ebay spamming!?

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Tha_Gunslinga
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Post by Tha_Gunslinga » Wed Oct 12, 2005 6:28 pm

hammr7 wrote: According to Gunslinga's logic, a Revised card listed as an "Unlimited" (or an Alpha card listed as "Beta") is far preferable to a card listed as "Unlimited, not Revised" (or "Alpha, not Beta"). As the victim of at least 30 such misrepresentations in the past year, I disagree completely. I would rather find out in the auction header that the card is or isn't what I am interested in than find out after receiving the card. I'm tired of chasing sellers who don't want to take back cards, or who think I should pay postage or a restocking charge for their problems.
I see your point, but if there's a scan, then it should be clear, and if the seller clearly knows the difference between the sets, and puts that in the title just to get more hits, that's different.

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Post by misterpid » Wed Oct 12, 2005 7:20 pm

hammr7 wrote:According to Gunslinga's logic, a Revised card listed as an "Unlimited" (or an Alpha card listed as "Beta") is far preferable to a card listed as "Unlimited, not Revised" (or "Alpha, not Beta"). As the victim of at least 30 such misrepresentations in the past year, I disagree completely. I would rather find out in the auction header that the card is or isn't what I am interested in than find out after receiving the card. I'm tired of chasing sellers who don't want to take back cards, or who think I should pay postage or a restocking charge for their problems.
If a Revised card is listed ad Unlimited, at least the seller can claim that they made a mistake. It is VERY wrong if it's done intentionally, but extremely hard to prove. Putting "Unlimited, not Revised" is obvious spamming and against the rules - which the seller happpened to agree to use the rules when they signed up with Ebay. The "not Revised" part can be put into the auction text, not in the title. There are many ways/places for a seller to give this type of description without it having to be in the auction title.

If you're that concerned about what your buying, you shouldn't buy from sellers who won't answer all of your questions (and if the auctions arn't clear as to what edition the card is, you should ask questions until you're absolutely sure) or provide scans of the cards.
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Post by bigfatkitty » Wed Oct 12, 2005 7:39 pm

misterpid wrote:If a Revised card is listed ad Unlimited, at least the seller can claim that they made a mistake. It is VERY wrong if it's done intentionally, but extremely hard to prove. Putting "Unlimited, not Revised" is obvious spamming and against the rules - which the seller happpened to agree to use the rules when they signed up with Ebay. The "not Revised" part can be put into the auction text, not in the title. There are many ways/places for a seller to give this type of description without it having to be in the auction title.
I feel the "Unlimited not Revised" post is almost reverse spamming for informations sake and shouldn't be considered harmful. How do you gain an advantage by using a less valuable keyword? This should be fine for any auction which could be easily confused with another. I'd also be fine with "Summer not Revised or Unlimited".
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Post by silver.paladin » Wed Oct 12, 2005 11:35 pm

As I can recall (and perhaps not perfectly), that there was a recent thread suggesting people from here could start policing the Ebay auctions, in an attempt to try to clean them up. I do not recall any negative reaction to this.

I am more than sick and tired of trying to find an item, and having all the various spam-like other auctions appearing. And I would have to admit that I would disagree with Hammr in the suggestion
hammr7 wrote:I would rather find out in the auction header that the card is or isn't what I am interested in than find out after receiving the card.
Information, such as not Beta or whatever, belongs in the Description field, not in the auction header. The Auction Header is meant to quickly describe what is for sale, not what is not being auctioned.
Even those sellers that put their company name or trademark in the Auction Header is a form of spamming, I would think (though I do not know if Ebay considers that spamming or not), especially in the result of Alpha Beta Unlimited company, as an example.

I personally have no problem with anyone wanting or trying to police these Ebay auctions, in an attempt to clean it up, be it a forum member or not. Targetting a forum member in particular, however, I would find unsettling - but if it just happens to be a forum member, than so be it.

In Normalbrains circumstance, I understand why he was being reported, the first time. The second time however, I would have to ask - Was he being targeted now - or is it, once his first auction was removed, did Ebay have some kind of 'bad-boy' list that he was placed on, and when he created the second auction, this 'bad-boy' listing saw his auction and deemed it to still be offensive. In other words, was he reported once or twice? Personally, I would hope that Ebay does create some kind of short term list, just to see if a user learns their lesson or not.

In regards to the Crystaline Sliver as mentioned above - it has never been officially recorded as being a stolen item, has it? If it is officially recorded as stolen, then I see no problem with informing WotC about owners of this stolen property. But on the other hand, did WotC accidently release a few of these Slivers wrongly, and for whatever reason, they have put a lid on the remainder. Until Wizards will ever 'officially' say what is happening with this particular card, I do not see any reason to do anything. If they do not annouce it as stolen, then there is nothing to police - it is just a few fortunate people who possess an unofficially released item.

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Post by squt » Wed Oct 12, 2005 11:36 pm

hammr7 wrote:The harsh reality is that there are certain situations with collectibles, including Magic cards, where cards are so similar that some differentiation is required. In many places Collectors Edition cards are known as "Beta CE", to differentiate them from the various Pro Tour decks which are included as generic "CE" cards. So some sellers of Beta or CE cards want to let people know they aren't "CE" or aren't "Beta" to spare potential buyers from having to open the link (its not a view unless you actually look at the auction).
Hammr7 - I always appreciate your insights - your posts are always well thought out and articulated well.

I am curious to know what you think about using the term "Like Beta" instead of "not Beta", and whether or not you think it matters that the poster added the phrase specifically to draw more traffic, not to clarify the card type, as normalbrains admits in his original post?

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misterpid
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Post by misterpid » Thu Oct 13, 2005 12:13 am

bigfatkitty wrote:I feel the "Unlimited not Revised" post is almost reverse spamming for informations sake and shouldn't be considered harmful. How do you gain an advantage by using a less valuable keyword? This should be fine for any auction which could be easily confused with another. I'd also be fine with "Summer not Revised or Unlimited".
I completely agree with you. However, it's still actually against Ebay's rules. I don't think that anyone would actually report an action that was listed as "Unlimited not Revised" or "Summer, not Revised or Unlimited."


I've reported a lot of keyword spamming on Ebay, usually lists of words in the body of the auction. I don't think any auction I've ever reported has been removed. I would think that when an auction like Normalbrains' get reported, 99% of the time it's by someone who's tired of looking for something in particular only to have a huge list of auctions appear that have nothing to do with what is being searched. It does get extremely frustrating.
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Post by AXIOS » Thu Oct 13, 2005 2:50 pm

misterpid wrote:
bigfatkitty wrote:I feel the "Unlimited not Revised" post is almost reverse spamming for informations sake and shouldn't be considered harmful. How do you gain an advantage by using a less valuable keyword? This should be fine for any auction which could be easily confused with another. I'd also be fine with "Summer not Revised or Unlimited".
I completely agree with you. However, it's still actually against Ebay's rules. I don't think that anyone would actually report an action that was listed as "Unlimited not Revised" or "Summer, not Revised or Unlimited."


I've reported a lot of keyword spamming on Ebay, usually lists of words in the body of the auction. I don't think any auction I've ever reported has been removed. I would think that when an auction like Normalbrains' get reported, 99% of the time it's by someone who's tired of looking for something in particular only to have a huge list of auctions appear that have nothing to do with what is being searched. It does get extremely frustrating.
But if it is someone you know, you can at least bring the decency to inform the person first!
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Post by hammr7 » Fri Oct 14, 2005 12:55 am

One point in my argument related specifically to the Alpha - Beta situation apears to have been overlooked. If Wizards legally trademarked their first release as "Limited", and the "Alpha" and "Beta" labels are unofficial desciptors, then how can their use be keyword spamming?

Keyword spamming seems to refer to misuse of a legal trademark name (like Chanel) which is not the case here. It also refers to throwing in a bunch of unrelated keywords, and I would argue that is not the case either.

Alpha and Beta are certainly related by the fact they are variations of the same product release. If you were offering a "limited" card you could certainly reference at least one of the Alpha / Beta labels, and probably both (since us Limited collectors might not care which we got).

There was a just completed auction for three supposedly Alpha cards on eBay: Balance, Wrath of God, and Serra Angel. The only problem was the Serra was a Beta. I have opened a number of recent Unlimited auctions to find pictures of Revised cards. With so much confusion within the regular selling community, anything that instills confidence that the seller is knowledgable should be applauded, not attacked.

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Post by mahdishain » Fri Oct 14, 2005 2:56 am

hammr7 wrote:

There was a just completed auction for three supposedly Alpha cards on eBay: Balance, Wrath of God, and Serra Angel. The only problem was the Serra was a Beta. I have opened a number of recent Unlimited auctions to find pictures of Revised cards. With so much confusion within the regular selling community, anything that instills confidence that the seller is knowledgable should be applauded, not attacked.
i disagree that someone stating that their alpha cards are not beta does anything to instill confidence that the seller is knowledgable. scammers and deceivers can be just as knowledgable as honest sellers. since buyers are responsible for determining if what they are bidding on is what they desire, i can understand how they would prefer not to be mislead by innappropriate keywords.

also don't loose track of the fact that normal has admitted that the reason he used not beta and like beta was to attract more people to his auction.
this is what people are objecting to.

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Post by AXIOS » Mon Oct 17, 2005 7:32 am

why does this sound egoïstic to me?
Tha_Gunslinga wrote:
Yes, very impolite. On a related note, next time I bid on an Ebay auction, I'll expect that no one on MagicLibrary will be rude enough to outbid me.
normalbrains expected that no one of magiclibrary reported HIS auctions! :evil:
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