May 4, 2007
Special to the San Jose Daily Planet
On the heels of the enormously successful Feedback 2.0, eBay is planning to rollout Buyer Feedback 3.1415, or Pie for short. Under the newly baked Pie, Sellers will rate Buyers on a 7 point, or slice, scale. Rather than using stars as eBay uses for Sellers, the Buyers will receive a slice of pie symbol. It has not been decided if the pie will resemble apple or cherry. Meg’s favorite of strawberry-rhubarb has already been ruled out as too tart for Buyers.
Buyers will be rated on the following attributes:
Watching Time – Did the Buyer watch this item too long before finally bidding on the damn thing?
ASQ – Did the Buyer ask intelligent or stupid questions?
Bids – Did the Buyer bid only the minimum amount over the high bid, or did they really “bid it up�
Communication – Did the Buyer require repeated invoices before acknowledging that they sent payment, would send payment, or are never going to send payment?
Payment – Was payment made timely and without a lame excuse like, “PayPal screwed up my account�
Notes – Did the “Note†section of PayPal contain any absurd comment such as “Send me the tracking number†when the S&H cost was $1 and your auction specified shipping by Media Mail?
Feedback – Did the Buyer give you a “pos†and then 1 star for all the attributes?
eBay tested the new Pie feedback in Liechtenstein. Tiny Liechtenstein, not quite as large as Washington, DC, lies on the east bank of the Rhine River south of Lake Constance between Austria and Switzerland. Although its population numbers only 33,000 people, it has 2 eBay Sellers, and Buyers numbering in the dozens (including those NARU’d). “We think this as an accurate samplingâ€, stated Dewy Cheatem, eBay’s Director of Unsubstantiated Feedback and Unscrupulous Slander (DUFUS). Stated Cheatem, “The response from both Sellers was overwhelmingly positive. They felt they could have their Pie and eat it too!â€
Republished with permission of the original author, Paul from Storage Liquidators.
