When HN users recommended it
1 HN user recommended this in 2012, in one comment.
20072026
Each tall tick is one HN user's first recommendation. A short tick is the same user again. Click a tick to jump to the comment.
1 HN user recommended this in 2012, in one comment.
Each tall tick is one HN user's first recommendation. A short tick is the same user again. Click a tick to jump to the comment.
I feel that eBay changed their business model to compete with Amazon, and now I have no idea what their value proposition is. In short, Amazon offers the same things, but with a much, much better experience. Compare [1] to [2]. Both offer the same thing (an iPod), and from a mulitude of sellers. But the Amazon version is cheaper and the page is much easier to understand.
[1]: http://www.ebay.com/ctg/Apple-iPod-classic-7th-Generation-Bl...
[2]: http://www.amazon.com/Apple-classic-Black-Generation-NEWEST/...
eBay was originally a great place to get deals on used goods from their owners, but they mostly abandoned that model several years ago, and became a place to buy things from random sketchy stores. Several times when I've looked on eBay, I've found that many sellers were offering prices greater than normal retail, but with the added “bonus” [sarc.] of being a much bigger hassle.
Beyond that, auctions were kinda fun at first, I guess, but really, because of bidding wars, you often don't save any money, or at least you don't save enough for it to be worth waiting longer, and dealing with greater hassle.
For example, if you look again at the eBay page, it looks like if I buy an iPod at auction, I can expect to pay from $210-$220 for it--I don't understand why I would spend the extra time and effort when I'm ultimately only going to save about $10-$20, plus deal with the fact that I'm buying from some random.
The thing is, people are still interested in buying used stuff from other people (who are real people). Look at how popular and fun garage sales and flea markets are. There are a lot of challenges to doing this well online, which is why there's no clear winner in this space. (Craigslist is a little different—they avoid a lot of these challenges since they're local.)