/news/article/104468.html

eBay bonanza after shoppers spend £4bn on unwanted gifts

The phrase "it's just what I wanted" is, it seems, as hollow as the cynics and Scrooges would have liked. An estimated £4bn of gifts received by Britons this year were entirely unwanted, according to a study out yesterday.
The "wrong gift" apparently cost the equivalent of £92 per person. The research, conducted by ICM for the online auction site eBay, found that Britons would receive an average of seven presents each this Christmas. A third of those gifts would remain untouched.

Read more http://www.guardian.co.uk/retail/story/0,,1978790,00.html