Gary Briggs

The final scores have all been tabulated, and I'm proud to award the title of #1 eBay Community in America to...drumroll, please...Lumberton, New Jersey!

Communities all over the country earned points by doing various types of eBay activities, such as buying, selling, participating in our Community forums, and using eBay Giving Works to sell and buy for charity. After using ZIP Codes to define local communities, and adjusting all the scores on a per capita basis, Zip Code 08048 in Lumberton took the winning spot with 234,580 points. They narrowly edged out the people in Zip Code 37201 in Nashville, Tennessee, who had 217,969 points.

We'll be heading to Lumberton in person to celebrate their accomplishment with them sometime over the next several months. Lumberton will also receive a $10,000 donation to an approved charity of their choice on behalf of eBay, Inc. What’s more, our number two community of Nashville, TN will receive a $2,500 donation, and each of the 8 runners up will receive a $1,000 donation!

Here are the top 10 communities (based on ZIP Code):

1. Lumberton, NJ 08048
2. Nashville, TN 37201
3. Henderson, NV 89011
4. Las Vegas, NV 89141
5. Talpa, TX 76882
6. Graton, CA 95444
7. Farmington, KY 42040
8. Coaldale, CO 81222
9. Indian Trail, NC 28079
10. Walnut, IA 51577

As mentioned previously, in December, Pulitzer Prize-winning photographer David Hume Kennerly will begin his journey to document the people who live in these most active eBay communities. Kennerly is a veteran photographer who has captured poignant moments in history for four decades, including portraits of every American president since Richard Nixon. Kennerly's photos of eBay members, and a collection of corresponding essays, will be donated to the Center of American History at the University of Texas.

If you are registered on eBay.com in one of these communities, you'll be able to vote for the charity to receive the donation soon at www.ebaycommunitycounts.com. You can also check this site to see where your community finished, and to learn more fun facts about Community Counts.

Sincerely,

Gary Briggs
Senior Vice President and Chief Marketing Officer
eBay North America

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Bill Cobb

Also, this is our last Town Hall of 2006, and we’re trying something new!

Phone in your question on the air
If you have a question for me or one of the other leaders on our panel, you'll be able to call us at our toll-free number – 877-474-3302 - and ask us your question on the air! We'll be broadcasting LIVE via Internet radio with the help of our friends at wsRadio (the same folks that produce Griff's eBay Radio show). As always, you'll be able to listen in via Windows Media Player or Real Player.

If you’d prefer to type us your question, you can post your question to our new Town Hall forum. We'll be answering some of the questions posted there, as well.

So, I hope you’ll join us to let us know what's on your minds and to hear what other Community members have to say. Visit www.ebay.com/townhall for more information.

Sincerely,

Bill Cobb
President, eBay North America

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Lara B. Housser

To celebrate, we're holding our eBay Express "Wish for IT" Sweepstakes. All you need to do is create a Wish List on eBay Express now through December 22, 2006, and you'll be automatically entered. Every Wish List you create gets you another entry, giving you up to 10 chances to win!

All winners will receive cash prizes in their PayPal accounts to use towards items on their Wish List. You could win the $5000 Grand Prize, one of 10 $500 First Prizes, or one of 500 $25 prizes.

Full details about the eBay Express "Wish for IT" Sweepstakes can be found on our information page.

Sincerely,

Lara B. Housser
eBay Express

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Jim "Griff" Griffith

• Jennifer Ibarra, Associate Manager, Cause-Related Problems, and Sally Faddis, Senior Manager, Brand Development will talk about a special "Making Holiday Dreams Come True" program eBay is doing this holiday season.
• Jim Miotke, President and Founder of Betterphoto.com, will explain how and why to protect your photos using watermarks.
• Pat West and Christy Johnson, Managers of Power U, will join Joyce Banbury, an Education Specialist Instructor, to cover what's new with the eBay Education Specialist Program and where it's headed in 2007.
• Peter Becker and Erik Holcomb, Co-founders of Global Garage Sale, Inc., are back to talk about the ins and outs of opening an eBay drop-off store.
• Jason Miner, host of PayPal Radio, with the latest PayPal site updates. Jason will stay on for the remainder of the hour to answer your PayPal questions.

Plus "The News" with Lee Mirabal, as well as the most important feature on eBay Radio: your calls! Call in during the show at 877-474-3302 (USA) or 001-858-678-8958 (Internationally) to talk with Griff and his guests or to ask a question and share your voice with the rest of the eBay Community. Remember, one lucky caller per week, selected at random, will receive an autographed copy of Griff's book, "The Official eBay Bible".

If you can't catch the live show, you can always subscribe to the , or access any past broadcast from the eBay Radio Archives. To subscribe to the podcast all you need is an reader (a portable MP3 player is optional). Visit www.wsradio.com/ebayradio for more information about subscribing to the podcasts and to listen to eBay Radio on your computer.

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The promotion will start Tuesday, November 28, 2006 at 00:00:01 PT (12:00 AM plus one second) and end on Thursday, November 30, 2006 at 23:59:59 PT (11:59 PM plus 59 seconds). Listings created prior to November 28, 2006 and scheduled to start during the promotional period (November 28-30, 2006) will be eligible for the promotional rate. Please note that the promotional price will be applied at the time of listing, although only sellers using the new Sell Your Item (SYI) form will see it applied during the listing process. Sellers using the old SYI form, or another listing tool, can verify the promotional price in View Account Status within My eBay.

This promotion will not apply to the following types of listings: all eBay Motors listings (including Parts & Accessories, Passenger Vehicles, Motorcycles, Power Sports, and Other Vehicles), as well as International, Live Auction, Professional Services, Real Estate, Ad Format, and Store Inventory listings. For full promotion details, please click here.

We hope you enjoy this special offer!

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Town Hall Event with Bill Cobb on Thursday, November 30th
Make sure to save the date for our next Town Hall event with Bill Cobb, President of eBay North America, on Thursday, November 30th, at 4pm PT. He'll be joined by other leaders around eBay as they answer your questions during this open-topic Town Hall. We’ll also be broadcasting via Internet radio, so you can call in your questions on the air! Stay tuned next week for more details.

Including Shipping Costs in your Listing, Shipping Enhancements
This workshop will be held on Monday, November 27th from 1:00 pm PT to 2:00 pm PT. In September 2006 we announced enhanced features to shipping including how to include costs when listing an item, and how those costs are displayed to buyers in the listings. In addition we introduced more shipping options for international shipping as well as greater flexibility displaying costs to Hawaii, Alaska and Puerto Rico. The shipping team at eBay will be hosting this workshop to describe these features and answer any questions. Please join us to learn more!

Increase your eBay Sales – Use Research to Find the Best Time to List
This workshop will be held on Friday, December 1st from 11:00 am PT to 12:00 pm PT. Join the Terapeak team; Sara Taheri and Dave Frey as they will be hosting a workshop introducing you to some tools that you can use to find the best times to list your auctions. They will show you how to find out what time of the day or week to end an auction, and what times of year see big spikes in demand. They will even show you a few cool trends that illustrate the huge spikes in sales that occur over the holiday season! As an added bonus they will also go over tools you can use to build a better title!

New Trust and Safety Tutorials
This workshop will be held on Friday, December 1st from 1:00 pm PT to 2:00 pm PT. Trust & Safety launched new tutorials in October 2006 providing key tips for buying safely and protecting your eBay account during the Holidays and beyond. Join Policy Managers from Trust & Safety (TnS) as they review the information covered in the tutorials and open it up for Q&A on these topics.

Workshops are hosted in discussion threads on the Workshops Board. To get to the Workshops Board:

• Go to www.ebay.com
• Click on Community at the top of the page
• Click on "Workshops" in the "Events" section
• This will bring you to the threaded Workshops Board.

To view archived workshops or to learn more about future workshop events, please check our Workshops Calendar.

Want timely reminders about workshops? We recommend two ways to make sure you never miss an important workshop:

• Sign up for the Workshops Information Group! By joining this group, you will receive an email notification reminding you about upcoming eBay Workshops. (To sign up for the Workshops Information Group, please click here.)
• Subscribe to the RSS feed for the Workshop board. When a new workshop becomes active, your RSS reader will be updated. (You can also subscribe to just the specific topic thread that interests you.) To subscribe, click on the button at the bottom of the Workshop board or thread. Copy and paste the feed URL into your reader to subscribe. For more information on RSS, please read our RSS Help page.

We look forward to seeing you there!

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Lara B. Housser

With eBay Express Wish Lists you can:

• Add items to your Wish List from any point in the browsing or buying process
• Create up to different 10 Wish Lists (for example, create one for your birthday, one for the vacation you're taking with your family, etc.)
• Email them to friends and family.

And as part of a marketing campaign, we've worked with 10 "iconic Americans," such as a Chicago fireman and a New York cabbie, to come up with their top Wish Lists. Check out what they're wishing for on eBay Express this holiday season! You can view the full lists here.

Sincerely,

Lara B. Housser
eBay Express

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Bryan Ward

I'm excited to kick off the eBay Holiday Dreams Sweepstakes, running November 24 – December 3. Enter and you could win an amazing, one-of-a-kind trip to Disneyland® Resort or Walt Disney World® Resort, where you could spend a night in the Cinderella Castle Suite, get treated like a VIP in the Mickey Mouse Penthouse, and much more! There’ll be one Grand Prize winner every day!

For an automatic entry into our daily prize drawing, register to participate, and then win an auction-style listing or purchase an item using Buy It Now on eBay.com, eBay Motors, or eBay.ca (including our new French-language site). Store Inventory items purchased from eBay Stores qualify, too!

Now here's an extra treat for your stocking: For up to five more entries into a day's prize drawing, find Hidden Mickey. Every day we'll feature a new picture of a Disney theme park with four Hidden Mickey shapes located throughout the picture. Find the Hidden Mickeys and select their location from the pull-down menus. Every Hidden Mickey you correctly find will earn you another entry into that day's drawing. For a fifth entry, correctly identify the Disney park location pictured. Some of the Hidden Mickeys are tough to see, so look closely!

eBay Holiday Dreams Sweepstakes starts Friday, November 24th, so get in the holiday spirit - shop, buy and you could win!

Sincerely,

Bryan Ward
eBay Marketing

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Jim "Griff" Griffith

• Greg Cole, President of HammerTapNow.com and eBay Radio Contributing Editor, with insights on using market research to identify buying trends.
• Troy Janisch, Marketing Director of Bizfilings.com, with important year end information on the importance of becoming a corporation or LLC.
• Nick Gogerty, Founder and CEO of Inclue!, with a tool that can help you track eBay listings.
• Skip McGrath, Publisher of Skip McGrath's eBay Seller's News, with some important photo tips.
• Lynn Dralle, The Queen of Auctions, brings her expert advice on how to handle eBay selling tasks efficiently and in a timely fashion this holiday season.

Plus "The News" with Lee Mirabal, as well as the most important feature on eBay Radio: your calls! Call in during the show at 877-474-3302 (USA) or 001-858-678-8958 (Internationally) to talk with Griff and his guests or to ask a question and share your voice with the rest of the eBay Community. Remember, one lucky caller per week, selected at random, will receive an autographed copy of Griff's book, "The Official eBay Bible".

If you can't catch the live show, you can always subscribe to the , or access any past broadcast from the eBay Radio Archives. To subscribe to the podcast all you need is an  reader (a portable MP3 player is optional). Visit www.wsradio.com/ebayradio for more information about subscribing to the podcasts and to listen to eBay Radio on your computer.

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The 20¢ Insertion Fee Sale starts on Tuesday, November 21, 2006 at 00:00:01 PT (12:00 AM plus one second) and ends that same day, Tuesday, November 21, 2006 at 23:59:59 PT (11:59 PM plus 59 seconds). Listings which were created prior to November 21, 2006 and scheduled to start during the promotional period will also be eligible for the special promotional rate.

This promotion will not apply to the following types of listings: all eBay Motors listings (including Parts & Accessories, Passenger Vehicles, Motorcycles, Power Sports, and Other Vehicles), as well as International, Live Auction, Professional Services, Real Estate, Ad Format, and Store Inventory listings. Also, the following Business & Industrial categories are excluded from this promotion: tractors & farm machinery (category #91952), heavy equipment (25249), concession trailers, carts (67145), imaging and aesthetics equipment (92035), forklifts and other lifts (97185), manufacturing equipment (92080), metalworking equipment (92082), and commercial printing presses (26247).

For full promotion details, please click here.

We hope you enjoy the 20¢ Insertion Fee Sale!

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Jim "Griff" Griffith

Be sure to check out the eBay Chatter Blog for Letters from Griff, and other stories about eBay and the Community.

If you can't catch the live show, you can always subscribe to the , or access any past broadcast from the eBay Radio Archives. To subscribe to the podcast all you need is an reader (a portable MP3 player is optional). Visit www.wsradio.com/ebayradio for more information about subscribing to the podcasts and to listen to eBay Radio on your computer.

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Gary Briggs

Countdown for Community Counts
Our Community Counts promotion wraps up on the 21st, so make sure you're earning points for your local community by bidding, buying, listing, selling and using our Community forums. The title of #1 eBay Community in America is up for grabs -- and so are the celebration and charitable donation that come with it!

It's been fun to see which local communities are near the top of the leader board. For example, Coaldale, CO, Ladera Ranch, CA, and Surprise, AZ are among the leaders in our Charity category so far. And Dellslow, WV, Neche, ND, and Point Roberts, WA are a few of the most active in our Community category. But there are several more days before Community Counts ends – and there's no telling which local eBay community will come out on top!

eBay Community Photo Project by Legendary Photojournalist David Hume Kennerly
Some more exciting news to share about Community Counts. Some of the most active local eBay communities – and some of the individual eBay members who helped them perform so well in Community Counts - will be photographed by Pulitzer Prize winning photographer David Hume Kennerly as part of a project documenting eBay communities across America. Kennerly won the 1972 Pulitzer for his photos of the Vietnam War, and was chief White House photographer for President Gerald Ford. He's also an avid trader on eBay! You can learn more about David Hume Kennerly here.

We're very excited about David’s involvement with Community Counts. In just 11 years, eBay and its members – you - have made a tremendous, positive impact on American culture and daily life. David’s photo project will document some of that impact. Next year, eBay will donate a collection of these images to the Center for American History at the University of Texas at Austin, where they’ll join an expansive archive of historic images.

Once we announce the winners in Community Counts, we'll reveal which communities David will be photographing in December, so stay tuned.

Holiday Catalogs and TV Campaign
Our holiday catalog was sent out to 4 million households in early November, and we're seeing some very good results. Plus, our Gift Guide will also be sent out to 4 million homes later this month.

In addition, we're running full throttle with our "IT" TV ads that communicate the central theme that "whatever IT is, you can get IT on eBay." They’re airing on all major networks, including FOX, NBC, CBS, and ABC. You can see them on high-profile programming such as Lost, CSI: Miami, and Deal or No Deal. The holiday-focused ads will also appear across many cable networks.

If you haven’t seen the TV ads yet, you can find them online at www.whatisit.com. Several new versions will be unveiled before the year is out, so bookmark this link. As I said in my last message, by the end of the year we'll have reached 85% of our consumer audience an average of 13 times each.

National "Sleep In" Day
We all know people who get up at dawn the day after Thanksgiving and fight the crowds just to pick up a few bargains, right? Well, this year we're reminding holiday shoppers that on eBay, you can forget all that. We're naming next Friday National "Sleep In" Day!

Part of what makes eBay special is that you get the best deals any time of the day or night, right from your own home. You can even shop in your jammies -- if that's your thing . So this year forget about setting your alarm, and enjoy the extra rest before you shop on eBay. Keep an eye out for our National "Sleep In" Day TV commercial (this commercial, too, will be available at www.whatisit.com soon).

More Promotions and Innovations at Work
We’ve been hard at work, running several promotions and special initiatives to create excitement and keep buyers active on eBay. eBay Deal Finder, eBay Pop, and the eBay Giving Works "Spotlight on the Gulf Coast" campaign are some of the promotional efforts we've launched recently. You've probably also seen our holiday home page, featuring a festive design and several new modules such as "Wish for IT" and "IT of the Day."

And finally, earlier this week Edurne Jorda from our Seller Development team announced a new PowerSeller Challenge that we're holding from now until December 26, 2006. Participating sellers who beat their personalized targets will receive credit to their account and be entered into a sweepstakes where they can win one of five $5,000 cash prizes. We know our sellers are busy this time of year, and we’re pleased to add a bit more fun and incentive to help them make this a very successful holiday season.

I’ll be back again next month. On behalf of everyone here at eBay, I’d like to wish you a very Happy Thanksgiving!

Sincerely,

Gary Briggs
Senior Vice President and Chief Marketing Officer
eBay North America

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Boost Traffic to Your eBay Store this Holiday with Email Marketing
This workshop will be held on Monday, November 20th from 2:00 pm PT to 3:00 pm PT. Email Marketing - a feature available only to eBay Store sellers - is a great way to promote your items. The tool allows you to quickly and easily send promotional messages to your subscribers who have opted-in to your email list and encourage those buyers to return to your eBay Store! Please join us to discuss the latest enhancements to the tool that make it easier than ever to create professional looking email campaigns in minutes.

How to Turn This Season's Hot Products Into Next Year's Product Line
This workshop will be held on Tuesday, November 21st from 11:00 am PT to 12:00 pm PT. The holiday selling season is in full swing and there are holiday hot lists popping up all around us. Retailers and the news media alike are eager to share the information on this year's hottest holiday merchandise. While many people think this information applies only to holiday sales, every holiday hot list is actually an indicator of a coming trend for the next season. Please join Lisa Suttora Founder/CEO of What Do I Sell.com (whatdoisell.com) and best-selling author of "What to Sell on eBay and Where to Get It" (from McGraw-Hill publishers) as she discusses how to use a variety of holiday hot lists as a starting point to expand your product line in 2007.

Workshops are hosted in discussion threads on the Workshops Board. To get to the Workshops Board:

• Go to www.ebay.com
• Click on Community at the top of the page
• Click on "Workshops" in the "Events" section
• This will bring you to the threaded Workshops Board.

To view archived workshops or to learn more about future workshop events, please check our Workshops Calendar.

Want timely reminders about workshops? We recommend two ways to make sure you never miss an important workshop:

• Sign up for the Workshops Information Group! By joining this group, you will receive an email notification reminding you about upcoming eBay Workshops. (To sign up for the Workshops Information Group, please click here.)
• Subscribe to the RSS feed for the Workshop board. When a new workshop becomes active, your RSS reader will be updated. (You can also subscribe to just the specific topic thread that interests you.) To subscribe, click on the button at the bottom of the Workshop board or thread. Copy and paste the feed URL into your reader to subscribe. For more information on RSS, please read our RSS Help page.

We look forward to seeing you there!

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1. The item must be in your possession at the time of listing.
2. The listing must include a unique photograph of the item in your possession.
3. Your User ID must be clearly displayed within the photograph (watermarks will not be accepted).
4. The listing must include a clear, readable copy of the sales receipt(s) or other proof of purchase. For your protection please black out any personal information.
5. If multiple quantities are being listed, all consoles must be included in one unique photograph. The same photograph must be used in each listing.

Sellers will also be notified of these requirements during the listing process when using the Sell Your Item form, and buyers will be reminded of them when placing a bid.

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Edurne Jorda

If you are a PowerSeller, register for the eBay PowerSeller Challenge and receive your personalized sales target for the 6-week challenge period (November 15 - December 26). Beat your personalized target and receive a one-time eBay listing fee credit equal to 1% of the difference between your target and the final value of your eligible sales during the challenge period. Plus, all participants will be entered for a chance to win one of ten $5,000 cash prizes! The following listings will not count towards your target and eligible sales: Store Inventory, Ad Format, Live Auctions, Real Estate, Automobiles and Vehicles, and Half.com. Get full terms and conditions and official rules.

PowerSellers rank among the most successful eBay sellers in terms of product sales volume and customer satisfaction on eBay. We're proud to recognize and reward their significant contributions to the success of the eBay Community. The PowerSeller program is open to all sellers who qualify.

Qualify to be a PowerSeller? It's not too late to join!
If you qualify to be a PowerSeller, but haven't yet accepted your invitation to the PowerSeller Program, it's not too late. We encourage you to do so at the PowerSeller portal. Members of the PowerSeller Program receive many benefits all year round – from recognition, priority customer support, and other offers. To participate in the PowerSeller Challenge, invitations to the PowerSeller program must be accepted by November 30, 2006.

Sincerely,

Edurne Jorda
Seller Development

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Scott Mencken

eBay Pop
eBay Pop is a fun new destination to learn what's hot on eBay, with a dash of pop culture. Check out which items have been big "Movers and Shakers," cast your vote in "Head to Head," or play "How Much Is It Worth?", (perfect for fans of The Price Is Right). There's plenty more, plus we'll be adding new content and features as time goes on, so check back often.

Check out eBay Pop at www.ebay.com/ebaypop.

eBay Deal Finder
eBay Deal Finder is an easy to use new way to discover great deals on eBay. It searches the eBay marketplace and finds items that are within the total price range that you specify (including shipping) and:

• are ending soon (in less than 4 hours)
• have yet to receive a bid
• do not have a Reserve price
• have a flat shipping rate (including free shipping).

In addition to the search criteria noted above, eBay Deal Finder also presents search results in an exciting new way, including a dynamic countdown clock to let you know how much time is remaining for each item.

Check out eBay Deal Finder at dealfinder.ebay.com.

Sincerely,

Scott Mencken
eBay Marketing

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The promotion will start on Tuesday, November 14, 2006 at 00:00:01 PT (12:00 AM plus one second) and end on, Thursday, November 16, 2006 at 23:59:59 PT (11:59 PM plus 59 seconds). Listings created prior to November 14, 2006 that are scheduled to start during the promotional period will be eligible for the promotional rate.

This promotion will not apply to the following types of listings: all eBay Motors listings (including Parts & Accessories, Passenger Vehicles, Motorcycles, Power Sports, and Other Vehicles), as well as International, Live Auction, Professional Services, Real Estate, Ad Format, and Store Inventory listings. For full details, please see our promotion page.

We hope you enjoy the 50% Off Gallery Plus promotion!

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During the eBay Motors Parts and Accessories 50¢ Insertion Fee sale:

For regular auction-style and Fixed Price Parts and Accessories listings with a starting price above $9.99 on the U.S. Motors site (www.ebaymotors.com), the insertion fee will be capped at $0.50. All insertion fees less than $0.50 will still be charged at the normal rate. For more information about insertion fees during this promotion, please click here.

Listings created prior to November 14, 2006 that are scheduled to start during the promotional period (November 14, 2006) will be eligible to receive the promotional rate. Excluded are Vehicle listings, listings on international eBay sites, Live Auction listings, Professional Services and Store Inventory listings, and listings on www.ebay.com. For full details about the sale, please see our information page.

We hope you enjoy the eBay Motors Parts & Accessories 50¢ Insertion Fee sale!

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The Importance of Goal Setting
This workshop will be held on Tuesday, November 14th from 11:00 am PT to 12:00 pm PT. During this workshop, Phyllis Wischer, Lead Business Coach, and JP O'Brien, CEO and Small Business Expert from Certified Provider KeepMore.net will discuss the importance of goal setting. When you realize that you are not just selling on eBay, but that you are building a business on eBay, setting goals is vital to your success. Topics to be discussed include: The magic of goal setting and why it is so important; making your goals S.M.A.R.T.; keeping yourself accountable to your goals; and, how to build your own Board of Advisors.

Research-Driven Listing Techniques to Boost Your Holiday Sales
This workshop will be held on Tuesday, November 14th from 2:00 pm PT to 3:00 pm PT. You have built up inventory for the holiday selling season and now the focus is on moving your product quickly and for the highest price. Sometimes simple changes to the way you list can dramatically increase your sales. See how eBay Marketplace Research can uncover listing tactics that work for your specific eBay niche.

Keeping Your Business Safe: Smart Use of Business Structures
This workshop will be held on Wednesday, November 15th from 10:00 am PT to 11:00 am PT. The right business structure will protect your business assets, your personal assets and reduce your taxes. The wrong business structure puts everything at risk, and, at the worst case, might even land you in jail. Please join best selling-author and CPA Diane Kennedy to learn what it takes to set up the right business structure for your business and run it so you get all the benefits you deserve.

Generate Buyer Demand with Free Shipping and Get It Fast (Overnight) Shipping
This workshop will be held on Wednesday, November 15th from 1:00 pm PT to 2:00 am PT. eBay Sellers can generate buyer demand during the holiday season by offering Free Shipping and Get It Fast (overnight) shipping on their listings. Using search filters, buyers can easily find such listings on eBay. In this workshop, we will explain to sellers how to create listings that will appear when buyers search for either Free Shipping or Get It Fast (overnight) shipping.

Automatic Billing, Invoices, and Fees, Oh My!
This workshop will be held on Thursday, November 16th from 12:00 pm PT to 1:00 pm PT. For many of us, our eBay selling activity represents part, or all, of our livelihood. Whether you sell full-time or casually, understanding when, how, and why you are charged eBay fees is critical to maintain your budget. Your Seller's account is designed to manage the process of recording and charging your eBay fees without constant monitoring on your part. It also allows for some flexibility when the unexpected occurs. Please join eBay staff for an overview on: billing cycles, automatic billing vs. one-time payments, and available payment methods. Due to privacy concerns, we will not be able to address specific account questions.

New MultiOrder Shipping from PayPal
This workshop will be held on Thursday, November 16th from 2:00 pm PT to 3:00 pm PT. In October 2006, we launched MultiOrder Shipping on PayPal, which allows the printing of up to 50 USPS domestic shipping labels at a time. This feature also allows you to import eBay orders, combine multiple sales to one package, and schedule carrier pickup. Please join us for this informative workshop. You'll also have an opportunity to provide feedback and participate in a Q&A session.

Using Market Research to Increase your Holiday Sales
This workshop will be held on Friday, November 17th from 11:00 am PT to 12:00 pm PT. The holiday season is just around the corner and it's not too late to start planning your sales, so you can cash in on the busiest time of year! Terapeak marketing team Sarah Taheri, Dave Frey, and Morgan Brooks will be hosting a workshop introducing you to some tools that you can use to prepare for the upcoming holiday season. They will cover; researching to $pot products that will $ell, Knowing the best brand/color/size to sell, and knowing the best time to list to get the highest profits.

Basic Advertising and Marketing Techniques
This workshop will be held on Friday, November 17th from 2:00 pm PT to 3:00 pm PT. Please join Janelle Elms, lead instructor with eBay University, author and Silver PowerSeller, and Phil Dunn, marketing and advertising writer, for the fourth installment of The 7 Essential Steps to Successful eBay Marketing workshop series. This session will help you persuade buyers with words. You'll sell faster and make you more money with these basic and advanced advertising and marketing techniques. We'll cover copy writing tricks of the trade, promotional motivations, offers, closing techniques, persuasive tone and style, and more.

Workshops are hosted in discussion threads on the Workshops Board. To get to the Workshops Board:

• Go to www.ebay.com
• Click on Community at the top of the page
• Click on "Workshops" in the "Events" section
• This will bring you to the threaded Workshops Board.

To view archived workshops or to learn more about future workshop events, please check our Workshops Calendar.

Want timely reminders about workshops? We recommend two ways to make sure you never miss an important workshop:

• Sign up for the Workshops Information Group! By joining this group, you will receive an email notification reminding you about upcoming eBay Workshops. (To sign up for the Workshops Information Group, please click here.)
• Subscribe to the RSS feed for the Workshop board. When a new workshop becomes active, your RSS reader will be updated. (You can also subscribe to just the specific topic thread that interests you.) To subscribe, click on the button at the bottom of the Workshop board or thread. Copy and paste the feed URL into your reader to subscribe. For more information on RSS, please read our RSS Help page.

We look forward to seeing you there!

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Sonia Wong

I'll be back after the holiday season with more details, so please stay tuned.

Sincerely,
Sonia Wong
Director, Product Management

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	***Original: Coming Soon: Alternative to “Use the Yellow Button” – Anonymous Email Forwarding***
	October 17, 2006 | 09:55AM PST/PT Sonia Wong Hi, I'm Sonia Wong with eBay's Product Management team. We've been working on a way for you to respond to emails sent to you through eBay's systems (such as Ask Seller A Question) from your own email client, while still protecting the privacy of email addresses. Currently, when an email is sent to you through eBay's system -- and the sender has chosen to hide their email address -- you cannot respond directly from your email client. Instead, you are directed to "Use The Yellow Button" within the body of the email, which takes you to a Reply form within My Messages. We've heard from members that this can be confusing and inefficient, especially when you have a large volume of emails to answer. To make responding to your eBay email easier, we've developed Anonymous Email Forwarding. This change will allow you to respond to email from your own email client, while still protecting the sender's privacy. This feature will launch near the end of the month. Here's how Anonymous Email Forwarding works: When a member sends you a message through eBay and has chosen to hide their email address, we'll create anonymous email addresses for both you and the sender. You can then reply to emails directly from your email client just like you do for any email. When your response comes back into our systems, our system will forward it to the appropriate recipient. The anonymous email forwarding service will help members communicate easily with one another while preserving the privacy of your email addresses. Of course, you can still use My Messages to respond, if you prefer. For more details about Anonymous Email Forwarding, please see our information page. Sincerely, Sonia Wong Director, Product Management
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Make sure to save the date for Bill's next Town Hall on Thursday, November 30th at 4pm PT.

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	***Previous update: Reminder for the eBay Town Hall Event with Bill Cobb – Tomorrow, October 26th***
	October 25, 2006 | 02:48PM PST/PT Don't forget to listen in as Bill Cobb, President of eBay North America, hosts our next Town Hall tomorrow, October 26th, from 11:00am to 12:00pm PT. He'll be joined by other leaders around eBay during this open-topic Town Hall. To submit your question and to listen in, visit our Town Hall page.
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	***Original: Save The Date: Town Hall with Bill Cobb on Thursday, October 26th***
	October 20, 2006 | 05:08PM PST/PT Bill Cobb Hi everyone...this is Bill Cobb, President of eBay North America. I'm here to invite you to our next Town Hall event on Thursday, October 26, 2006 from 11:00 AM to 12:00 PM PT. As we get into the heart of the holiday buying and selling season, I wanted to make this an open-topic Town Hall. I’ve asked other leaders at eBay to join me on the 26th, and I invite you to submit your questions in advance through our Town Hall page at www.ebay.com/townhall. We'll also take questions submitted to us by listeners live during the event. You can listen to the audio of this Town Hall through either Windows Media Player or Real Player. Details on how to download and install the latest versions of both of these are available on our Town Hall page. I hope you can join us on Thursday, October 26th at 11:00 AM PT. Sincerely, Bill Cobb President, eBay North America
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We appreciate your input on how we can make categories better for everyone. You may submit categories suggestions here.

Thanks again to all our members who contribute to these trade-enhancing changes!

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	***Original: Coming Soon: Category Updates***
	October 25, 2006 | 05:19PM PST/PT The category structure will be updated in mid-November based on feedback received from the eBay Community and from experts in the affected fields. You may provide category structure feedback at any time by clicking here. A complete list of the new category structure can be found on Seller Central here. Updated categories: CAMERAS & PHOTO Check out changes under Digital Cameras. CLOTHING, SHOES & ACCESSORIES Look for changes under Infant & Toddlers CONSUMER ELECTRONICS Check out changes under MP3 Players & Accessories and Portable Audio. EBAY MOTORS Look for new models under Cars & Trucks. TRAVEL A new Car Rental category has been added. VIDEO GAMES Check out changes under Accessories. As always, you can move your item to another category by revising your listing here as long as it has not received a bid and there are more than 12 hours left in the listing. We appreciate your input on how we can make categories better for everyone. You may submit categories suggestions here. Thanks again to all our members who contributed to these changes!
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The promotion starts on Wednesday, November 8, 2006 at 00:00:01 PT (12:00 AM plus one second) and ends that same day, Wednesday, November 8, 2006 at 23:59:59 PT (11:59 PM plus 59 seconds). Listings which were created prior to November 8, 2006 and scheduled to start during the promotional period will also be eligible for the special promotional rate.

The 10¢ Fixed Price Sale will not apply to eBay Motors vehicles and non-vehicles, International, Live Auction, Professional Services, Real Estate, Ad Format, and Store Inventory listings. Also, the following Business & Industrial categories are excluded from this promotion: tractors & farm machinery (category #91952), heavy equipment (25249), concession trailers, carts (67145), imaging and aesthetics equipment (92035), forklifts and other lifts (97185), manufacturing equipment (92080), metalworking equipment (92082), and commercial printing presses (26247). Please click here for more details.

For full promotion details, please see our information page.

We hope you enjoy the one-day 10¢ Fixed Price Insertion Fee Sale!

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Jim "Griff" Griffith

• Rob Cross, Sr Manager with eBay Developers Program, will be joined by the eBay Radio Developer of the month, Ralf VonSosen, VP of Marketing for Infopia.
• Christine Hipwell, eBay's Trust and Safety Communications Manager, will be here to talk about the TnS tutorials: Buying Safely, Account Protection, and Marketplace Policy.
• Bill Keck, CEO of www.PoliceAuctions.com, with more product sourcing solutions.
• Julia Wilkinson, author of the “eBay Price Guide,” will share useful information on pricing products.
• Jason Miner, host of PayPal Radio with PayPal multi-shipping solutions and the latest PayPal News.

Plus "The News" with Lee Mirabal, as well as the most important feature on eBay Radio: your calls! Call in during the show at 877-474-3302 (USA) or 001-858-678-8958 (Internationally) to talk with Griff and his guests or to ask a question and share your voice with the rest of the eBay Community. Remember, one lucky caller per week, selected at random, will receive an autographed copy of Griff's book, "The Official eBay Bible".

If you can't catch the live show, you can always subscribe to the , or access any past broadcast from the eBay Radio Archives. To subscribe to the podcast all you need is an  reader (a portable MP3 player is optional). Visit www.wsradio.com/ebayradio for more information about subscribing to the podcasts and to listen to eBay Radio on your computer.

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Bill Onderdonk

We know that sellers see increased traffic and sales when they accept PayPal. So, effective November 23, 2006, millions of PayPal buyers will be eligible to receive cash rebate offers worth from $10 to $20. There is a limit of one rebate per PayPal buyer.

By offering this reward to our loyal buyers, we'll be helping to drive more online shoppers to sellers who accept PayPal on eBay.com and from their own qualifying Merchant websites.

Cash rebate programs will be available to buyers from November 23, 2006 through May 15, 2007. Look for more details in the next few days on PayPal.com. We'll also be emailing registered PayPal buyers with more information soon.

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Jim "Griff" Griffith

Be sure to check out the eBay Chatter Blog for Letters from Griff, and other stories about eBay and the Community.

If you can't catch the live show, you can always subscribe to the , or access any past broadcast from the eBay Radio Archives. To subscribe to the podcast all you need is an reader (a portable MP3 player is optional). Visit www.wsradio.com/ebayradio for more information about subscribing to the podcasts and to listen to eBay Radio on your computer.

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The Smart Guide to Listing Fees
This workshop will be held on Monday, November 6th from 11:00 am PT to 12:00 pm PT. Please join Jen Cano of HammerTap market research, a Certified Solution Provider, as she discusses how to decide which listing fees will boost your profits. For example, some might claim that bold is a must, while others disagree. Join this workshop to learn how to decide which listing features will attract more bidders and higher-paying buyers.

eBay Holiday Sales Success Tips
This workshop will be held on Tuesday, November 7th from 1:00 pm PT to 2:00 pm PT. It's hard to miss that the holidays are on their way! Walk into any chain store and the aisles are full of holiday promotions. The brick and mortar stores are revving up for the holidays and the same holds true for eBay sellers. Rebecca Shapiro, owner of Pig and Panda (pigandpanda) will offer great tips on how to take advantage of the fantastic eBay holiday marketing blitz that is well underway. So grab a cup of cocoa and get your business on eBay ready for the great holiday sales rush!

eBay Express: Wish List & Other Product Developments
This workshop will be held on Wednesday, November 8th from 1:00 pm PT to 2:00 pm PT. Learn about the new Wish List functionality we're launching for buyers on eBay Express, just in time for the holiday season. You'll be able to add items you like to a Wish List right from the item page and then make the list available to anyone you choose. Given the wide range of items on eBay Express, buyers can finally send their friends and family the one list with everything they want for the holidays. Also, learn about new placements for eBay Express we'll be testing within eBay.com as a way to increase awareness of eBay Express. As part of these tests, a small number of eBay.com pages will have additional eBay Express promotions.

eBay Giving Works: Spotlight on Holiday Dreams
This workshop will be held on Thursday, November 9th from 11:00 am PT to 12:00 pm PT. Please join us to learn more about a special Spotlight on a Cause, where you can make dreams come true this holiday season. Find out how you can list items with eBay Giving Works and help organizations dedicated to disaster relief, particularly in the Gulf Coast region.

Use Research to Increase your Motors “Parts & Accessories” Sales!
This workshop will be held on Friday, November 10th from 11:00 am PT to 12:00 pm PT. If you want to take your eBay selling to the next level then you should join the Terapeak team; Sarah Taheri, Dave Frey, and Morgan Brooks for their upcoming workshop. They will introduce you to some tools that you can use to learn more about the items you are selling and items you should be selling! They will cover researching the sales potential for products/brands, researching the sales strategy of other sellers, and using research to know the best time to list.

Workshops are hosted in discussion threads on the Workshops Board. To get to the Workshops Board:

• Go to www.ebay.com
• Click on Community at the top of the page
• Click on "Workshops" in the "Events" section
• This will bring you to the threaded Workshops Board.

To view archived workshops or to learn more about future workshop events, please check our Workshops Calendar.

Want timely reminders about workshops? We recommend two ways to make sure you never miss an important workshop:

• Sign up for the Workshops Information Group! By joining this group, you will receive an email notification reminding you about upcoming eBay Workshops. (To sign up for the Workshops Information Group, please click here.)
• Subscribe to the RSS feed for the Workshop board. When a new workshop becomes active, your RSS reader will be updated. (You can also subscribe to just the specific topic thread that interests you.) To subscribe, click on the button at the bottom of the Workshop board or thread. Copy and paste the feed URL into your reader to subscribe. For more information on RSS, please read our RSS Help page.

We look forward to seeing you there!

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Rob Chesnut

Since eBay began in 1995, it's been our job to balance the need for openness and transparency in the marketplace, with the need to protect our Community of members from the threats that have appeared as the Internet has flourished. As the Community has grown from the size of a small town in 1997, to the size of a large country today, we've had to take measures to protect our members that also reduce transparency.

From the beginning, any member of the Community could request the contact details of any other member and the bidding process was very transparent. As we've grown, we've limited communication to members involved in transactions with each other. Additionally in 2003, we eliminated the public display of email addresses from the site, and therefore, required thousands of people to set up new User IDs. Naturally, as we've stepped up education and other efforts to improve safety, the bad guys continued their efforts to try to exploit our members.

The User IDs of members – plus their member information such as feedback and previous bidding and/or buying activity – have always been freely available to anyone visiting the site. Members have been able to access this information from the item page, bid history page, and Advanced Search by Bidder feature. Unfortunately – while bid history and contact information about trading colleagues are helpful when evaluating a transaction, and provide a level of trust within the transaction – bad guys can use this information for potentially harmful purposes.

One way they use this information is to send unwanted commercial spam, spoof emails, and fake Second Chance Offer emails. While legitimate Second Chance Offer emails are a great tool on eBay that give sellers the ability to offer another buyer an additional item they may have available, fake Second Chance Offers and other types of solicitations sent by bad guys generally lure the targeted member off the eBay website and collect payment through an unsafe payment method, such as wire transfer—all while providing the false impression that eBay endorses the transaction..

As our Community knows, the problem of spam, spoof and fake Second Chance Offer emails has not gone away. In fact, despite industry leading efforts to educate the Community about online safety (eBay Toolbar, tutorials and safety messaging), partnering with law enforcement and industry groups, and investments in technology that make the site more safe – we've seen this problem grow. Increasingly, sellers and buyers have turned to us for a solution.

Introducing the Safeguarding Member IDs Project
The Safeguarding Member IDs project is a new approach to auction-style listings that offers more privacy for our members through changing how bidding information is displayed. Following intensive development and review, as well as Community input, we believe the Safeguarding Member IDs project provides the Community with enough information about the bidders involved in an auction-style listing for them to feel confident in placing a bid – without revealing actual User IDs. We're implementing this new system on listings with a high bid of $200 or greater, which is where we believe it can have the greatest positive impact. The bid information for listings where the bid is lower than $200 will display as it does today.

Here's what will change:

1. On the bid history page for each listing we'll replace member User IDs with aliases (such as Bidder 1, Bidder 2 and Bidder 3) in the order of their bids placed. For each bidder involved in a listing, we'll display the number of bids in unique categories that they've placed, a range that their feedback score falls within (i.e. 10-49, for instance), their percentage of positive feedback, their length of time as an eBay member, and the number of bids they've placed on the item. At the end of a listing, the winning bidder's User ID will be displayed on the item page. Please note: Sellers will still be able to access bidder information on their listings through the Bid History page and the My eBay selling table.
2. In My eBay, members will no longer have access to the high-bidder column from bid and watch tables.
3. On the item page, you'll only be able to see the high-bidder ID if you are the signed-in seller of the item or the signed-in high bidder.
4. Through the Advanced Search by Bidder link, we'll only show completed listings within the last 30 days.

Future enhancements are being designed that will provide even more transaction data about the bidders and seller involved in a transaction. We'll continue to update the community on these changes as these plans become finalized.

Safeguarding Member IDs – Launch plans
Clearly, even the smallest changes on the eBay marketplace may have unexpected effects, and we want to move forward carefully. While we are cautious of making changes to the site during the holiday season, we feel strongly that this is the right thing to do for the Community.

Our first step is to launch on eBay Motors in early November. This decision is based on Community input in these categories, especially in Motor Vehicles, where the rates of member reported spoof and fake Second Chance Offers have been higher than in other categories. As November and December are slower months for vehicle sales, we believe this is the right time for implementation.

If all goes well, we could implement the Safeguarding Member IDs project on eBay.com in early 2007.

I know these changes will concern some members. My team and I have had many conversations with buyers and sellers about these plans, and I can tell you that this project has been intensely debated internally, as well. But considering the nature of the problem we all face, it's time to take stronger measures to ensure our members can continue to feel safe when they transact on eBay.

To learn more, please read our Frequently Asked Questions. We know you'll have more questions, so the Trust & Safety team will be hosting a workshop shortly after this project launches. Please stay tuned to the General Announcements board for day and time.

Also I'II be joining Bill Cobb at his next monthly Town Hall on November 30 at 4 p.m. Pacific time to talk more about the Safeguarding Member IDs project.

Sincerely,

Rob Chesnut
Senior Vice President, eBay Global Trust & Safety

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For more details, see Gary's original announcement below, or go directly to the Community Counts information homepage at www.ebaycommunitycounts.com.

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	***Original: A Message from Gary Briggs – Community Counts!***
	October 26, 2006 | 01:27PM PST/PT Gary Briggs Hi everyone...I'm eBay’s Senior VP and Chief Marketing Officer. As you may have read in my post last month, eBay is supporting your holiday sales with a variety of marketing campaigns and other ways to generate buyer demand. I'd like to tell you about a new promotion that will celebrate eBay's incredible Community. Plus, I'm going to talk a bit about new eBay.com TV ads that are starting to air. Community Counts -- Stand up and be counted! If you listened in to the Town Hall meeting earlier today, you heard Bill Cobb talk about a new promotion starting November 1 called "Community Counts." Community Counts will put the spotlight on what makes eBay so special – our Community. We'll be inviting you – and others in your local community – to stand up and be counted in the first-ever local "census" of eBay members and their activity on eBay.com. We'll track activity on the site and sort it by ZIP code – so every community in America will have the equal opportunity to join in with their neighbors and compete in "Community Counts." Curious which community in America is the most sports-oriented? Interested in who the most generous communities in America are, based on activity through eBay Giving Works? We'll be offering these kinds of insights into the eBay activity happening at the local level for the first time. But here's where it gets good – just by being active on eBay, you and other members in your neighborhood gain the chance to benefit your local community! Here's how it works: For three weeks, starting on November 1, we'll be giving points to various types of eBay activities, including listing-related transaction activity (on eBay.com, eBay Express and eBay Motors), contributions to the Community Forums, and charitable buying and selling activity through eBay Giving Works. We'll be tabulating the points earned for each activity to the ZIP code to which the member is registered. There's no registration required, so just by being active on the site, you'll be helping your community’s chances of winning. After the promotion ends on November 21, the local community with the most points will be named the #1 eBay Community in America for 2006. They will also receive a $10,000 donation from eBay, Inc. to the approved charity of their choice – PLUS eBay will host a big party in their town to celebrate. If you live in a small town and are wondering about your chance of competing with big cities, don't worry. We felt it was important to tabulate points in such a way that we adjust for population. We'll base our calculations on population per ZIP code, as reported by the U.S. Census Bureau. This preserves the "level playing field" so that people all over the country have a fair shot at winning. On November 1, we'll be sharing many more details about Community Counts on our website at www.ebay.com/communitycounts (we will update this announcement when this page is available). So spread the word – and stay tuned! Six new TV ads Last weekend, we launched a fun campaign designed to drive top-of-mind awareness for eBay. A whopping 15 million people saw the debut of the new eBay TV campaign last Saturday during World Series Game 1. Throughout the end of the year, six new TV ads will build upon the core message that "whatever IT is, you can get IT on eBay" by showcasing people's unique connections with their "ITs" in unexpected ways. These first ads are just the start of an integrated holiday marketing campaign that will roll out in the upcoming weeks. By the end of the year, we'll have reached 85% of our target audience an average of 13 times each. I'll be talking more about our holiday marketing plans next time, so stay tuned. Sincerely, Gary Briggs Senior Vice President and Chief Marketing Officer eBay North America
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This limited-time offer is free of charge to sellers and will be automatically displayed on eBay items over $50 as long as sellers accept PayPal and have not opted out of displaying PayPal Credit messages on their listings.

The PayPal Plus Credit Card is designed to give you all the security and convenience you'd expect from PayPal and MasterCard® – plus an rewards program that lets you earn points on any purchase you make, all with no annual fee

If you don't have a PayPal Plus Credit Card, you can apply now.

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Don Albert

As a result we are expanding to include more categories. Starting today Skype will be available to add to listings in Motorcycles, Special Vehicles, Cell Phones & Portable Electronics, Camera & Photo, Baby, Travel, and additional areas of Collectibles. A complete list of all eligible categories can be seen here.

How to add Skype
When you use the Sell Your Item form to list in one of these categories, you'll be able to choose to add either a Chat or Voice button (or both) to your listings. Buyers just need to click on the buttons, register for Skype (if they haven't already done so), and then send their message. It's fast, it's easy, and it's free.

To learn more about adding Skype to your listings, click here. We also invite you to join our Skype discussion board.

Sincerely,

Don Albert
Vice President and GM, Skype North America

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We’re concerned, of course, about the cause of this incident, and needless to say, eBay is working closely with local and federal law enforcement agents in their investigation.

Sincerely,

Bill Cobb
President
eBay North America

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