EBayers Boycott Feedback Changes Announcement
 Monday, February 18th, 2008

You should have known we'd be all over this like syrup on your Eggo's, because we love a good boycott with purpose for the little guy!  Hey, what other bargaining chip to consumers have these days?  Auction fanatics, bulk product pushers, and regular old eBay-loving individuals have begun their boycott today of all things eBay, in response to eBay's recent announcement that, among other things, sellers can no longer leave negative feedback for their buyers.

From a Yahoo! tech blog, here is some info on the changes brought about by the announcement that eBay's CEO Meg Whitman, 51, is stepping down next month.  She'll be replaced by John Donahoe, 47.

Christopher Null, a great technology blogger that calls himself "The Working Guy," wrote yesterday, "A recent poll of eBay sellers showed that a full 90 percent were unhappy with the policy change...sellers appear to be weighing whether to even bother selling merchandise online at all, turning instead to flea markets and enthusiast fairs instead of wading through what many now see as a bureaucratic and expensive nightmare."

EBay spokesman Usher Liberman has said that they'll likely wait out the boycott.  "At this point it's still premature for us to speculate.  We're empathetic with our sellers and understand that they're concerned, and that some of them object to some of the changes we're implementing.  On the other hand, we think we have very good reasons for what we're doing."

And those would be...?  Perhaps some of the bigwigs at eBay have forgotten that eBay became a phenomenon because of the public, not vice versa.  It started out as a tiny online auction site by founder (and current chairman) Pierre Omidyar.  eBay may also underestimate the ability of internet users to converge in cyberspace:  BoycottVictoriously.com has already set up (and Dugg, of course) a website for "feebay refugees" to organize, communicate, and inform fellow buyers and sellers of where they'll be until the tentative end-of-strike February 25th.

If the public doesn't want it - why do it?

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