It’s been pointed out, that in my effort to express the need for John Donahoe to speak publicly, outside of an eBay bubble (specifically eBayinkblog.com) that I seemed to indicate Mr. Donahoe had an obligation to speak on MY show, when in actuality I should have stated, that I thought it was incumbant upon him to speak on the record with any outside eBay blogger or podcaster.

At this point, I think it can only do eBay good.

I hope he does, and I’d be honored if it was my show.

Mr. Donahoe did not have the easiest job coming in, eBay had become a Giant Octopus with a lot of power and many tentacles. I think that he would likely have just as much to talk about with accomplishments and things achieved that we don’t see or aren’t talking about right now.

This post will be entered on the Examiner.

With all due respect right back at you, I don’t understand the context of your reply.

If you meant that you wanted an interview with John Donahoe, I’m a little taken aback. You seem to have indicated in the ColderIce interview that you had contact with Mr. Donahoe and in fact, occasionally have lunch with him, if that’s true, why would you need to interview him?

If your point was that you wanted the interview with me first before Mr. Donahoe, again, with all due respect, the offer was extended to John Donahoe, specifically to avoid another middleman interview, so I think I’ll stick with that for now.

You may want to inform Mr Donahoe,(or the PR department that will relay the message to Mr. Donahoe for you) that I’ve just completed a telephone interview with a reporter from Business Week, and have told him of this dialog, and that I planned to publish the interview request in my Examiner column.

If Business week prints the content of the interview that pertains to Mr. Donahoe, I’d imagine that eBay stockholders would be very interested to know the outcome of the interview request.

At this point, I feel I have enough of a reply to publish an initial column, but will be fair and publish any follow-up replies, should the interview be granted or denied.

Thanks much again for your time.

Walt Kolenda aka AuctionWally

You stated on the ColderIce show, that John Donahoe had asked you if he should blog, and you said no. I agree, it would be bit unseemly for the head of a company such as eBay to blog.

However, it’s past time that we’ve heard directly from the head decision maker at eBay.

Each eBay representative who has spoken or appeared in public recently, has basically said, “I feel your pain, but I don’t make the policy”, when it comes to the important questions and concerns that have users leaving eBay.

Let’s have a reasonable discussion with Mr. Donahoe then, as someone directly in charge of policy, I think it’s incumbent upon him to face the community at this time.

I am inviting, no, challenging if I must, Mr. Donahoe to be a guest on a future episode of the AuctionWally Show.

The Senior Manager for Corporate Communications of eBay, Usher Lieberman has been on the show. I think it’s time Mr. Donahoe did the same, I would be honored, and it would be greatly appreciated by my audience.

I keep hearing how eBay is sincere in to become more transparent and interactive with it’s members.

Wonderful, but we are all waiting to see if there will be anything more than lip service paid to these statements.

I’ve had some high profile guests in the business world on my show, Terry Kovel,Usher Lieberan, Will Seippel from Worthpoint, Ina Steiner, Mike Kranz and others.

I have treated all of my guests with complete respect, and although I may disagree with Mr. Donahoe on some points, would give him the same courtesy.

I would think that with all of the criticism aimed at him and eBay in the last 2 years, he would welcome the chance to tell his side, and give us a glimpse into eBay’s plan for the future.

I do intend to run this comment, and your reply in my column at the Examiner.com

Thanks much for your time, I await yours’ and Mr. Donahoes’ reply.

Walt Kolenda aka AuctionWally

I Have met and talked to Griff a few times during my 10 years of selling on eBay. He is very knowlegdable and helpful to most eBay users.

I do think the question you missed asking Griff was: In his role as “Sr. Manager, Seller Advocacy” What three things has Griff advocated on the behalf of sellers that resulted in meaningful change on eBay since he started this new roll about a year ago?

You should consider adding a component to this “Meet the eBay Staff” feature that focuses on how each person is making a difference at eBay. It goes beyond just personifying them to the community and shows how they really are on the side of the community members.

Thanks,

DD

But Richard, Griff has been around for years and is pretty high profile. I enjoy ‘meeting’ the faceless majority like your previous guest.