[W&B] vanished camera on eBay?

[David Silver]

Hi Bob,

Okay, I did what I could for now to scan through the past auctions of
"clicklovely", who is apparently in England, and found two things.  First.
whoever he is, he sells VERY nice stuff and seems to have plenty of happy
repeat business.  Second, in all the auctions I perused, there was never a
telephone number or any other means (except through eBay itself) provided
to contact him.  Just the same, I took a really stupid risk and attempted
to contact him through eBay.  Lord knows some automated program will now
red flag my account and suspension is right around the corner, but, oddly
enough, I think the message went through.  I can only wait now and see if
perhaps "clicklovely" will respond.  Reagrding eBay's assinine new way of
dishing out suspensions, I'm afraid it's now automated, yes, a computer
sub-program, to better protect the "safety and integrity" of the eBay
conmmunity.  I can tell you one definite way you'll get bumped.  Quite
simply, if you have a really dedicated and motivated bidder who decides to
bid on ALL the items you list some night, the automated system WILL see
that as shill bidding and you'll both go down!  No analysis of past
history, no human investigation into the identities of seller and bidder,
just a matter of pattern recognition, and you're screwed!  It's happened
to a couple of my friends on eBay recently (not camera people), and it was
hell getting back in.  So, as for the risk I just took trying to send
"clicklovely" a message through eBay's system, well, if they come after
me, I'll just tell them I'm really Milan Zahorcak and they owe me one!

Best wishes,

David Silver--President
International Photographic Historical Organization
E-mail: silver at well.com  Telephone: (415) 681-4356
Webpage location: http://www.well.com/user/silver/


On Sat, 10 Feb 2007, Bob Kulinski wrote:

> Hi Dave - the seller of the Murray & Heath camera was clicklovely. He had a number of items listed along with the camera, but he/she is no longer a registered user after 6 years and 2600 transactions, with only 7 negatives. I wish I had copied his M&H page because he listed his phone number. Is eBay turning into a police state? Not only can't we see who is bidding on  an item, but now when you go into "sellers other auctions" you very often can't get back to the main menu list you were starting from. Oh well, I probably could not have afforded $7500 for that camera anyway.
>
> ________________________________
>
> From: woodandbrass-bounces at kjsl.com on behalf of David Silver
> Sent: Sat 2/10/2007 6:55 PM
> To: Collectors of 19th Century Cameras &Photographica
> Subject: RE: [W&B] vanished camera on eBay?
>
>
>
> Hi Bob,
>
> The only way an eBay auction could have "completely disappeared" is if
> eBay security took it down.  Then all records of the auction would vanish.
> Darn, I wish I could have seen that one!  Life keeps getting in the way,
> and I never have enough time for eBay surfing.  Anyway, Bob, do you have
> a recollection of the seller?  Maybe we can backtrack to see if something
> happened to him.  You know, with all of eBay's ridiculous new "security"
> measures (like the totally irresponsible "bidder #1, bidder #2, etc."
> crap they're pulling now, so it's nearly IMPOSSIBLE for us, the bidders,
> to spot the really malicious shillers anymore!), I'm hearing of more and
> more honest-to-gosh good sellers getting suspended due to some sort of
> automated analysis of "suspicious" bidding and listing patterns.  And
> with eBay, you are friggin' guilty as hell until proven innocent, and good
> luck actually having any communication with the swines to clear up any
> such mess!  Maybe the seller got axed.
>
> Best wishes,
>
> David Silver--President
> International Photographic Historical Organization
> E-mail: silver at well.com  Telephone: (415) 681-4356
> Webpage location: http://www.well.com/user/silver/
>
>
> On Sat, 10 Feb 2007, Bob Kulinski wrote:
>
> >
> > Dave - this morning I saw a Murray and Heath sliding box camera on eBay - supposedly one of only  two M&H cameras known. Bidding was at $4200 - only 2 bidders - #1 and #2. This afternoon it has completely disappeared - not even a notice of being withdrawn - as if it never existed. Any ideas?
> >
> >
>
>
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>