Ebay sucks- suggestions anyone?

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Posted By: Tbob 

I am tired of reporting kingcollectibles over and over again for selling those fake FroJoys and having ebay never even respond. I know that at least 7 posters on this board have also reported them. They have gone to 1 day auctions and private bidders to shield the unwary from discovering the truth. Ebay KNOWS these ytems are fake. The seller KNOWS they are fakes. Many of the bidders from some bizarre reason leave feedback that they have been swindled but many at the same time leave positive feedback along with their comments that they have been duped. Incredible!
O.K., my questions are these:
1) Other than bidding in these scumbags' auctions, how can I get their contact info from eBay so I can report them to the Federal Internet Commission and FBI?
2) I emailed kingcollectibles and told them if they didn't discontinue selling these known counterfeit items on ebay (they know) I was going to report them. Think ebay will get me for harassing emails of members? Please note the email (I kept a copy) was drafted by a lawyer (albeit a mad one) who kept the email non-physically threatening, factual and non-harassing or threatening.
OK, I'll shut up and get your suggestions. At this point I am about to give up and just let the bozos who bid on this crap get what they deserve and quit trying to be a good guy to the unknowing and unway.

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Posted By: jay behrens

I saw a short bit about all the fraud on eBay on the Discovery/Times channel and in numerous collectibles catagories, groups of collectors have gotten together and run up the bids on the known fakes, then refuse to pay and leave neg feedback about the seller and thier items.

If they can't sell thier items, they can't make any money. The hardest part is to find enough people willing to take the hits on thier feedback to do something like this.

Also, if I were eBay, right about now I would doing everything possible to clean up my act. Their has to be at least one lawyer, if not more looking to bring a lawsuit of some type against eBay. The lawyer to make it work is gonna damn rich from the settlement and we all know money will make people do anything.

Jay

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Posted By: hankron

The color sheets as fake is information publicly available from numerous public sources: Beckett Almanac, Standard Catalog, Bob Lemke's 10-year old 'Sportscard Counterfeit Detector,' search on google, post a question on the CU, Net54, Beckett, SCG or maybe even eBay's own boards. You could throw a dart on a moonless midnight and not miss one of those. But you gotta throw the dart.

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Posted By: slacks

You're all a smart bunch of folks.

Why haven't you all realized that eBay isn't going to do anything about this? Give it up. Move on.

If you found a store selling fake FroJoys, would you complain (repeatedly) to the landlords? No, you'd go to the police.

Prepare a coherent, complete letter and send it to the FBI. Or call your local office and make an appointment. Then relax. You will have done all you can do. They may not pursue it right away, or ever, but they have the ability to get the seller information from eBay and go after them. And maybe they will pursue eBay for allowing the auctions to continue.

It might help to step out of your collector's shoes for a change and look at this as a normal citizen might: someone's selling new cardboard and pretending it is old cardboard. Or someone is trimming a piece of old cardboard, making it look more even, and selling it pretending that is wasn't trimmed.

Not a big deal for most people.

[edited for clarity]

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Posted By: t-206collector

Moreover, from a legal perspective, it is next to impossible to have any sort of actual claim unless you are the one being hurt. Basically, Ebay doesn't care if you complain if you're not the one being hurt because you have no claim against Ebay.

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Posted By: jay behrens

slacks, for most poeple, driving drunk isn't a big deal, but when I drove limos, I made numerous calls to the CHP to report drink drivers on the rode while I was driving around. Just beucase most people don't care about a problem doesn't mean something shouldn't be done about it.

Bob, I think I may have mentioned this in my other post, but have you considered buying one of the Fro-Joys and then pursue legal action that route? At that point, you become directly involved in the situation.

Jay

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Posted By: slacks

<<slacks, for most poeple, driving drunk isn't a big deal.>>

Compared to the number of people that care about baseball card fraud, yeah it is. Drunk driving has a tangible, visible price to society and organizations such as MADD lean heavily on legislators and law enforcement officials to maximize penalties and provide enforcement of existing laws.

One problem with eBay, is that even if they shut down this guy, we all know that 24 hours later they will be up again under a different ID. EBay isn't going to examine every FroJoy ad to see if it looks real or not, so documenting their past transgressions won't help them ban future auctions.

I can't imagine any law enforcement operation having the manpower to pursue this case until prosecution. Shut down a few auctions maybe, a small fine possibly, but these guys aren't going to hang in the town square as you hope they will.

[edited to add: For what it's worth, I will agree that they are scumbags that should indeed be stopped, and in a perfect world there would be a gov't agency in charge of collectibles fraud and they would get nailed.]

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Posted By: jay behrens

I am like MW, I know everything When I comment on something or compare something, I am usually pretty well informed on the subjects. And yes, I am very aware of MADD, etc and very anti-drinking and driving myself. Most people will give it lip service, but when push comes to shove, they will still get back behind the wheel when they have been drinking.

And yes, we know that if kingcollectibles loses his account that he will just create a new one. But if make a con artist's life misrable enough, they are gonna go away to some place where it is easier for them to con people without hassle. It complacency that they thrive on.

Jay

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Posted By: hankron

I hope people saw my point that if a bidder on eBay is unwilling to do even the simplest of homework, there is nothing you can do for him or her. If he's not burned on this Fro Joy, he's going to get burned one something else. I am more than happy to help out newbies and people with questions and Fro Joys Ruths are spelled out twice on my website ('Do not buy color ones'), but it's not my job to change their diapers and wipe their noses because they haven't figured how.

A woman once bought a Pricess Diana 'autographed' obituary, the obituary being Diana's. Am I supposed to go around and warn people that people can't sign their own obituaries? Someone placed on eBay a Jack Chesbro autograph with his name mispelled and people placed bids. Am I supposed to go around telling people they should only bid on autographs where the name is spelled correctly?

People regularly email and say, "I found this card, do you know it is? I know absolutly nothing about baseball cards" or "Have you ever seen this before?" or "A guy wants to sell me this print. Do you have any idea what would be a fair price? And if you don't do you know of a website that might help me?"

Why do these total beginners ask questions, while others apparently find it impossible?

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Posted By: hankron

Say on eBay, one auction was for a color sheet and the very next listing was an acution for a $1 booklet titled "Almost all Fro Joys Babe Ruth Are Fake, this simple guide will tell you how to identify the Fakes, even if you are a total beginner. Endorsed by Bill Mastro, Beckett, Rob Lifson, PSA, Barry Halper, Sotheby's, Christies, SGC, Baseball Hall of Fame Museum, Tuff Stuff and the Harvard Art History Department." I am convinced that some bidders would bid on the color Fro Joy and ignore the $1 guide.

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Posted By: slacks

And I think that is the value of this board and your website, Hankron.

I think that Tbob -- and many of us -- hope that by the time people find these resources, they haven't been burned so bad that they're turned off the hobby for good.

However, what should happen and what will happen are quite different, and I think focusing on education will make more of a difference than trying to get ebay to put the sellers of bogus cards out of business.

There will ALWAYS be someone taking advantage of new, uneducated buyers. In the case of collectible cardboard, the federal authorities aren't going to spend too much time busting them, and eBay couldn't care less.

The answer is eductation, not hand-wringing over the scammers who will always be around.

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Posted By: Bill Cornell

It's worth re-reading the end user agreement, in particular section 3. Just about every public site that requires registration has one of these.

http://pages.ebay.com/help/policies/user-agreement.html

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Posted By: slacks

Ebay has fair rules, but they are enforced, um..."inconsistently."

For an obvious (but by no means the only) example, they prohibit keyword scamming. In fact, even those PRO card auctions with a PSA card add-on are EXPRESSLY forbidden.

Sellers violate listing policies with such frequency and in such numbers, it's laughable. Maybe Ebay will get in trouble for this, maybe they won't. Even if they reach a settlement on some of the current charges against them, it might just be the cost of doing business for them.

For the time being, I don't see eBay responding to notification of usage rule violations anytime soon. I gave up trying to show them the habitual rule breakers long ago.