Some small traders worry that eBay has lost interest in them. They say it"s increasingly focused on winning business from large retailers instead.
"In this six to seven years I"ve been doing it, I have seen it changed quite a lot as well. It has gone from kind of embracing the smaller sellers to now embracing the larger companies. They are making themselves into more of a marketplace, almost like Amazon. It seems that if what they"re going for, they"re looking to make eBay into this marketplace of major retailers and big sellers. And this has kind of squeezed on small people because when people search, the smaller sellers tend to come up lesser in the ratings or lower in the ratings, so they are harder to find their items. And so eBay has changed into more of a corporation as opposed to the small company."
EBay is now pursuing new business models. It"s also facing a radical shift in the way people use its services. It"s started out as a pure auction site, but now most transactions are done at a fixed price which makes eBay more similar to other online retailers. Some say it"s merely adapting to changed market conditions. Others worry that eBay is in danger of losing its soul.