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eBay announced  that starting March 30, it will be "lowering the cost of selling for sellers of all sizes," a notion that is heavily disputed. The company claims it will introduce its lowest insertion fees ever, and that may be true for the lowest-priced auctions, but many are claiming prices are higher. Just read through the comments of this article to get a feel for what is being discussed.

Note: Some edits have been made to this article, but it has always said that the price change represents an increase for some sellers (now bolded below).

Here are the new options for sellers, as described in eBay’s announcement:

Option 1: "eBay Everyday" Standard Rates

- List up to 100 items a month Auction-style free—no Insertion Fees—when you start your Auction-style listing under $1.

- Get new, lower Insertion Fees for all other start prices.

- Either way, pay one easy Final Value Fee of 9% of the winning bid—and never more than $50—pay only if your item sells.

- List in Fixed Price for 50¢ with Final Value Fees mostly the same as today

Option 2: eBay Stores Subscription Packages

- List in Fixed Price with full search exposure for as low as 3¢ Insertion Fees with Final Value Fees for the most part the same as today

- Get FREE pictures

- Get deeply discounted fees on Auction-style listings

eBay says option one is ideal for those who sell occasionally, while option two is better for most sellers with 50 or more listings a month.

eBay’s price change does represent a price increase for sellers who don’t have a store. This is brought up in an interview (though supplied by eBay itself) with eBay VP of Buyer and Seller Experience Dinesh Lathi. His response is below (there is more to the interview, which can be viewed here):

When asked about why eBay will now only offer zero insertion fees for auctions starting under $1, as opposed to 5 item listings for free at any start price, Lathi says it is because eBay feels like the under $1 price is where the auction format works best.

Not everything from eBay’s announcement is targeted at sellers. For buyers, the company is launching a new buyer protection program, which they see as a way to bring in more buyers and keep them on eBay. There is another series of videos discussing this aspect of the announcement with eBay Senior Director of Resolutions Lynda Talgo here. When asked whether or not the program could be perceived as eBay favoring the buyer over the seller, she says:

Another key component of eBay’s announcement is what the company refers to as a boost to seller efficiency. For example, sellers of auto parts will be able to create a single listing with a complete list of compatible vehicles, which will save the seller on insertion fees and time. Sellers will be able to list multiple variations of a product in one fixed price listing in "many more" categories.

More details that reflect upcoming eBay changes can be found in this interview, this interview, the 2010 Spring Seller Update overview, and this announcement itself. In addition, there will be a webinar Thursday, and more details announced on the announcement board.

What do you think of eBay’s upcoming changes? Discuss here.

Related Articles:

> eBay Declares Mobile Success For Holiday Season

> eBay Fined $2.6 Million Over LVMH Sales

> eBay Previews Possible Geotargeting Feature For Sellers

About 22 months ago, Google was sued over its Street View program by a couple named Aaron and Christine Boring.  The entire suit was dismissed a little while later.  Now, the Borings have made a small bit of headway with an appeal, but it doesn’t appear that Google has much to worry about.

The United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit is sticking by the dismissal of the Borings’ claims for invasion of privacy, unjust enrichment, injunctive relief, and punitive damages.  The only claim that will be allowed to go forward is one regarding trespassing.

  (Now-Deleted) Street View Shot Of The Borings’ House

The Borings, who originally sought $25,000 in damages, don’t seem likely to get much money due to this, either.  A court document stated, "[T]hey ‘bear the burden of proving that the trespass was the legal cause, i.e., a substantial factor in bringing about actual harm or damage’ . . . if they want more than a dollar."

This looks to be a significant win for Google.  Had things gone another way, the lawsuit could have encouraged all sorts of people to sue the company.  Taken to an extreme, Street View might have met its end as a result.

Yet as things stand, no one can count on getting more than a single dollar, and that’s only if Google’s Street View drivers prove unable to turn back at "Private Road" signs.

Related Articles:

> Street View Spreads To Denmark, Sweden

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The media sector performed well in 2009, recovering $200 billion of value, or 63 percent of what it lost in 2008, online content providers and distributors made up more than half of these gains, according to a new report by consulting firm Oliver Wyman.

The largest gains were in China, where the media sector market value increased by 200 percent. The report indicates that the trend toward online media cannibalizing traditional platforms could push the industry toward a "zero-sum game" and increase the pressure on existing companies to sharpen online strategies.

Online video viewing minutes increased in 2009 by 50% in the U.S. and 30% in Spain, with TV shows and movies accounting for around half of these minutes. "These averages, however, mask the full extent of the change among the subset of the population that watches long-form content online," said Robert C. Fox, a Partner in Oliver Wyman’s Communications, Media, and Technology practice.

"In the U.S., for example, among those who watch long-form video online, 15% of their total long-form viewing is online and their linear TV and DVD viewing decreased in 2009. Similarly among all 18-34 year-olds, a key advertising demographic, all forms of viewing other than online and mobile dropped in 2009."

"The pace of growth in online-video viewing is striking," said Mr. Fox. "However, while the platform is still in its infancy, the behavior of today’s online population suggests that much of this growth will come at the expense of traditional platforms. Video could be headed for a zero-sum game," he added.
 

Related Articles:

> Google To Get More Interactive With Mobile Video Ads

> IAB Releases Ad Unit Guidelines Updates

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At the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas earlier this month, Intel had a lot of things going on. For one, they introduced a whole new family of Intel Core Processors. They also had a cool proof-of-concept device on display. This was something they call the Intel Infoscape.

Infoscape is a giant display featuring cubes of information, and users can walk up to it and access all kinds of different content – Google News, Tweets, blogs, Flickr images, etc. While on display at CES, the content dealt with CES-related info.

Being a proof-of-concept device, Infoscape is designed to look at different ways of presenting content down the road. The giant cube is powered by Intel’s Core I7 processor, and pulls from about 20,000 different content sources.

The Infoscape displays its content on a double HD screen at 1920×1920 resolution, running at over 100 frames per second. For the event, it was organized into content areas like healthcare, habitat, the environment, communications, transportation, etc.

According to Intel, the device is aimed at exploring how people might access and organize their content in the future. What do you think?

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If you are one of those people still skeptical about the business uses of social media, you may be interested to know that Google’s Social Search is no longer just an experiment. Though it does have the beta tag on it, it is now mainstream. This is something we’ve all known would come sooner or later, but now it’s here.

Have you established enough connections to do well in social search? Comment here.

If people were already seeing different search results from one another before, that is really going to be true now, now that Google is plugging results based on the individual’s social circle into any given SERP. This is one of the many ways SEO is changing, and it would appear that any business looking to get some play in Google search, would do well to have as many connections established as possible, via various social networking sites and tools.

Keep in mind that the social circle is based upon information that Google has about you from your Google account. You can see your list of connections anytime from here (assuming you have a Google account). It pulls connections from your Google Contacts, and any services you have listed on your Google profile (assuming you have services listed on your profile). If you have Twitter listed for example (Facebook connections are not public), anyone you are connected to through one of those services is fair game for potential search results.

Google’s thinking is that if the user is connected to certain people, results from those people will have relevance because you know and trust them. Google says, "You can improve social search results for your friends and contacts by linking to content you have created such as blogs, photos and videos on your Google profile."

"We’ve been having a lot of fun with Social Search. It’s baby season here on our team — two of us just had little ones, and a third is on the way," the company says in the announcement. "We’re all getting ready to be parents for the first time and we have lots of questions. So, what do we do? We search Google, of course! With Social Search, when we search for [baby sleep patterns], [swaddling] or [best cribs], not only do we get the usual websites with expert opinions, we also find relevant pages from our friends and contacts. For example, if one of my friends has written a blog where he talks about a great baby shop he found in Mountain View, this might appear in my social results. I could probably find other reviews, but my friend’s blog is more relevant because I know and trust the author."

Appearing in social search results means:

1. Make sure you have all of your important links on your Google Profile.
2. Make as many connections as possible.
3. Encourage customers to follow you via social networks.
4. Participate in social media so people will engage with you.
5. Encourage sharing of content (there are plenty available social media buttons)
6. Include social network info on business cards/signage, etc.
7. Include social network info in your online advertising
8. There are probably many more worthwhile tips (if you have any, share them in the comments).

Google’s social search doesn’t end with regular web search. They’re adding it to image search, and who knows what else. Look for a lot more features to become part of social search, as Google leaves that Beta tag on. Let’s not forget that Gmail only left beta last year, and I don’t have to tell you they’ve added a lot to that over the years.

Just remember that social results will always be clearly marked as such on Google’s SERPs. They will be accompanied by a heading that says "Results from your social circle". Still, for traditional SEO it is just one more thing to compete with as far as page real estate. That’s why social is a much more of an important part of search than ever.

Google has been making many moves over the last couple years that seem to slowly turn it more and more into its own social network. Now that its profiles have a direct impact on search results, how people view Google in this light is likely to change significantly. Once more and more average users start to realize the social features are being integrated more into their everyday searches, they may find themselves getting sucked into using Google as more of a social tool, as opposed to just search.

What are your thoughts on Google’s social search? Discuss here.

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> Google Profiles Go to the SERPs

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Earlier this month, Polaroid announced a multi-year strategic partnership with Lada Gaga, which will see the pop superstar serving as the company’s creative director for a specialty line of Polaroid Imaging products. This was highlighted at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas, which WebPronews attended.

While we were there, we had the opportunity to speak with Polaroid Chief Marketing Officer John Pollock, who talked about some of Lady Gaga’s duties with the company. "She’ll be in charge of directing us creatively, and she’ll also be in charge of working with us on a co-branded line, a Polaroid-branded sub-brand with a lady Gaga twist to it," he said.

"I am so proud to announce my new partnership with Polaroid as the creative director and inventor of specialty projects", said Lady Gaga said upon the original announcement. "The Haus of Gaga has been developing prototypes in the vein of fashion/technology/photography innovation–blending the iconic history of Polaroid and instant film with the digital era–and we are excited to collaborate on these ventures with the Polaroid brand."

"Lifestyle, music, art, fashion: I am so excited to extend myself behind the scenes as a designer, and to as my father puts it–finally, have a real job," she added.

The products that will come from Lady Gaga’s partnership with Polaroid are expected to be available in late 2010. On a related note, Polaroid also gave WebProNews an exclusive look at its new photo sharing site PolaroidStudio.com.
 

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Don’t be shocked if one or more shrines to Windows 7 are erected in Redmond today.  Microsoft released its quarterly earnings report this afternoon, and thanks in large part to the new operating system, the company’s numbers look quite good.

Analysts thought Microsoft might report something like $17.84 billion in revenue and earnings per share of 59 cents.  Microsoft overshot those forecasts by a significant amount, posting $19.12 billion and 74 cents, instead.

That puts the company up 14 percent and 57 percent, respectively, on a year-over-year basis.  And it would be an understatement to say that victories of this nature don’t occur every day, particularly given our economy’s current condition.

So if you’re happy (and as you’ll see in a minute, investors are), think well of Windows 7.  A record for Windows units was set last quarter, and Peter Klein, Microsoft’s CFO, said in a statement, "Exceptional demand for Windows 7 led to the positive top-line growth for the company.  Our continuing commitment to managing costs allowed us to drive earnings performance ahead of the revenue growth."

Unfortunately for Microsoft, things didn’t go so well in every respect.  The Online Services Business lost a whopping $466 million, which makes for a significantly worse performance than last year (when it lost $320 million).

Then, one other possible cause for skittishness is the fact Microsoft hasn’t yet given any guidance.  Windows 7 can’t sell well forever, after all.

Still, investors have received Microsoft’s news with open arms and fists full of dollars.  Even though the Dow and Nasdaq both sank today (by 1.13 percent and 1.91 percent), Microsoft’s stock is up 1.47 percent in after-hours trading.

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Amazon.com today reported strong fourth quarter profits that beat Wall Street analyst’s estimates.

The online retailer said its net income increased 71 percent to $384 million in the fourth quarter, or 85 cents per share, compared with $225 million, or 52 cents per share in the fourth quarter of 2008.

Net sales increased 42 percent to $9.5 billion in the fourth quarter, compared with $ 6.7 billion in the fourth quarter of 2008.

"Millions of people now own Kindles," said Jeff Bezos, founder and CEO of Amazon.com.

"And Kindle owners read, a lot. When we have both editions, we sell 6 Kindle books for every 10 physical books. This is year-to-date and includes only paid books — free Kindle books would make the number even higher. It’s been an exciting 27 months."

Amazon said it expects its operating profit for the first quarter of 2010 to be between $275 million to $365 million, on revenue of $6.4 billion to $7 billion, for growth between 32 percent and 43 percent.

Shares rose 3.7 percent in after hours trading to $130.41 signaling investors were pleased with Amazon’s Q4 results.
 

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Politicians are perhaps not the best people to talk to about privacy; they intentionally thrust themselves into the spotlight, and can be responsible for annoying commercials and phone calls that bother the rest of us at home.  Still, Facebook arguably accomplished something today by discussing privacy with six politicians and the CEO and of the Family Online Safety Institute.

In recognition of Data Privacy Day, Facebook posted quotes from the Chairman of the French Data Protection Commission, the Australian Privacy Commissioner, the Information and Privacy Commissioner for Ontario, and three U.S. representatives (along with the aforementioned CEO).  This demonstrates that Facebook’s at least thinking about privacy.

It also indicates that Facebook is on fairly decent terms with all of these individuals.  Most of the quotes were meaningless and/or self-promotional, and we won’t bore you by repeating even half of them.  But the fact that the politicians supplied them is interesting; you probably wouldn’t find these folks dealing with a company they disliked or considered too controversial.

So a couple of takeaway points might be that Facebook has your best interests at heart and possesses friends in high places. 

As for privacy-related advice, we’ll just relay the words of Stephen Balkam, the Family Online Safety Institute’s CEO.  He wrote that too few people "read privacy policies and set privacy settings.  Data Privacy Day is a good time to think about what information you are revealing about yourself on the web and take the time to talk to kids about the content you are posting and where you are posting it."

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Google’s made an announcement regarding Unicode, and believe it or not, there’s something for everyone here.  Programmers should be interested to know that Unicode is becoming more popular at a rapid pace.  Normal Google users, meanwhile, will be happy to learn that searches should now turn up additional useful results.

Let’s start with the stuff that’s easier to understand.  On the Official Google Blog, Mark Davis explained today, "[T]he characters ‘fi’ can either be represented as two characters (‘f’ and ‘i’), or a special display form ‘?’.  A Google search for [financials] or [office] used to not see these as equivalent – to the software they would just look like *nancials and of*ce."

Davis then continued, "But no longer – after extensive testing, we just recently turned on support for these and thousands of other characters; your searches will now also find these documents."

As for the news that may only mean something to a smaller set of people, well, Google’s been tracking Unicode usage for a while based on its index, and the search giant believes Unicode has itself nearly earned the "giant" moniker.  The graph below shows that usage is almost at 50 percent.

According to Davis, Google’s ability to deal with different languages should improve as Unicode becomes more common.

Related Articles:

> Google Celebrates Data Privacy Day

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