Badmike wrote:Like someone in the article said, it's hard to project anything about a service that doesn't even exist yet. If and when this is up and running in about 2-5 years, we'll see.

Badmike wrote:But there really, really needs to be another competitor to Paypal. Their fees go up again for merchants in August, and I would bet anything that if and when Google starts a similar service they will offer a discount and Paypal would be forced to match or lose millions of dollars.

Badmike wrote:  As for the Ebay competition, ehhh, believe it when I see it. Every couple of years someone says they are going to compete with Ebay and nothing comes of it.

Badmike wrote:Ebay has about a ten year head start on competitors in terms of name recognition, reliability, software, etc.

Badmike wrote:Any new service is going to have a lot of glitches and goofs before it's running smoothly. I predict we might see this in 2010 by the earliest, but until then don't cancel your Ebay accounts.

dathon wrote:
The Yahoo! article says it could be as early as later this year. Google will roll it out slowly as usual but it will certainly be faster than 2-5 years.

The sooner the better. Paypal needs a kick in the ass. I"m tired of giving them a buck for every 20 bucks I get...due to go up in August, btw.

Indeed, competition would be good for consumers.

If it was able to win over consumers by showing reliability, Paypal would be forced to either match prices or services (what services?  They do nothing0.  A win/win for consumers

Actually it's been quite a few years since anyone has realitically challenged eBay. Yahoo! and Amazon were the last to try and fail. All the big boys seemed to give up after that. With customer dissatisfaction with eBay rising and translating to lost customers (sellers particularly who have closed down many stores, and less bidders), the time may be right for someone to take eBay on. eBay's profits are increasingly tied in to Paypal so if someone can spear that cash cow then the rest of company could be troubled. I don't have much faith in Meg Whitman to weather a crisis from the interviews I've seen and read.

I really think this amounts to a ton of wishful thinking.  If I remember correctly, all the Microsoft haters have been predicting doom and gloom for Gates and company for years and years, he even finally got taken to court, and he's still out there making billions and his system has something like 95% of the market share to this day. As much as AOL has shot themselves in the foot time and time again, and they keep losing millions of customers each month, and they barely survived the Time Warner debacle, they are still the 900 lb gorilla of dial up services.
   I think the customer service gripes about Ebay are overblown.  I've used them many years with very little trouble. (Same with AOL, I've had it since 1992 and never a problem yet).  Lost customers? Where are they going?  There's nowhere else to go.  The people who give up on Ebay in disgust are not really interested in buying or selling online anyway, otherwise they'd take the good with the bad and find a way to make it work. Are they unresponsive to customers needs?  Sure.  Do they have dozens of quirky rules and goofy pronouncements? Sure.  But what's the alternative?  A brand new service that is going to have headache after headache, as all new businesses do, when they finally get up and running in a few years?  Believe me when Google takes on Ebay, you'll see plenty of people leave them in disgust after several months of customer dissatisfactions, software problems, etc.  It's the nature of the beast.  Just like everyone gripes about gas prices and when was the last time your local gas station was responsive to your needs?  Why aren't we all out riding our bikes to work or buying hybrids?  People love to bitch but they won't do anything about it.  The best hope is that it will cause EBay to finally stop sitting on their laurels and start innovating.  Personally, I hope Ebay makes it and thrives, I run a business on Ebay after all.  Competition can only help.  But will Google be the saviour and panacea of online shopping all rolled into one?  Let's wait five years and see.  
 But make no mistake, if Ebay ignores this news with a shrug, then I will agree they could be in big trouble when/if Google rolls out their online auction site...

So did Sears on Wal-Mart and look what happened there. Dinosaurs never see the next paradigm shift arriving.

I don't think you can apply "dinosaur" to the Ebay format quite yet (now, if everything is exactly the same in 10 years, then yeh...).  

Five years in a loooong time on the net; I think we'll see how this plays out in just the next few years. eBay will stick around for a while, but it may finally get some competition so perhaps we should prepare to open a second account.