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It's a long running conspiracy theory, of course the whole idea is ludicrous at least to the extent that it's a conspiracy rather than just an unplanned and unwanted technical glitch (personally I'm not sure it's even that).
Essentially some people think that eBay purposely takes servers off-line making a portion of listings inaccessible.
The slightly more rational only go so far as to suggest that eBay's server farm is so rickety that servers go down on a regular basis. There's probably some truth to this but still most of the "evidence" doesn't pass the smell test.
Essentially some people think that eBay purposely takes servers off-line making a portion of listings inaccessible.
The slightly more rational only go so far as to suggest that eBay's server farm is so rickety that servers go down on a regular basis. There's probably some truth to this but still most of the "evidence" doesn't pass the smell test.
The "proof" such as it is, is less in gaps in sales as in runs of sales.
There are so many possible reasons for this.....
Example; I used to think of Spain as a marginal territory for me, I made sales there but nothing special. About two years ago a Spanish buyer bought a bunch of things from me, shortly thereafter another and over the course of a few months I ended up with a half dozen regular multiple item buyers in Spain. It's now one of my top 3 foreign destinations but it's all due to word of mouth between a tiny group of like minded buyers. Nothing at all to do with eBay or site visibility or any vast conspiracy.
In my old days of retail I would often wonder why a particular record which had sat for months or years would all of a sudden start selling....query a few buyers and I get comments like "they've been playing it on CBC" or "there was review in Mojo magazine" or similar stories. The effects of these things are somewhat sort-lived but a new one pops up a few weeks later and leads one to wonder what prompts this sort of activity.
Here's a current example, Google have put PacMan on their homepage today for the 30th anniversary of the game. I'd bet that anybody selling anything related to PacMan will notice a sudden upsurge of interest over the next few weeks before it returns to "normal".
Another one, I have a particular record (reggae) which I've sold about 50 copies, 75% of those sales have gone to San Jose (the rest spread out around the world). I asked one of the buyers about it, they explained that for a very long time there has been a small but dedicated group of reggae freaks in San Jose and it all originated in the early 80's due to the influence of one or two local taste-makers. It's very predictable, I'll sell one copy and within a few weeks several more, it then goes dead for a few months before repeating itself.
There are so many possible reasons for this.....
Example; I used to think of Spain as a marginal territory for me, I made sales there but nothing special. About two years ago a Spanish buyer bought a bunch of things from me, shortly thereafter another and over the course of a few months I ended up with a half dozen regular multiple item buyers in Spain. It's now one of my top 3 foreign destinations but it's all due to word of mouth between a tiny group of like minded buyers. Nothing at all to do with eBay or site visibility or any vast conspiracy.
In my old days of retail I would often wonder why a particular record which had sat for months or years would all of a sudden start selling....query a few buyers and I get comments like "they've been playing it on CBC" or "there was review in Mojo magazine" or similar stories. The effects of these things are somewhat sort-lived but a new one pops up a few weeks later and leads one to wonder what prompts this sort of activity.
Here's a current example, Google have put PacMan on their homepage today for the 30th anniversary of the game. I'd bet that anybody selling anything related to PacMan will notice a sudden upsurge of interest over the next few weeks before it returns to "normal".
Another one, I have a particular record (reggae) which I've sold about 50 copies, 75% of those sales have gone to San Jose (the rest spread out around the world). I asked one of the buyers about it, they explained that for a very long time there has been a small but dedicated group of reggae freaks in San Jose and it all originated in the early 80's due to the influence of one or two local taste-makers. It's very predictable, I'll sell one copy and within a few weeks several more, it then goes dead for a few months before repeating itself.
It was the regular Thursday night maintenance! I always forget about it but like clockwork there are always some posts about odd glitches on Thursday night/Friday morning.
It's still better than back in "old days" when the site shut down completely for 2 hours each week.
It's still better than back in "old days" when the site shut down completely for 2 hours each week.
