eBay sued for online slander

news24 ^ | 1/24/03 | Gina Keating

[Arkinsaw]

If it keeps up they are going to regulate and adjudicate commerce out of existence both on the net and walk in.

[Excuse_My_Bellicosity]

What a lame-o lawsuit. If a guy receives something of poorer quality than advertised, he has a right to say so on the forum. And, since it is a forum, doesn't the guy have the right to give an online rebuttal. Oops, that would require thought and would not net him a bunch of shakedown money.

[templar]

IMO, He's going to fail. At most, ebay may end up with a few more disclaimers on the feedback section. And California fictitious name registration would have to be enforced individually by California, a difficult proposition at best.

[Burkeman1]

Frivolous. It is a "feedback" system. The guy could have posted a rebuttal and let others judge for themselves who was telling the truth or not.

[Excuse_My_Bellicosity]

Yep, I think you're right.

[shadeaud]

I trust the replies that are submitted by both buyers and sellers on Ebay. When I see too many negatives on a sellers name, I just move on to another auction. This guys seems to have gotten his feelings hurt when he didn't deliver what he promised. Another opportunist.

[Excuse_My_Bellicosity]

Yep. It seems to me that if somebody should be sued here, it would be the guy making the supposed vicious comments. But he probably doesn't have the millions of dollars that e-Bay does, so we know why he's going after e-Bay and not the commentor.

[Dan(9698)]

If you pay by credit card, and don't receive what you bought, you can claim fraud to the credit card company and they will credit your account.

They will then get their mony from the seller.

This works, as I have done it. I shipped the stuff back after I received credit. All I was out is the return shipping.

[Leisler]

"Grace, an attorney, said he would not have filed suit over the postings "except for the fact that eBay's policy needs to be revised".

"In his lawsuit, Grace demands $2.5 million in punitive damages from eBay and $100 000 from Neeley."

Lawyer. Frig'n scum.

[69ConvertibleFirebird]

Grace demands $2.5 million in punitive damages from eBay and $100 000 from Neeley

What scum. Another good reason to loath lawyers. If lawyer-scum didn't want in on the legal lottery these cases wouldn't be coming up. Also, partially the fault of brain dead juries, of course...

[Howlin]

He's here to help us.

[babylonian]

The key to leaving negative feedback for someone on ebay, is to avoid calling them names, or making charges. If you stick strictly with the facts and tell what happened to you, you remain on the high ground. Creative wording of the facts can have the highest impact.

[nothingnew]

I've never watched eBay. My wife won't let me.......oh....yeah...that's Baywatch...

FMCDH

[sonofatpatcher2]

eBay was once a fine place to buy and sale, however they have gotten so big, they care more about profits than anything else. I moved to Yahoo Auctions as they were much more reasonable (5 cents listing instead of 25 cents plus at eBay) and less restrictive about things. I still use them a little for my none firearm related sales.

Nowadays, I use Auction Arms as they have a 2nd Amendment friendly look at arms and there is not any listing fee at all. Plus their commission for sales are very reasonable.

If you are looking for firearms and/or related products, I highly recommend them. They follow the Law and any firearms must go through a FFL dealer. They have a large listing of FFLs who will handle such transactions.

[INSENSITIVE GUY]

E-BAY hurts other business and actually winds up costing a buyer more than if he had just simply purchased something at an advertized price.A lot of times a bidder is the buddy of who is selling something and places false bids to drive up the price.NO E-BAY FOR ME!

[bannie]

e-Bay does bring buyer and product in contact. Many eclectic items used to be next-to-impossible for matching buyers to find.

Free Enterprise. It's a good thing.

[giotto]

Feedback is a powerful thing on eBay. There is really no way to leave negative feedback "in a nice way." You could say "This seller is a great eBayer but my stuff arrived late and not in the best condition" and as long as you post it as negative feedback, it's a slap in the face to the receiver.

I once bought something from a guy who sent my item really late and then refused to send my feedback, even though I had sent him payment with PayPal immediately after the auction. When I emailed him, his response was very testy. I could tell that the whole thing could turn into the wrong kind of feedback, so I sent him a somewhat conciliatory message along with some shipping tricks I had picked up in my own business. He eventually sent me positive feedback, although I think he sold my email address, because I started getting tons of spam after that.

Moral: Never use fighting words when communicating with strangers. And never use an email address you want to keep.

[CFC__VRWC]

The lawsuit also demands that buyers and sellers, who use aliases in eBay transactions, register their screen names with the state of California as fictitious business names, and that eBay be forced to collect state sales tax.

On the face of it, this seems like a totally frivolous lawsuit, but who knows what a coked-out, brain-dead California jury will do? And, what on earth does collecting sales tax on eBay transactions have to do with a supposed slander?

Does this ambulance chaser have any kind of ties to Gov. Doofus? Because I really have to wonder if the "slander" isn't a smokescreen, and the REAL issue is to tap yet another source of revenue to feed California's out-of-control government.