Ebays buys Marktplaats

Ebay acquires biggest classified ads site in Netherlands
eBay has acquired Marktplaats.nl, the most popular classifieds Web site in the Netherlands for about $290 million, the company announced on Wednesday. It bought the site from Het Goed Beheer BV, a company that owns second-hand retail shops in the Netherlands. Het Goed Beheer BV owns 92 percent of Marktplaats.

Marktplaats.nl site boasts over a million classified ad listings, ranging from clothing and collectibles to cars and household items, and some 500,000 daily visitors.

Marktplaats BV earlier clinched a deal to deploy Google’s search engine and advertising software programmes on Marktplaats.nl and other websites in the Netherlands and abroad.

Shill bidding doesn't pay. Don't bid on your own items!

If you're thinking of asking your friends to bid on your items just so to inflate prices and create a bandwagon effect, think again. According to an AP report, eight eBay sellers were ordered to pay nearly $90,000 in restitution and fines "after admitting they bid up products online to inflate the prices."

New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer said more than 120 people will receive restitution in the settlement of the three cases, which wrapped up last week in state courts.

Too bad.

A buyer, Brad Clarke, 48, of Peachtree City, Ga., already has received a check for $3,089 after overpaying for a 1999 Jeep Cherokee sport utility vehicle he bought on eBay from a New York seller in 2002, according to the report.

"I'd always been suspicious because it seems like an easy thing to do, to just keep bidding up," Clarke told AP. "But I was still just completely shocked and very surprised."

Ebay guidelines specifically prohibit "shill bidding" - Shill bidding is the deliberate placing of bids to artificially raise the price of an item and is not allowed. To avoid the appearance of being involved in this activity, family members, friends, and individuals living together, working together or sharing a computer should not bid on each other's items. -- Ebay.

"Shill bidding undermines trust in our community and is not permitted on eBay. In addition, shill bidding is illegal in many areas with severe legal penalties. We want to ensure that all eBay users understand what shill bidding is, why eBay treats it so seriously, and what can happen if one engages in shill bidding. We also want to ensure that one does not unknowingly engage in the practice." -- Ebay policy.

Can sellers bid on their own listings?
"eBay originally allowed sellers to bid on their own listings as a way to close their listing without selling to the highest bidder. Because this privilege was abused it was eliminated. Therefore, bidding on your own item is considered shill bidding and is not allowed." - Ebay

Sample Scenarios:
- A member bids several times just under the highest bidder towards the end of a listing, incrementing the final sale price by a dollar and retracting if he/she inadvertently bids more than the high bidder.
- A member bids 30 times or more even when there are no other bidders on the listing.

According to the report, three sellers were accused of making 610 bids on 106 of their car auctions under the user name "Mother's Custom Automotive NY Dealer."

More on shill bidding tomorrow...