"The service will close down on 28th June (GMT) - we cannot continue after this date or there's a risk that eBay will deem your auctions in breach of their new policies which become effective on 1st July - we are not prepared to risk *your* eBay account being suspended as a result of *our* service being deemed in breach by eBay (who are the sole judge and jury in such matters). We have been unable to obtain direction from eBay on whether our service will pass their new rules or not, so we must assume it will not. We apologise for the short notice of the closure but the timetable is dictated by the timing of eBay's changes.
We have achieved part of why we created the service in the first place - to provide free counters and cross-promotions in competition to the paid-for services. Our competitor's services are now free (although for how much longer they can remain so is a separate question since they are subject to the same issues with eBay as ourselves). We always believed (and still do) that you should not have to pay for counters, cross-promotions or statistics (web analytics) on your eBay auctions - the prices being charged for these services were out of all proportion to the costs involved."
I'm not given to being an alarmist, but this sounds like the Scrolling Gallery and the Auctiva Store are at risk. Essentially, the new linkage policy only allows...."Third-party solutions and services directly related to the particular listing.", which could mean you can't link to a page with other items for auction from a listing page or to an off-site page with unrelated items. I've been concerned since I read the policy, but wondered if Auctiva and other 3rd party partners had a pass on these items.
I'm watching for comments or any indications of direct responses to linkage policy and other new policies by other competitors.
The 900 pound gorilla doesn't want to share its bananas anymore.
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Oh....and has anyone else besides me seen any eBay listings with the new experimental listing format? They only show on one visit to a listing, or I'd post a link. Bought a present for my Grandson's 5th Birthday last Monday, and the auction had the new format on first look. On recheck and final bid visits, it was gone.
Danno