[meteorite-list] Item #553686416

From: Sharkkb8_at_aol.com <Sharkkb8_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Thu Apr 22 09:41:07 2004
Message-ID: <16.88bdf33.27b374f6_at_aol.com>

SSachs9056_at_aol.com writes:

<< In the meantime I'm going to continue haunting his auctions and warning
bidders. >>

Be careful, though. As odd as it may sound, YOU can find yourself in trouble
for that. Ebay is like a cosmic-sized swapmeet, they don't have proficiency
at recognizing authenticity in every conceivable kind of collectible, any
more than the promoter of a small, parking lot swapmeet could. So they can't
and don't guarantee authenticity of every item contained therein, and
shouldn't be expected to. But they also consider emailing a prospective
bidder to warn him of an item, to be "tampering" with the auction, and they
can conceivably take disciplinary action. I wrote to the ebay folks, to ask
about this very thing, back during the days when a listee, who shall remain
nameless ;-) was having his own problems with ebay rules & reg's. The ebay
folks do sympathize with honest members wanting to warn novice bidders of
problematic stuff. But they also understandably have concerns about
less-than-honest people trying to compromise or undercut auctions by third
parties. There are, unfortunately, probably a lot more people who would try
to discourage prospective bidders for the WRONG reasons, than people like
yourself, trying to do so for the RIGHT ones.

Gregory
Received on Wed 07 Feb 2001 11:05:10 PM PST