eBay Sellers Seething Over Targeted Ads

hoagiecat writes "eBay isn't just an enormous auction site; it's also a publisher of Google and Yahoo targeted ads, which earn eBay money every time a user clicks on them. But those clicks take users to a new page, and lead them away from the auctions — and those who make their living from those auctions are starting to get upset. Is eBay doing the right thing to make some extra cash from the hot advertising market? Or are they cannibalizing their income and hurting the sellers who have been the backbone of their business?"

All surfaces and links will become advertising.

[Gary W. Longsine]

Even the insides of your eyelids. Chu Chi [youtube.com] has seen it. It must be done.

You can disable it in user preferences!

[kad77]

I just added a new eBay account last night, and when setting my user preferences I noticed two settings for targeted ads from ebay. I opted out of each option in one second.

Sorry to hear this is bothering multitudes of people --- but it is REALLY SIMPLE to disable.

This is a PEBKAC problem with eBay options.

Re:Google has the same problem

[Anonymous Coward]

Plus, dividends are taxed twice, once when the company pays them and once as income to the recipient.

This statement is more than a bit deceptive.

A company makes some income. They must pay tax on that income no matter what they choose to do with it. There is no special tax on the company for issuing a dividend.

If they choose to give it to investors, then those investors pay a tax on those receipts, and this is often referred to as 'double taxation' by tax protesters. But to be clear, there are no special or extra taxes put upon the company because they decided to give away their money.

Re:It isnt' a simple question

[ivan256]

They're a public company, and it is not sufficient for them to simply make profits. They must actually grow those profits.

That's not technically true. They could pay dividends on their stock to make the value of the stock the payout of dividends, rather than increasing stock price...

Or they could use their profits to gradually buy back their stock, since they have accomplished what they wanted to with the investment capital to the mutual benefit of the company and the investors.

Re:Craigslist

[puck01]

I've noticed people doing this, although I can't say I've had it happen on an item I was interested in. If I remember, it is against the terms of service of craigslist to do this. As with the ads I've noticed doing this, I just click on the 'spam' or 'prohibited' tag. I'm not sure there is much else you can do short of contacting CL directly.