Scott Kirsner in The Boston Globe (link will break tomorrow) writes about companies trying to enhance eBay. His lead example is a storefront operation run by AuctionDrop that operates as a consignment shop: You bring in your old goods, they place them on eBay, you split the winnings. It sounds like a cool idea until you get to the final paragraphs of the piece: Their 75 employees and 20,000 square feet of warehouse space brought in $1.3M in revenues last year. Ulp.

Scott cites other companies that have failed, sometimes because eBay sued them into failure. An eBay spokesperson says:

"We are happy to see this universe of different kinds of companies offer services that extend the eBay marketplace in new and innovative ways," says Hani Durzy, an eBay spokesman. But Durzy says it is in eBay's best interest to ensure that tools offered by third parties work well, and that data from the site is used in a way that protects "the integrity of the marketplace."

That's not why they sued BiddersEdge.com into oblivion. BiddersEdge consolidated auctions across auction sites, so you could find which site was offering the Princess Di Beanie Baby at the lowest price. BiddersEdge helped preserve the "integrity of the marketplace"...unless you define "the marketplace" as "eBay." Yet eBay tolerates (how magnanimous!) AuctionSniper and other such sites that, for a fee, place your bid at the last possible second before a bid closes. Does this protect "the integrity of the marketplace"? Maybe, maybe not, but it does ensure that eBay gets the highest price that robots can provide.

I've lost bids to auction snipers. As a customer, I feel cheated, even though, of course, I could take a sniper's eye-view of the transaction. Even if letting robots game the auction doesn't affect the integrity of the marketplace, they sure take the fun out of it. And that's part of eBay's value as well.