chameloon Posted February 9, 2013 Report Posted February 9, 2013 Hi there, we all know the methods of these people. A funny remark : if you check the address of the pics they use in their Ebay listings, you can see where the object is actually listed : they don't even save them on their hard drives to repost them on Ebay, they use directly links of pictures coming from yahoo auctions. Demonstration : let's use this auction: http://www.ebay.com/itm/Japanese-SAMURA ... 0848216168 You can find this picture on the listing ( right click -> save image link to access the link of the picture) : http://auctions.c.yimg.jp/img309.auctio ... 427936.jpg If you want to go further, by copying this link in google image, you can find back the page with the original auction. In this case : http://winners-auction.jp/productDetail/3694/ (sold for 20000 yens already) Laurent Quote
chameloon Posted February 9, 2013 Author Report Posted February 9, 2013 Another example, using this method (google image search): Ebay : http://www.ebay.com/itm/Japanese-SAMURA ... 0848008003 The original : http://page5.auctions.yahoo.co.jp/jp/auction/e131629818 13500$ vs. 402000 yen Have fun finding the others Laurent Quote
Jiro49 Posted February 9, 2013 Report Posted February 9, 2013 They're dominating eBay right now with a barrage of listings since winners took off. Quote
cabowen Posted February 9, 2013 Report Posted February 9, 2013 Funny you should post that last one as that is an early work by Enomoto Tatsuyoshi, who as I posted yesterday, passed away the other day..... Quote
Brian Posted February 9, 2013 Report Posted February 9, 2013 They do have the "make an offer" feature, so I think they are expecting ppl to take a major chance and offer like half of the auction price...then they would accept it, and still make a decent profit. Ppl would assume they got a bargain. Brian Quote
Drago Posted February 9, 2013 Report Posted February 9, 2013 I wonder, should you report them to eBay? Those methods can't be acceptable... Quote
Adrian Posted February 9, 2013 Report Posted February 9, 2013 I'm afraid that technically speaking they operate within the law (if I understood correctly the mechanism involved). Since they propose for sale items that the average ebay buyer cannot purchase directly, they are basically providing an (expensive) service. Morally speaking it's an entirelly different issue and they should be exposed on all the enthusiast/collector forums. Maybe with links to sites that offer the same service at a resonable cost. Quote
Brian Posted February 9, 2013 Report Posted February 9, 2013 Nothing illegal about what they do. An item is available somewhere for $100. They list it for $500...and if someone buys it, they go and purchase the item and send to the buyer. If already sold, they tell the buyer the item is no longer available, and refund in full. May not be ethical, but not breaking any rules. About the same as the hundreds of thousands of drop-shippers. Brian Quote
chameloon Posted February 9, 2013 Author Report Posted February 9, 2013 Nothing illegal may be, but at least, with my method you can contact the original seller on yahoo Japan (or any other site) and finally skip those easy-money-seeking leeches... Laurent PS: If they list on Ebay something they don't own, without the consent of the original seller on yahoo JP, yes, it is illegal! Quote
Adrian Posted February 9, 2013 Report Posted February 9, 2013 It may be against ebay's TOS. But illegal? Quote
chameloon Posted February 9, 2013 Author Report Posted February 9, 2013 No matter the way, on real life or on the internet, you cannot sell something you don't own if the original seller is not aware of that. Legally speaking it is called a pyramid (or Ponzi) scheme (see Madoff) Laurent Quote
Marius Posted February 9, 2013 Report Posted February 9, 2013 What about using someone's pictures? And using them for commercial purposes? Quote
Adrian Posted February 9, 2013 Report Posted February 9, 2013 Laurent, you're making a confusion, a Ponzi scheme is very different from asking an inflated price on some goods that someone else is actually selling. What these guys are doing would be illegal only if they were unable to purchase the goods and didn't refunded the buyer in full. However, if they don't ask the permission of the original seller to use the pictures, then Mariusz is right. Quote
rkg Posted February 9, 2013 Report Posted February 9, 2013 Well, technically, reposting images for for pretty much ANY purpose w/o the image rights owner's permission (actual or implied) is illegal, but hey, everybody ignores that on the internet so it has to be OK, right? "fair use" doesn't cover anywhere near all the purposes people think it does... As far as these go, if the images were used w/o the permission of the image owner, the image owners can ask ebay to pull infringing images and then hit them with a DCMA takedown notice if they don't respond/do it in a timely fashion (take that, customer no-service...). http://rising.blackstar.com/how-to-send ... otice.html Best, rkg (Richard George) mariuszk said: What about using someone's pictures? And using them for commercial purposes? Quote
chameloon Posted February 9, 2013 Author Report Posted February 9, 2013 I don't know what the sellers on yahoo JP would think of what is done with their pictures Laurent Quote
Adrian Posted February 9, 2013 Report Posted February 9, 2013 Maybe they should start reading the collectors message boards :D Quote
micko Posted February 10, 2013 Report Posted February 10, 2013 i sent him questions,like 8000$ for a 800$ tsuba have you made a mistake in the listing price he never replied,ivé done this lots of times now he has questions blocked,so it will hurt him a little if anyone was silly enough to be interested in his items Quote
Brian Posted February 10, 2013 Report Posted February 10, 2013 chameloon said: I don't know what the sellers on yahoo JP would think of what is done with their pictures Laurent I think they are probably fully aware of what is going on. Likely the eBay sellers are contacting the other sellers, and telling them they are expanding their audience, and since there is no down side for the Yahoo sellers, they have probably given the ok. Just what I would have done.... No matter anyhow. Brian Quote
Kai-Gunto Posted February 10, 2013 Report Posted February 10, 2013 2 years ago I bourght a yoroi kake from them with no problems at all. They had at that time the cheapest and best quality kake on ebay. I was happy with my purchase. Quote
Kai-Gunto Posted February 12, 2013 Report Posted February 12, 2013 Saw this navy dirk today......wtf 3000usd and the text....complete wrong. http://www.ebay.com/itm/Gunto-Koshirae- ... 1e7744e0bc Quote
chameloon Posted February 12, 2013 Author Report Posted February 12, 2013 gunto said: Saw this navy dirk today......wtf 3000usd and the text....complete wrong.http://www.ebay.com/itm/Gunto-Koshirae- ... 1e7744e0bc The original auction : http://page6.auctions.yahoo.co.jp/jp/auction/f119914545 Nice increase in price... Laurent Quote
Adrian Posted February 12, 2013 Report Posted February 12, 2013 What's a 0 added at the end these days? :lol: Quote
estcrh Posted February 12, 2013 Report Posted February 12, 2013 Ebay has been notified many times by several different people letting them know that these guys and a few others are selling items that they do not have in the immediate possession to sell and that the images being used are not legally theirs to used but Ebay has not taken any action, Ebay has also been notified that these sellers are listing items which are absolutely not currently for sale and still nothing has changed. Quote
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