Site eBay Research Articles

Who Needs the Dark Web? Exploring the Trade in Critically Endangered Plants on eBay.

Stemming the illegal trade of endangered species is a critical and very difficult challenge for conservationists and law enforcement. Much effort is given to stopping the trade of “charismatic megafauna” such as tigers, elephants, and rhinoceroses. Endangered plant species, however, receive far less attention and fewer resources, resulting in devastating consequences. Plant species continue to go extinct due to illegal harvesting and selling, while just one order of plants, Orchidales, makes up more than 70% of all threatened wildlife species. This study examines the role the Internet plays in critically endangered plant transactions. Rather than focusing on the dark web for these sales, I search the e-commerce site eBay to better understand the extent to which these trades take place in plain sight. Of the 193 critically endangered plant species examined, 56 were for sale in some form on eBay during the study period. These results indicate a high degree of trading in these species, but do not necessarily indicate criminality. The complexity of the international legal frameworks regulating these transactions makes it difficult to ascertain their legality, but certain indicators point to at least a subset of these sales being unlawful. E-commerce sites like eBay must take more proactive measures to regulate sales and protect these species on the brink, for it is clear the surface web is playing an understudied and important role in fostering these cybercrimes. In sum, the dark web is unnecessary when the surface web is convenient, widely available, and scarcely policed.

EBay for Charity hits $1 billion fundraising milestone

eBay for Charity, the cause‐driven platform of global auction site eBay, has reached a major milestone—over $1 billion in total funds have been raised on the site for charities around the world.

Youth access to JUUL online: eBay sales of JUUL prior to and following FDA action

BackgroundThe novel e-cigarette product JUUL has experienced rapid market growth. The online auction site eBay has been mentioned as a source of JUUL access for youth, and the US Food...

An Australian Longitudinal Study Into Remnant Data Recovered From Second-Hand Memory Cards

Consumers demand fast, high capacity, upgradeable memory cards for portable electronic devices, with secure digital (SD) and microSD the most popular. Despite this demand, secure erasure of data is still not a composite part of disposure practices. To investigate the extent of this problem, second-hand memory cards were procured from the Australian eBay site between 2011 and 2015. Digital forensic tools were used to acquire and analyze each memory card to determine the type and quantity of remnant data. This paper presents the results of the 2014 and 2015 studies and compares these findings to the 2011–2013 research studies. The longitudinal comparison indicates resold memory cards are disposed insecurely, with personal, confidential and business data undeleted or easily recoverable. The impact of such discoveries, where information is placed in the public domain, has the potential to cause embarrassment and financial loss to individuals, business, and government organizations.

Soudní praxe ve vybraných státech v případech právní odpovědnosti aukčních portálů za prodej padělků

The problem with verification of origin of goods in the online environment has resulted in an increase of the sale of counterfeit goods and general abuse of Trademarks. The following article deals with the question of legal liability of Internet auction portals, which have become a distribution and sales point of counterfeit goods. With regard to the topic of the article, which falls within the scope of the rarely codified are of the operation of law on the Internet there are particularly compared approaches both European and North American judicial practice. Courts on the both continents have repeatedly solved the problems of Internet portals as information society service providers. The subject of particular interest is globally active auction site eBay, which has been the subject of many disputes worldwide.

Linear Probability Models (LPM) and Big Data: The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

Sizes of datasets used in academic research are growing quickly, with many studies using tens and hundreds of thousands or even millions of records. Linear regression is among the most popular statistical model in social sciences research. Linear probability models, which are linear regression models applied to a binary outcome, are commonly used for various reasons, despite criticisms of such usage. We carry out an extensive study to evaluate the use of LPMs in the realm of Big Data, where large samples and many variables are available. We evaluate performance in terms of coefficient estimation as well as predictive power. We compare performance to alternatives suggested in the literature. We find that the LPM is beneficial for descriptive modeling when the outcome is naturally binary, whereas it is beneficial for predictive modeling when the outcome is binary by discretization. We motivate and illustrate our study through an application to modeling price in online auctions, using real data from the online auction site eBay.

Trust in E-Commerce

E-Commerce’s virtuality poses questions concerning trust between buyer and seller. Web 2.0 formats have provided new complications for these questions. Companies are creating more social networking sites, experimenting with ways to use such networks for marketing purposes. This paper explores the issue of trust in social networking site transactions vs. those at more established e-commerce sites. The authors apply the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) to assess the level of trust in different types of e-commerce sites. TAM measures trust along several dimensions and includes potential explanatory factors, such as ease of use, perceived usefulness, search and research capabilities, security, value of product recommendations, and value of customer reviews. The authors directed the respondents to assess amazon.com, Facebook, and eBay—sites with different levels of institutional credibility and social networking affiliations. The data suggest definite differences exist between the sites, perhaps explained by institutional credibility and social networking.

Country-of-Origin Premiums for Retailers in International Trades: Evidence from eBay's International Markets

Using real-world transaction prices in the Internet auction Web site eBay's U.S., U.K., and global markets, the authors study the price dispersion of homogeneous products related to the sellers’ country-of-origin. For both tangible and intangible products and services, sellers from the United States enjoy a price premium. This premium appears to stem from country-of-origin equity instead of trading risk or product quality. The findings of this research suggest potential profitable opportunities in international trade by employing the retailer's country-of-origin as an arbitrage tool.

Listing eBay masculinity: erotic exchanges and regulation in ‘gay’ and ‘gay interest’ underwear and swimwear auctions

eBay underwear and swimwear sellers incorporate gay identities and female masculinities into the eBay site. They indicate that the men depicted in listings are gay, suggest listings that are of interest to gay men, and include unconventional bodily presentations. While eBay asserts its role as a selling platform, gay underwear and swimwear listings are often a byproduct of men's interests in self-display and communication with other men. Their sexual representations conflict with eBay's heteronormative focus and the company often regulates them. I reflect on the political influence gay clothing sellers have when imaging their gym-built bodies, soft flesh, uneven physiques, genital bulges, and flaccid penises. The humanities-oriented methods of close visual, textual, and theoretical analysis assist me in considering over 1000 eBay listings and related profiles from the English-language website. I argue that these sellers deserve critical deliberation because they undermine eBay's normalizing discourses and traditional ideas about gender, sexuality, and embodiment.

What a Mess

eBay promises to engage everyone while asserting its organizational logic and configuring people. eBay encourages members to identify as traditionally gendered and heterosexual by employing personalization and Web 2.0 conventions. Members tend to follow eBay’s directives and self-present with such culturally approved identities as binary gendered individuals and heterosexual couples. These identities, including the over 1000 portrayals of heterosexual couples and chaotic homes that I analyze using the humanities methods of close visual, textual and theoretical analysis are worth studying because they are derived from significant identifications with objects, consumerism and the company, and compromised by the messy aspects of collecting and the purportedly defiling features of used objects. Members’ depictions of disordered homes negatively code individuals, render the eBay site and auctions as less desirable and suggest the association of the company with goodness and heteronormative purity is fraudulent. The clutter and disorganization of other Web 2.0 sites also troubles traditional identity positions and organizational logics. Further research into the ways norming occurs in these settings is imperative because narratives about internet empowerment make it difficult to identify how regulation and personalization work together.

Rescued from an eBay site

A poster for W.H. Power's touring production of The Ivy Leaf , an American melodrama celebrating life in rural Ireland, suggests a reliable source for Edison's 1908 film Rescued from an Eagle's Nest . Challenging Charles Musser's claim that this film, produced by Edwin S. Porter, directed by J. Searle Dawley, and featuring D.W. Griffith in a leading role, was entirely derived from a waxwork group in New York's Eden Musee, Mayer offers pictorial and textual evidence that the film was taken from this theatrical source.

The determinants of sales on eBay: the case of baseball cards

The popularity of online auctions has grown immensely with the eBay site being the largest auction site. One issue that has not received sufficient attention in the eBay auction literature is the effect of reserve-prices (or minimum prices) on the probability of a sale. Studies that have included this variable in their empirical specifications include Lucking-Reiley et al. (2000), Eaton (2002) and Jin and Kato (2002). However, all these studies used the book-price itself to determine its effect on auction outcomes. This study used alternative specifications of the reserve-price to determine if there were different effects of this variable on the probability of sale of baseball cards. These alternative specifications combined the reserve-price with the published book-prices for the baseball cards being sold. None of the three specifications of the reserve-price affected the probability of a sale including a binary variable representing reserve to book-price ratios >2.00. The rationale offered for these results is that there is a geographic mismatch when baseball cards are distributed and eBay extends the reach of the card market, which allows collectors to buy desirable cards at a premium.

The electronic trading site eBay as a useful tool for obtaining historical data on natural events

The electronic trading site eBay as a useful tool for obtaining historical data on natural events

Transformations for semi-continuous data

Semi-continuous data arise in many applications where naturally-continuous data become contaminated by the data generating mechanism. The resulting data contain several values that are “too frequent”, and in that sense are a hybrid between discrete and continuous data. The main problem is that standard statistical methods, which are geared towards continuous or discrete data, cannot be applied adequately to semi-continuous data. We propose a new set of two transformations for semi-continuous data that “iron out” the too-frequent values thereby transforming the data to completely continuous. We show that the transformed data maintain the properties of the original data, but are suitable for standard analysis. The transformations and their performance are illustrated using simulated data and real auction data from the online auction site eBay.

Online Art Auctions à la Française and à l'Américaine

This study extends previous research into online auctions by introducing a comparative cross-cultural dimension and focusing on heterogeneous goods. Samples of artwork auctions taken from two independent eBay sites—eBay USA and eBay France—are analyzed to detect culturally specific patterns of seller and bidder behavior. The analysis of these two samples reveals systematic differences in the art auctioned, winning bids, starting prices, and price dynamics, as well as bidders' “flocking” behavior and sellers' reliance on reserve auctions and other risk-management strategies. American sellers tend to offer more valuable items and to garner much better closing prices than French sellers. French auctions, by contrast, are dominated by domestic sellers; further, the number of bidders is more highly correlated with the final sale price in French than in American auctions. Finally, the data regarding art auctions disclose contrasting orientations to eBay's reputation system in that French bidders tend to be more attentive to negative feedback than Americans.

Transformations for Semi-Continuous Data

Semi-continuous data arise in many applications where naturally-continuous data become contaminated by the data generating mechanism. The resulting data contain several values that are too frequent, and in that sense are a hybrid between discrete and continuous data. The main problem is that standard statistical methods, which are geared towards continuous or discrete data,cannot be applied adequately to semi-continuous data. We propose a new set of two transformations for semi-continuous data that iron-out the too-frequent values thereby transforming the data to completely continuous. We show that the transformed data maintain the properties of the original data, but are suitable for standard analysis. The transformations and their performance are illustrated using simulated data and real auction data from the online auction site eBay.

In Community We Trust: Online Security Communication at eBay

As e-commerce and virtual communities fundamentally change the way Americans do business and build relationships, how can people be assured of safety in unfamiliar cyberspaces? This essay focuses on online auction site eBay to understand how eBay has successfully attracted millions of users in spite of perceived risks and uncertainties. It argues that eBay is, in fact, a community (of commerce), and that the rhetorical construction of “community” on the site provides a foundation for trust between users. Based on trust theory, this essay isolates eBay's “community trust” model as consisting of seven elements that work together to give users reasons to trust and to be trustworthy. Finally, the essay examines recent changes to eBay's system, suggesting that so-called improvements for control might actually weaken the “community trust” system already in place–a warning to other sites that might imitate eBay's community approach.

Reputation in Auctions: Theory, and Evidence from eBay

Employing a procedure suggested by a simple theoretical model of auctions in which bidders and sellers have observable and heterogenous reputations for default, we examine the effect of reputation on price in a data set drawn from the online auction site eBay. Our main empirical result is that seller's, but not bidder's, reputation has an economically and statistically significant effect on price.

Predictors of consumer trust: likelihood to pay online

PurposeUsing data relating to eBay transactions, investigates the economic, demographic, and geographic factors affecting willingness to pay for purchases online.Design/methodology/approachCarries out regression analysis of 3,386 eBay transactions, over a two‐year period, reported by two American sellers operating on the United States eBay site. In all auctions examined, consumers had the option of making payment online or by various traditional payment methods.FindingsAnalysis identifies several variables as reasonable predictors of the chosen payment method, including the value of the transaction, the buyer's gender, rural versus urban residence, and several other characteristics of the community in which the buyer lives.Research limitations/implicationsThe general demographic, geographic, and economic variables of consumers can be used by researchers and planners to predict consumers' willingness to make online payments. The effect of income demands further investigation. Factors not identified – such as consumer personality and ethnicity or product category – might also influence this form of online consumer behaviour. The study is restricted to online consumer auction transactions in one country only.Originality/valueUses a larger sample than most previous studies of eBay to identify general demographic, geographic, and economic characteristics of an American sample of eBay consumers, which act as predictors of willingness to make online payments for purchases. Can be a departure point for further research in other countries.

How Valuable Is a Good Reputation? A Sample Selection Model of Internet Auctions

On the online auction site eBay, by convention, sellers do not ship goods to winning bidders until after they have received payment, so there is an opportunity for sellers to take advantage of bidders' trust. Realizing this, the designers of eBay created a system that relies on self-enforcement using reputation. Several recent studies have found that bidders give little or no reward to sellers who have better reputations. I show that in fact, sellers are strongly rewarded for the first few reports that they have behaved honestly, but marginal returns to additional reports are severely decreasing.