VUVOX on eBay

MechelleOn June 23, 2008 at 5:50 pm Said:

how much will this cost to use? Looking at it I’m not sure where this will be handy in my store or listings?

ConnieOn June 23, 2008 at 6:41 pm Said:

Will it conform to all of eBay’s new rules regarding active content? Sounds like a dumb question, but been there, done that. :)

MistyOn June 23, 2008 at 9:40 pm Said:

I second the question of how much it will cost?

I use photobucket and other image/video hosting sites will these still be allowed on our listings?

I like to keep my listings simple and easy for my customers to understand and use.

Patricia1On June 23, 2008 at 10:14 pm Said:

They can bring on all the bells and whistles they want…without buyers its all for nothing! Sellers won’t buy things they can’t afford no matter how much its supposedly “enchances the buyer experience”. Ebay best start thinking of ways to get traffic to their site instead of simply trying to get money out of sellers where there is none to be had!

Andy GeldmanOn June 24, 2008 at 1:42 am Said:

This is an interesting development, but not that surprising – eBay started making noises about video last year with their flip-flop over embedded video.

It does bring into question the fate of their certified video providers, like vzaar. If video is available within eBay itself, they will struggle to survive.

bonniOn June 24, 2008 at 2:27 am Said:

My reaction to this is: Whatever. I know, not very helpful, but really, so what? Sellers will be able to put moving pictures in a listing, no doubt for a hefty fee. How does this in any way help the situation with unhappy sellers, feedback extortion, categories so flooded with fakes and frauds that they’re now unusable, and the general exodus of sellers and of buyers, too?

Oh, wait! eBay now has some sort of moving picture thing for listings! I’ll rush right back with my credit card in hand…

I think not.

joebftpk2On June 24, 2008 at 6:50 am Said:

Great. Video in listings. Whoop-ti-do. A substantial portion of buyers still use dial-up or a slow dsl, you put video in listings and those folks will just hit the back button. I know whereof I speak, as I’m on a dial-up right now. Heck, I even hit the back button on Auctiva auctions, as they take just too darn long to load. If you have a good product, you don’t need all the eBay ‘enhancements’ to sell it. If you don’t have a good product, well, putting lipstick on the pig ain’t gonna make anybody want to kiss it.
As to whoever the eBay talking head was that got ambushed by the anonymous seller, nobody even cares who the e-dweeb is.

DaveyOn June 24, 2008 at 1:26 pm Said:

This won’t mean that when I put my cursor over a picture in an auction, music will begin to gratuitously play, will it? Yech! I hope not (I hate it when web pages have embedded unsolicited audio).

Any demos that show this capability in action?

I don’t know about other sellers, but my product doesn’t benefit from video or motion in its display, so I can’t get excited about this.

I also fear, even though I have cable, that this will further slow page loads like the banner ads now do. I guess I’ll have to wait and see.

How about a technology that actually mimics good human judgement, and putting it behind eBay’s customer service bots? That’s something I could get excited about…

permacrisisOn June 24, 2008 at 4:39 pm Said:

Remember the dotcom-bubble IBM commercial, where the web programmer kid has the corporate logo burst into flames solely because it’s “cool”?

Deja Vu

implogOn June 25, 2008 at 11:40 am Said:

@ Permacrisis

Precisely.

One gets the impression that eBay developers assume that when eBay users aren’t listing/buying they are either completing a quest on World of Warcraft or updating their Facebook page via their DSL or faster connection.

*Disruptionese Update*

Richard might have just given us the new, post eBay Live, “Can’t we all get along?” corporate code for “excellent buyer experience” with his use of “enhanced customer experience” in his post above.

(Richard – Those of use who have spent years in eBay’s pretty hate machine are way weary of the word “enhancement”. Use it judiciously. It is a false prophet.)

vzaar JamieOn June 26, 2008 at 9:07 am Said:

Hi there,

Thanks for the generous plug Richard, much appreciated. Also interesting to see eBay making a move on media rich tools.

At vzaar we certainly believe that using video can help enrich the experience for both buyers and sellers and the feedback from our time at eBay Live last week is that we should continue to invest in technologies like this that help sellers drive trust and integrity.

To joebftpk2’s point – we understand that if you’re on dial up and if your buyers are too, video doesn’t exactly help. However 60% of US households (http://www.websiteoptimization.com/bw/0804/) are using broadband now and I’m positive the percentage is higher amongst regular internet users and those that shop online. We have to assume these numbers will only grow as dial up becomes too slow for many users. In respect to the vzaar player we took this into account as our video player loads in the background so their presence should not effect the downloading of a listing page. Furthermore it is only activated to stream in the content by the buyer once they press the play button.

Regards
Jamie

AmberOn June 26, 2008 at 10:11 am Said:

60% of US households (http://www.websiteoptimization.com/bw/0804/) are using broadband now and I’m positive the percentage is higher amongst regular internet users and those that shop online.

What that doesn’t take into account are the millions of RURAL ecommerce buyers who have no choice about the dial up status of their service. 75% of my county is still on dial up because nothing else is available. And I’d wager 90% buy online because it simply costs too much to drive to the nearest town with decent shopping.

The more “stuff” you add to your listings, the more alienated your buyers will feel. What happens if a dial up user bids on your item but doesn’t get crucial information available in the video because their dial up status does not allow them to view it?

You’ll see an increase in SNADs, that’s what. Sellers will think they’ve got their bases covered with video and not follow through with traditional descriptions.

There are some categories where video is useful, but for the most part, I hit the back button on any listing with video. Even with dsl, it’s too slow.