How The Crooks Get Away With It.......

Enclosing a [feel]remark[/feel] does not exempt it from truth tests, such as whether/not RICO is (or can be) (or has ever been) used against facilitating / hosting services.

Income tax evasion charges have been brought against houses of ill repute based on their laundry bills, but no laundry has ever been prosecuted under RICO for cleaning the sheets of a house of ill repute. Feeling that they could does not make it so.

I am deeply offended at the New Internet Amorality that has enabled YouTube to argue that, since they could not police copyright violations and make money, they must be exempt from policing copyright violations.

I do not think that I have ever defended ebay's disregard of abusive listings, but I have always tried to calmly understand the actual legal environment in which they operate, the self-interest which may have guided this or that policy, etc.

RICO, SHMICO, feel, shmeel.

RICO does not get used against airlines for hosting hijackers, it does not get used against colleges for hosting fraternities & hazing, and it does not get used against shopping centers for hosting fast food joints that sell sugary garbage to the obese.

Cheers,

/s/ ikeyPikey

If an airline allowed successful hijackers to board another of their flights and demanded a fraction of the ransom the hijackers demanded...

I'm guessing the airline would be held to account.

If you want to make hypothetical comparisons, compare apples to apples.

Just saying.

-Dunc

When ebay presents this question to their lawyers, their lawyers may be telling them that Dunc (et al) do not have standing.

I might feel (that word!) that someone should not be building an ugly house in Houston, but my feeling about the law is that I do not have standing to bring a law suit against them because (keeping it brief) I am not impacted by the event.

I feel that it is not unreasonable for ebay's lawyers to say that they feel that the only person with standing to bring a complaint about a transaction is the successful bidder and, for that person, there are remedies in place.

Feel, shmeel ... I welcome the thoughts of any practicing attorney.

Cheers,

/s/ ikeyPikey

When laws are broken, only the victim has standing? That would make it tough to prosecute a murder case, wouldn't it? Exaggerated, sure, but laws are written to protect all of us. If you think laws (like the RICO Act) are only prosecuted on behalf of specific victims, you'd have to show me that part of the Act, otherwise I ain't buying it.

Seems like all the prosecutor needs to worry about is whether the law has been broken, by whom, and whether it can be proved.

Somebody needs to find you the link demonstrating George K's efforts at documenting evidence of one bad stamp seller's ongoing massive fraudulent ebay sales, including a trip to New York to provide his findings to the NY Attorney General's office, where it was ignored.

Part of the problem is not proving that laws were broken, but rather that SO MANY laws are broken that every jurisdiction passes the buck and wants somebody else to prosecute. They cross state lines, international boundaries - leave it to the Feds? A state? US Customs? Is it mail fraud? (Mail fraud triggers the RICO Act, too, by the way).

PS: Standing? I might need standing to bring a case, but certainly not to testify or provide documentation that ebay knowingly violated the law. Jeez. Get over it.

George Kopecky's fight against stamp fraud...

http://www.nbcnews.com/id/17171372/....VYIPIM_bI5s

It isn't easy. I'm pretty sure the author posted a follow-up also.

Protections are being swept away and we're reverting back to this pathetic era on ebay; it's important to know and learn from the past.

-Dunc

I should add that some of George's documentation is probably still available online, at the revived Swedish Tiger site.

Jenny;

The misconception that we are "trolling for bad guys" is the fartherest thing from the truth. What I choose to consider it, is trying to help inexperienced buyers not get burned by either "bad guys" **or** good guys who make honest mistakes. I can tell you that despite the fact that we barely touch the tip of the iceberg of bad items in the Stamps category on ebay, it is very satisfying and worth (to me) the time and effort (which is considerable) when we do manage to get positive results. And even more so, when I see someone as devoted as Don to "the greater good".

In my time on ebay (I think I am in my 13th year) I've had my share of the "good deals" you refer to, including some where I made thousands of dollars in profit, but it is still just as satisfying to know that I've donated my time and experience to helping those most likely to lose their shirts if they simply take the sellers word for everything. But of course, ebay makes it even easier to dupe the inexperienced by no longer requiring a word description, allowing only pictures to suffice, so stamps with undisclosed faults abound.

If you go fishing without bait then you might not catch anything.

Assume it's wrong and then try to prove it's right. Stamps and evrything.

Of course, there is romance and mystery. Can't forget that. Where would we be without romance and mystery?

Oh yes, that's the romance and mystery of stamp collecting.

I wouldn't be surprised if ebay's lawyers are the ones who told ebay NOT to police listings. I think I remember hearing that, from a legal perspective, it's better to make no effort at all policing things than to make an ineffective one. Of course my legal opinions are free and they're worth every penny. In fact, my legal opinions might even be overpriced at "free".

ebay's policy, while not necessarily morally defensible, likely makes sense from a business (dollars and cents) perspective from their point of view. I'm sure they've run the numbers, figured out how many people they'd have to hire to do a good job of policing things vs what they would gain in terms of increased sales and they just don't see the return on investment. It's almost certainly cheaper, easier, and less legally fraught for them just to refund the occasional buyer's money than to have a full-time staff devoted to "police work". Again, I'm not defending that policy on a moral basis, just seeing things from their point of view as business people. They're in business to make money, not protect the general interest of hobbyists and collectors (whatever the hobby or collection might be). Like any business, that means finding the most cost effective way of doing things.

DuncanDoenitz writes:




Elegantly turned!

But in the case of ebay, it is the airline that makes the hijackers give the ransom back!

RICO, shmico.

Cheers,

/s/ ikeyPikey

If only ebay was consistent in "giving the ransom back" all would be good. But far too many bad auctions run to completion. Imagine bank robbers who simply had to give the money back when caught. Not really much of a deterrent, I'd say, but a fair comparison to the way ebay works. "Sorry, Al, but we just can't allow you to continue using ebay for hit contracts, and to show you that we are serious, we are banning the user name "Scarface".

Agreed.

Earlier, Artful used the expression "1 oz prevention = 1 lb of cure."

I think it fair to guess that ebay sees prior restraint (policing the listings so as to stop bad auctions from running to completion) as "1 lb prevention => 1 oz of cure" ...

... especially if prior restraint requires certifying & enabling & policing third party protectors for each of the hundreds & hundreds of collectibles categories.

ebay needs (or, is likely to prefer) a solution that remains in the hands of ebay; the refund policy is just that.

Cheers,

/s/ ikeyPikey

A lack of oversight is one thing, but actually facilitating deception of buyers through weak terms and conditions is another. There is a line between these, so for me the question becomes 'does ebay cross it'?

But thinking that a lack of oversight is the only issue that might be occurring seems to me to be shortsighted. In my opinion there exists some level of responsibility, such as much better vetting of seller accounts and/or making multiple accounts very difficult, which would greatly improve the situation. Through the use of improved T&Cs and better analysis of their own data ebay could cut back the levels of fraud and deception that is occurring in all categories.

It is my opinion that ebay has foregone these things in favor of profitability. Frankly if they were struggling I might understand their movement away from T&Cs that did not facilitate shady practices. But as someone mentioned, they have lower the bar in establishing an account to levels which make it child's play to make additional account identities.

I would be satisfied to simply have ebay show they actually care by improving their current terms and conditions. No need to 'police' listings if you nip it in the bud via better control of seller accounts. This removes the need for them to employ 'experts' or use 3rd parties. Simply clean up their own house and sell it by explaining to shareholders that the short-term drop in profitability would mean a stronger long-term outlook.
Don

Don (I hope you're feeling better) ebay has gone so overboard in their seller requirements that many, many good stamp sellers have abandoned the platform for good. It's a shame for all.

"and/or making multiple accounts very difficult"

I see the mention of "multiple accounts" here in the context of the idea that having multiple accounts is somehow against the "rules". I had an extended conversation with a very sharp ebay CSR a while back. He said that it is very common for ebayers to have multiple accounts. He mentioned a couple different scenarios: one for buying and one for selling, and a big seller who wanted to have one account for electronics and one for clothing so that buyers wouldn't have to wade through stuff they are not interested in. He added that he himself has two accounts. His name is "Kelly" and he works for ebay in Utah. Before you guys get all charged up about the multiple identity issue you might want to do your homework.

The same applies to the legal theories being tossed around. Honestly some of the ebay bashing discussions here are starting to smell like a few people with a grudge against ebay, or with some other agenda. Yawn.

Columbian 12;

You are correct, there are lots of legitimate reasons why someone would have multiple accounts and it is within the rules. We know that. But would you believe that the "British Cartel" we refer to here had had around TWENTY different seller accounts over the last 5 years, and currently has about 6 different? So in your mind, we should simply overlook such a "co-incidence"? Even when every one of those seller names has engaged in problematic sales practices over the years?
Please don't give "bad guys" a free pass just because you believe we who care about trying to help the inexperienced, do so because we are "holding a grudge" against ebay. That's just silly. All you need to do is look at my selling record/feedback on ebay (wrw1943) to see my history with the venue. I also worked on the Stamp Watch Committtee for 4 years, the Enhanced Member Reporting group for another 5 or so. When the ebay Stamps Category Reviewer was pushed out of her job when they decided to do away with expert policing, she sent letters of appreciation out to all of us who devoted lots of our time to reporting bad listings.

Last, it is another misconception that a lot of people are needed to police a Category. The Stamp Community Watch had, if memory serves me correctly FIVE experts and ONE Reviewer for ebay. The EMR Program had about the same amount of experts (perhaps a few more) and TWO ebay Reviewers. And both programs were very effective with a very high rate of action taken by ebay upon expert advice.