Shoestring Theory

Currently documenting the house that is eating our lives, we will return to regularly scheduled programming in a couple of more months

Shoestring Theory header image 5

Updated: eBay search badly broken this morning

March 11th, 2008 No Comments

Click for larger image (where time is visible). Updated: This afternoon eBay put up a post on the Systems Announcements board that the restructuring of some categories was resulting in not everything being displayed correctly: Some items affected by last night’s category updates have not been moved to their new categories yet, which is affecting […]

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eBay promises to refund money to scammed Aussies

March 10th, 2008 No Comments

The Gold Coast Bulletin in Australia is reporting that eBay will refund thousands of Australian eBayers who lost money on fake vacation packages they purchased from an eBay seller. Refunds could amount to $1 million (I would assume that’s in Australian dollars). The Bulletin originally broke the story of the holiday sales Mar. 8. GOLD […]

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“eBay Ink” blog to give access to company innards

March 6th, 2008 No Comments

Forbes Small Business has an exclusive interview with Richard Brewer-Hay, who will launch a new “no-holds-barred” blog for eBay in April called “eBay Ink.” Unlike eBay’s existing blogs and forums, which focus on more traditional (and sanitized) corporate communications, eBay Ink aims to give readers a peek inside eBay’s internal operations. Brewer-Hay has pledged to […]

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Because you need to smile (and Bunny gives you that)

March 5th, 2008 No Comments

This was too appropriate not to post (especially given the news of the last month). Click the picture for a full size image where you can actually read the text (or go to Bunny’s site). You should go there anyway and enjoy the wonderfulness that is Bunny. Bunny is created by Huw Davies and licensed […]

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Bad idea: A wiki/ebay breakup

March 5th, 2008 1 Comment

Classy folks, real classy. So normally I despise the celebrity gossip/rumor mill, but this one intersected with two of my favorite sites, Wikipedia and eBay. The St. Petersburg Times is reporting: It’s war of the Web roses between St. Petersburg’s Jimmy Wales, founder of Wikipedia, and his ex-girlfriend, Rachel Marsden. She claims he dumped her […]

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eBay officially expanding anonymous bidding policy

March 4th, 2008 1 Comment

I had known this was coming, but eBay sent out a notification to buyers today announcing that complete user IDs will no longer be displayed on any auction format listings. Soon we will no longer display the complete user IDs of people bidding on any auction-style listing. Instead, we’ll use asterisks such as x***y to […]

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eBay settles 7-year patent spat with MercExchange

March 2nd, 2008 1 Comment

Looks like eBay has agreed to fork over some money to MercExchange and finally end the long patent battle over eBay’s “Buy It Now” feature. The San Francisco Gate is reporting: As part of the agreement, eBay will buy three patents for e-commerce from its adversary, along with some additional assets. Financial terms of the […]

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Paying off student loans with Upromise and Ebay

March 2nd, 2008 1 Comment

Many years ago, I pissed away a golden opportunity. The University of Kansas, private organizations and assorted government agencies heaped money on me to go to school (hint: NMS). Who knew, brains actually can pay off. But, being young, foolish and a little lost, I dropped out, giving up all that money. Twelve years later, […]

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Your life needs fewer options, not more

February 29th, 2008 2 Comments

Dan Ariely explains why your life needs fewer options. Keeping too many options open could actually hurt you. Maintaining options in life can sap time, money and resources, explained Dr. Dan Ariely of MIT in a New York Times interview. Areily and economist Jiwoong Shin tested students at MIT with a simple computer game involving […]

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Confidential British government data included in eBay auction

February 28th, 2008 1 Comment

Let’s play a game! What’s under the keyboard? (Note, not the actual keyboard in question.) Governments really shouldn’t use laptops. They just seem to lose, misplace or let the dang thangs get stolen a little too easily. In another privacy embarrassment for the British government, an encrypted CD with “highly confidential” government data was found […]

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