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Speaker 1: Get in text with technology with tech Stuff from how

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Speaker 1: stuff works dot com. Hey there, and welcome to tech Stuff.

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Speaker 1: I'm your host, Jonathan Strickland. I'm an executive producer at

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Speaker 1: how Stuff Works in a love all things tech, and

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Speaker 1: today we're going to conclude our series on eBay and

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Speaker 1: bring it up to date. We're up to two thousand

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Speaker 1: seven in the saga of eBay, but we're gonna really

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Speaker 1: toward two thousand fifteen or so. We're really gonna be

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Speaker 1: jumping ahead quite a bit. But this would be Meg

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Speaker 1: Whitman's last year as president and CEO of eBay in

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Speaker 1: two thousand seven. That same year, eBay purchased stub Hub.

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Speaker 1: StubHub is an online ticket exchange company and provides a

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Speaker 1: marketplace for buyers and sellers of tickets for various live events.

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Speaker 1: The company started back in two thousand when to Stanford

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Speaker 1: Business School graduates named Eric Baker and Jeff Fleurs an opportunity,

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Speaker 1: and by two thousand five, StubHub was generating two hundred

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Speaker 1: million dollars in sales. Now, not everything was going smoothly

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Speaker 1: for StubHub. In that time. Some people had used the

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Speaker 1: service to sell counterfeit tickets others found that they were

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Speaker 1: being penalized by major sports teams for getting a season ticket.

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Speaker 1: They would go out and buy a season ticket to

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Speaker 1: a sports team, then they would sell their regular season

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Speaker 1: seats on StubHub per game. So let's say I get

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Speaker 1: a season ticket to the Braves, for example, and then

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Speaker 1: on individual games, I'm selling my seats to anyone who

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Speaker 1: goes through on StubHub, and I make a profit because individually,

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Speaker 1: selling those seats over and over again, I make more

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Speaker 1: money than it cost for me to get the season tickets. Well,

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Speaker 1: the New York Yankees suspended dozens of season ticket holders

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Speaker 1: rights to attend playoff games after finding out they had

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Speaker 1: been selling regular season seats and denied them the opportunity

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Speaker 1: to renew their season tickets. So once people cut onto that,

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Speaker 1: they said, well, you know, we went went, We're going

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Speaker 1: to the playoffs, but you don't get to see it

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Speaker 1: because you've been selling your seats to other people and

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Speaker 1: that's against our rules. Where we can make tons of

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Speaker 1: money selling seats, but you sure as heck can't. Yeah, anyway, UM,

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Speaker 1: I have different feelings about this, largely because it's very

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Speaker 1: hard to go see a live theater show particularly at

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Speaker 1: a notable venue like on Broadway, without paying crazy amounts

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Speaker 1: of money for a ticket, Because you have people buying

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Speaker 1: up seats and then reselling them out of markup price,

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Speaker 1: and it's it's pretty infuriating at the same time seeing

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Speaker 1: people get punished for doing this. It's interesting, like it

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Speaker 1: opens up a gray area, like where is it legal

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Speaker 1: versus illegal? Anyway, I guess for season tickets there are

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Speaker 1: specific their specific wording involved when you purchase those season passes,

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Speaker 1: and that's what tells you that you're not supposed to

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Speaker 1: do this sort of thing. StubHub in the New England

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Speaker 1: pay Trips got into legal battles over the rights to

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Speaker 1: resell tickets, issues with voided tickets, claims of unfair trade practices,

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Speaker 1: and more, and ultimately the courts decided against stub Hub.

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Speaker 1: That wouldn't happen until two thousand nine, though, so that

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Speaker 1: would be after eBay had already purchased them. eBay bought

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Speaker 1: stub Hub for three hundred ten million dollars, a princely

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Speaker 1: some in two thousand eight. We'd get another new president

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Speaker 1: for PayPal with Scott Thompson. Jeff Jordan had been president

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Speaker 1: from two thousand four to two thousand and six and

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Speaker 1: regive Doda from two thousand six to two thousand eight.

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Speaker 1: Now remember PayPal was now part of eBay. Jordan's had

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Speaker 1: gone on to lead Open Table, and Doddo would move

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Speaker 1: into an executive vice president position with the parent company

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Speaker 1: of eBay. Thompson would serve as president of PayPal until

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Speaker 1: two thousand twelve, when he would leave to become the

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Speaker 1: CEO of a different company, one that has struggled famously

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Speaker 1: over the last few years. Yahoo. In March two thousand eight,

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Speaker 1: Meg Whitman stepped down as president and CEO of eBay

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Speaker 1: and John Donahoe absumed that role. And when Whitman joined eBay,

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Speaker 1: it was a company of about thirty employees. By the

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Speaker 1: time she left, eBay had grown into a global corporation

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Speaker 1: with more than fifteen thousand employees valued at forty billion dollars.

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Speaker 1: The company's growth had slowed quite a bit, but to

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Speaker 1: be fair, it had such an explosive growth period when

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Speaker 1: it was expanding into new markets it would have been

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Speaker 1: unrealistic to expect that pace to continue at that particular rate.

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Speaker 1: Whitman had led eBay into many new business ventures, and

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Speaker 1: she had opened operations throughout the world. One of her regrets, however,

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Speaker 1: was her failure to establish eBay as an effective presence

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Speaker 1: in Japan early on. According to Whitman, her opportunity to

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Speaker 1: get into Japan coincided with the site's blackout crashes in

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Speaker 1: that I talked about in an earlier episode. The company

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Speaker 1: had to switch focus to fixing its infrastructure and improving

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Speaker 1: reliability and lost the chance to get its foothold in Japan.

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Speaker 1: At that time, the company had established a Japanese site,

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Speaker 1: but without proper support, the outlet didn't do very well,

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Speaker 1: and ultimately Women chose to to close up shop in Japan.

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Speaker 1: It wouldn't be until two thousand nine when eBay would

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Speaker 1: create some partnerships with local companies in Japan then managed

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Speaker 1: to get back into that market, and it wasn't until

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Speaker 1: February before eBay announced it would acquire a company called

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Speaker 1: Geosis g I O s I S that conducted e

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Speaker 1: commerce in Japan that would really get to try again.

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Speaker 1: With Japan identified as the third fastest growing e commerce

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Speaker 1: region in the world, it marked a pretty late start

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Speaker 1: for eBay to get into that region. Women had a

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Speaker 1: bit of a mixed reputation among eBay users, the actual

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Speaker 1: buyers and sellers on the site. For one thing, there

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Speaker 1: was no denying the company had grown significantly under her leadership,

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Speaker 1: but she also had made choices that at times upset

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Speaker 1: the community. For example, at one point, she gave Disney

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Speaker 1: its own auctions page, which many saw as preferential treatment

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Speaker 1: that put normal sellers at a disadvantage. They didn't get

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Speaker 1: the platform that Disney had, and of course Disney is

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Speaker 1: a multibillion dollar corporation, so it felt like they were

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Speaker 1: being shoved aside. And plus, Whitman had actually worked for

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Speaker 1: Disney in the past before she came to eBay, so

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Speaker 1: there was that element as well. However, Whitman actually paid

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Speaker 1: attention to reactions and she backed off of her decision.

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Speaker 1: She reversed it, so it's not like she was saying

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Speaker 1: it's my way or the highway. She actually did listen

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Speaker 1: to the community and she paid attention. After her departure,

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Speaker 1: Meg Whitman ran for governor of California in the twenty

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Speaker 1: ten gubernatorial race. She ran as a Republican and largely

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Speaker 1: funded her own campaign out of her own money. Ultimately,

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Speaker 1: she would lose to Jerry Brown, the Democrat. Ended it

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Speaker 1: for a governor, and Whitman would go on to support

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Speaker 1: Mitt Romney during his bids for presidency. In the election, however,

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Speaker 1: she famously supported Hillary Clinton rather than the Republican candidate

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Speaker 1: Donald Trump. Starting in September twenty eleven, Whitman served as

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Speaker 1: the CEO of Hewlett Packard. She did not get rave reviews,

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Speaker 1: and Hewlett Packard didn't do so well in the following years,

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Speaker 1: and Whitman shouldered a lot of that blame, perhaps unfairly.

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Speaker 1: She would step down as CEO of Hewlett Packard Enterprises

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Speaker 1: on February one, eighteen. John Donahoe was now the man

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Speaker 1: in charge. So here's just a little bit more about him.

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Speaker 1: He was born in Evison Evanston, Illinois. He worked at

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Speaker 1: a beer distribution company out of high school before he

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Speaker 1: became an associate consultant with a company called Bayne and Company.

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Speaker 1: He started there in nineteen eighty two and worked his

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Speaker 1: way up the chain, eventually becoming the CEO of the

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Speaker 1: entire company in nineteen From there, he joined eBay as

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Speaker 1: the president of eBay market Places. During his tenure as

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Speaker 1: the president and CEO of all of eBay, which lasted

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Speaker 1: nearly seven and a half years, he more than doubled

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Speaker 1: the revenues of the company to eighteen billion dollars, and

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Speaker 1: he saw eBay's market value hit eighty billion. He would

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Speaker 1: step down as president in but he joined the board

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Speaker 1: of directors for PayPal as the chairman at that time.

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Speaker 1: Now it's easy to forget this, but back in two

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Speaker 1: thousand eight, the app store for the iPhone was brand new.

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Speaker 1: It was a new thing. It did not launch with

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Speaker 1: the first iPhone. It was only available starting with the

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Speaker 1: second generation iPhone, also known as the iPhone three G.

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Speaker 1: eBay was one of just a handful of companies that

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Speaker 1: had an application ready at launch, and in fact, it

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Speaker 1: got featured a bit during Apple's unveiling. Also in two

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Speaker 1: thousand eight, eBay made more acquisitions, including a company called

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Speaker 1: bill Me Later and e commerce company uh. They made

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Speaker 1: that act position for nearly one billion dollars. Bill Me

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Speaker 1: Later is a credit company. As the name would suggest,

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Speaker 1: you get billed later on, and the way it works

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Speaker 1: is that if you choose bill me Later as an

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Speaker 1: option when you're checking out, the service asked you for

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Speaker 1: your birth date and the last four digits of your

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Speaker 1: Social Security number, and then it runs a quick credit

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Speaker 1: check on you, and assuming the credit check is favorable,

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Speaker 1: you are credited the money for the purchase, and then

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Speaker 1: you pay back the service with interest. Of course, that's

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Speaker 1: how it makes money. However, eBay also at this time

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Speaker 1: laid off about ten percent of its workforce, which equalled

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Speaker 1: around one thousand, six hundred employees. The company focused most

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Speaker 1: of the layoffs on the marketplace division, as that was

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Speaker 1: the department that had slowed in growth the most to

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Speaker 1: two single digit rates. It was still growing, but at

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Speaker 1: a very slow pace. eBay would hold another big round

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Speaker 1: of layoffs in firing about two thousand, four hundred employees

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Speaker 1: on that go around, which represented about seven percent of

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Speaker 1: its workforce at the time. So you see how big

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Speaker 1: the company grew in the meantime. If ten percent is

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Speaker 1: sixteen hundred back at this point and then in two thousand,

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Speaker 1: four hundred is only seven, I mean, that's that's that

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Speaker 1: shows you the company did grow even after this this

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Speaker 1: round of layoffs. Regarding the two thousand eight layoffs, Donajo

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Speaker 1: said it was necessary to quote improve our operations and

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Speaker 1: strengthen our ability to continue investing in growth end quote.

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Speaker 1: So in other words, he wanted to make sure that

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Speaker 1: the company was focusing on the areas that were developing

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Speaker 1: the fastest and to stop pouring resources into areas that

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Speaker 1: had really plateaued. One last thing about two thousand eight.

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Speaker 1: In November of two eight, a seller named Jack Sheng

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Speaker 1: became the first seller on eBay to get a feedback

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Speaker 1: score of one million. You remember that Pierre Omidier had

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Speaker 1: created this feedback ability where you could give someone a

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Speaker 1: positive or negative one in feedback. So Jack Shang had

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Speaker 1: received at least one million plus one votes. Uh, maybe

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Speaker 1: more than that, because if some people had given negative

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Speaker 1: feedback then that would have taken away from the total.

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Speaker 1: So once he hit one million, eBay honored him by

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Speaker 1: naming a conference room after him over at eBay headquarters.

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Speaker 1: Now I've gotta more to say about eBay, but before

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Speaker 1: I get into it, let's take a quick break to

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Speaker 1: thank our sponsor. eBay launched a program in two thousand

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Speaker 1: nine inside the company called the Women's Initiative Network or WIN,

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Speaker 1: which provides opportunities and career development training for women interested

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Speaker 1: in building a career in any department within the company,

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Speaker 1: which I think is pretty cool and in fact, one

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Speaker 1: thing I have to say about eBay is whether or

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Speaker 1: not you like the site or the service, whether or

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Speaker 1: not you've ever done an auction, there are shop there.

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Speaker 1: The company itself has a reputation for promoting fairness in

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Speaker 1: its UH and its corporation among its employees. So everything

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Speaker 1: from giving special opportunities for people to pursue training career development,

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Speaker 1: making certain that people are not being treated unfairly due

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Speaker 1: to ethnicity or gender, or sexuality or any of those things.

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Speaker 1: It's really interesting and really admirable. So whether or not

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Speaker 1: you like the company, at least the policies that the

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Speaker 1: company has put in place, I think have been really

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Speaker 1: progressive and I like that a lot. Two thousand nine

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Speaker 1: was also the year eBay sold the majority of Skype

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Speaker 1: to a group of private investors. I mentioned this in

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Speaker 1: the previous episode and how initially it looked like eBay

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Speaker 1: was going to take a huge loss on the purchase

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Speaker 1: and failed integration of Skype. However, Microsoft's bid a little

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Speaker 1: bit later to buy up Skype for more than eight

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Speaker 1: billion dollars would end up offsetting that. Ex events, they

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Speaker 1: ended up making enough money on the UH the amount

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Speaker 1: of Skype they may they retained because they only sold

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Speaker 1: a majority of their steak in two thousand nine, they

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Speaker 1: kept about thirty five percent, and when Microsoft bought up

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Speaker 1: all of it later for eight billion dollars, they sold

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Speaker 1: it off in and it turned out that the difference

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Speaker 1: more than paid off for their initial purchase of Skype,

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Speaker 1: even after you factor in things like the debt that

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Speaker 1: needed to be paid off and and taxes and things

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Speaker 1: like that. In two thousand ten, eBay got hit with

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Speaker 1: a patent infringement lawsuit from a company called XPRT Ventures

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Speaker 1: ll C. This story let me down a real rabbit

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Speaker 1: hole and research, because I saw plenty of news reports

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Speaker 1: from two thousand ten about the lawsuit being filed, but

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Speaker 1: not nothing really substantial about how it all shook out.

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Speaker 1: And as it turns out, the reason for that part

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Speaker 1: is that it's eight years later and the lawsuit is

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Speaker 1: still going on. So what is actually at the heart

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Speaker 1: of this lawsuit. Well, xp RT Ventures, which as far

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Speaker 1: as I can tell, is a company that has patents

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Speaker 1: but doesn't actually do anything else, sued eBay for three

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Speaker 1: point eight billion dollars in twenty ten. An alleged that

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Speaker 1: the company was infringing upon several patents and had stolen

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Speaker 1: trade secrets. According to the complaint, the patent holders met

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Speaker 1: with eBay in two thousand one and showed a law

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Speaker 1: firm claiming to represent eBay the patent applications for some

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Speaker 1: of the patents they had been filing for online payments. Then,

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Speaker 1: the complaint alleges that eBay used that information later when

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Speaker 1: eBay incorporated some PayPal functionality into its own e commerce

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Speaker 1: payment platform several years later. Now the plot thickens. The

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Speaker 1: actual patents were rejected multiple times during this application process.

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Speaker 1: The final patent was accepted in two thousand nine. The

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Speaker 1: website tech Dirt pointed out that the finalized patent, the

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Speaker 1: one that actually would be protected from infringement, was different

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Speaker 1: from the original filing, the one that eBay supposedly took

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Speaker 1: a look at and then later infringed. So, in other words,

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Speaker 1: the the wording that was present in two thousand one

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Speaker 1: uh that was that had changed by the time the

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Speaker 1: patent was finally accepted, because it had been revised multiple

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Speaker 1: times until accepted in two thousand nine. Other outlets outright

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Speaker 1: called xp RT a patent troll. A patentrol is a

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Speaker 1: person or a company that files or buys patents with

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Speaker 1: no intent to produce anything from them, but rather use

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Speaker 1: them to threaten litigation against others in order to win

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Speaker 1: court cases or more likely get a settlement out of court.

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Speaker 1: You could also license patents to companies, and in fact,

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Speaker 1: there are a lot of companies that do licensed patents

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Speaker 1: out to other people or other organizations. But there's a

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Speaker 1: disturbing trend among certain groups to kind of hoard these

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Speaker 1: patents and just wait for someone to do something that

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Speaker 1: appears to violate them or to infringe upon them, and

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Speaker 1: then they threaten legal action. And some companies, rather than

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Speaker 1: going through the process of having to defend themselves in court,

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Speaker 1: which is incredibly expensive and time consuming, will just end

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Speaker 1: up coming to an agreement for an out of court settlement.

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Speaker 1: And that's how these companies make their money. They don't

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Speaker 1: make it by producing something or building anything, or licensing

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Speaker 1: and you know, ideas out to other people, or rather

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Speaker 1: patents patents aren't really for ideas, it's it's the implementation

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Speaker 1: of an idea. Instead, they wait for someone to do

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Speaker 1: something that looks like it's an infringement and then they

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Speaker 1: go after them and with the hope of an out

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Speaker 1: of court settlement or maybe a court award if the

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Speaker 1: whole case goes to decision. The most recent information I

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Speaker 1: could find about this involved eBay arguing that the patents

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Speaker 1: in question contain unpatentable materials such as abstract ideas you

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Speaker 1: cannot patent and abstract idea. That information all came to

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Speaker 1: light back in the spring of at least that was

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Speaker 1: where the documents I found were. That's when they were

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Speaker 1: filed was in So this is still unfolding as I

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Speaker 1: record this, and I have to admit I haven't read

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Speaker 1: all the legal proceedings. It would take me days to

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Speaker 1: go through it all, or even the full two page complaint,

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Speaker 1: because that was it was enormous. It could well be

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Speaker 1: that XPRT has a valid argument here, So I don't

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Speaker 1: want to give you guys the feeling that the whole

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Speaker 1: thing is without merit. That might not be the case.

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Speaker 1: There may be a real legit case behind xp rt

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Speaker 1: s allegations. I am amazed that this battle is stretched

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Speaker 1: into twentyen though, because typically you would see either a

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Speaker 1: settlement in this case, you would argue that, well, it's

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Speaker 1: because eBay is fully confident that they did not do

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Speaker 1: anything wrong and therefore they are defending themselves, um or

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Speaker 1: you would see the accusers dropped the case because it

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Speaker 1: would just get so expensive to continue. But neither of

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Speaker 1: those things have happened. Yet another legal issue that began

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Speaker 1: to broil back in twenty ten would eventually scoop up eBay.

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Speaker 1: It was a antitrust action from the United States Department

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Speaker 1: of Justice, and later it would inspire a class action

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Speaker 1: lawsuit brought against several companies in the tech space, including eBay, Lucasfilm, Apple,

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Speaker 1: and Google, among others. I think Intel was in there too,

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Speaker 1: but the charge was that these companies were colluding with

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Speaker 1: one another in an agreement to not conduct cold call

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Speaker 1: recruitment efforts with each other's talent. So, in other words,

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Speaker 1: these companies were not supposed to try and hire talent

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Speaker 1: away from each other, which on the corporate level seems

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Speaker 1: like it's all fair, right, You would say, oh, well,

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Speaker 1: of course, it's not really fair for Intel to go

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Speaker 1: after Google, or a Google to go after Apple, and

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Speaker 1: so on and so forth. But then if you look

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Speaker 1: at it from the perspective of the employees, you would argue,

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Speaker 1: wait a minute, this is denying people the opportunity to

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Speaker 1: potentially improve their careers, to go and get a more

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Speaker 1: competitive salary or a more fulfilling job somewhere, and that

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Speaker 1: was in fact the basis of the argument both from

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Speaker 1: the Department of Justice and the class action lawsuit. The

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Speaker 1: Department of Justice suit was settled pretty much the day

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Speaker 1: it was filed. The class action lawsuit also went into

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Speaker 1: settlement with various companies paying out to the sixty four

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Speaker 1: thousand or so employees who were represented in the suit. UH,

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Speaker 1: but it all depended upon individual UH companies and the

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Speaker 1: percentages of that sixty four thousand because not all of

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Speaker 1: them worked for the same company. Obviously. Also in eBay's

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Speaker 1: app would launch on the iPad, that was a brand

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Speaker 1: new product in and the company acquired Milo dot com

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Speaker 1: and that was a local shopping service. The service would

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Speaker 1: let shoppers research products and compare prices to buy locally

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Speaker 1: with real time availability information and so it kind of

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Speaker 1: go through the inventory of various local stores and you

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Speaker 1: could price do price comparison right there before heading out

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Speaker 1: of your house to go and actually buy something. eBay

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Speaker 1: bought Milo dot Com for reported seventy five million bucks,

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Speaker 1: and that was just one of many acquisitions eBay made

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Speaker 1: during this period. And to go through every single one

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Speaker 1: of them would be pretty bonkers. Also, a lot of

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Speaker 1: them were, you know, like commerce sites or data and

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Speaker 1: analysts sites, things that most of us don't have any

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Speaker 1: connection to, and it wouldn't really be meaningful to go

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Speaker 1: into it anyway. But I will hit some of the

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Speaker 1: ones that are super important, because uh, I think we

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Speaker 1: need to at least acknowledge a few of them. But

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Speaker 1: I'm just not going to do another episode on eBay

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Speaker 1: right away, so we're not gonna go through every single one.

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Speaker 1: So let's keep on trucking. Uh. We're up to two

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Speaker 1: thousand eleven now, and I'm gonna go fairly fast from

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Speaker 1: this point and just hit the big story points. In

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Speaker 1: two thousand eleven, eBay continued its acquisitions, including the purchase

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Speaker 1: of a majority stake in the online marketplace Giddy Giddy Your,

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Speaker 1: which is based in Turkey and I only included it

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Speaker 1: because that name is awesome. Uh. Then in two thousand twelve,

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Speaker 1: eBay launched PayPal Here, a system that would allow small

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Speaker 1: businesses to accept PayPal as a payment option. Some analysts

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Speaker 1: began to worry that eBay might be pushing PayPal to

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Speaker 1: move beyond its scope of services to the detriment of

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Speaker 1: its core business. David Marcus would become the president of

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Speaker 1: PayPal in two thousand twelve, and then in two thousand thirteen,

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Speaker 1: eBay would acquire Braintree, a company called Braintree for eight

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Speaker 1: million dollars. Braintree is a payment processing service that automates

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Speaker 1: online payments, including stuff like recurring billing. I include it

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Speaker 1: here because Braintree also was the parent company of Venmo.

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Speaker 1: Venmo is a payment transfer service that lets you send

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Speaker 1: money directly to another Venmo user, and it's an easy

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Speaker 1: way to transfer money between average, everyday people right. It

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Speaker 1: was created by some developers who saw the opportunity for

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Speaker 1: a way that the average person could send somebody else

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Speaker 1: some money. Let's say that you go out for an

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Speaker 1: evening with a friend of yours and you realize, oh, no,

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Speaker 1: I left my wallet at home, and your friends says,

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Speaker 1: we'll tell you what, I'll spot you tonight and you'll

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Speaker 1: just owe me. Venmo was a way that you could

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Speaker 1: very quickly send money from an account to your friends account,

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Speaker 1: so that you could pay them back and not have

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Speaker 1: that just sit over your head like an evil ax

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Speaker 1: over your friendship, threatening to follow at any moment. H

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Speaker 1: So now PayPal would actually own Venmo, which actually makes

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00:22:36,080 --> 00:22:39,159
Speaker 1: me chuckle a bit, because I know some young folks

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Speaker 1: who would turn their nose up at paypalty said, oh

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Speaker 1: that's I would never use PayPal. I use Venmo, And

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Speaker 1: they clearly did not realize the Venmo was owned by PayPal.

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Speaker 1: I just find that amusing. But then I'm old and grouchy,

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Speaker 1: so to pay that with a grain of salt. Also

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Speaker 1: in eBay launched a new venture called digital Storefronts. The

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Speaker 1: store of friends were really interactive screens that showed various products,

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Speaker 1: and customers could order them by going up to the

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Speaker 1: screen and touching using gesture controls that would send information

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Speaker 1: to the customer's mobile device, and then they could use

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Speaker 1: PayPal on the mobile device to actually pay for the

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Speaker 1: thing and arrange for a delivery to their homes. Later

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Speaker 1: on a post on the Forrester dot com blog, in

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Speaker 1: stated that this experiment really failed to deliver additional value

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Speaker 1: to the shopping experience, that it was trying too hard

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Speaker 1: to change things. But they they said that there was

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Speaker 1: an update to this strategy that was much more effective.

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Speaker 1: It was an integration in a Rebecca Minkoff store in Soho,

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Speaker 1: in which the digital windows inside the store provided contextual

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00:23:47,760 --> 00:23:50,240
Speaker 1: information about the products that were there in the store,

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Speaker 1: as well as help customers make purchasing decisions and link

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Speaker 1: them to customer loyalty programs. And they were interactive in

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Speaker 1: a way where you were around the actual physical objects,

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Speaker 1: and the author of the piece, whose name I don't

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Speaker 1: know because I couldn't find it on the blog post,

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00:24:04,200 --> 00:24:07,920
Speaker 1: stated that rather than trying to overhaul the entire shopping experience,

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Speaker 1: this tactic was aimed more at enhancing the experience and

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Speaker 1: that was more effective. Well, we're in the home stretch.

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Speaker 1: We've got just a little bit more to say about eBay,

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Speaker 1: but before I get into that, let's take another quick

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Speaker 1: break to thank our sponsor. According to its official company timeline,

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Speaker 1: in two thousand fourteen, eBay announced that it would spin

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Speaker 1: off PayPal into a separate company. Now, this was something

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Speaker 1: that Donahoe had initially resisted, as did the board of directors,

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Speaker 1: but intense pressures in the market pretty much forced eBay's hand.

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Speaker 1: So what was going on? Well, first, there was a

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Speaker 1: guy named Carl Icon. Carrl Icon is a billionaire businessman

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Speaker 1: and an investor who has a large steak in lots

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Speaker 1: of different company including eBay. He had more than forty

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Speaker 1: six million shares in eBay. Icon pointed out that PayPal

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Speaker 1: was the fastest growing division in all of the company

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Speaker 1: of eBay, and he said it would be growing even

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Speaker 1: faster if it weren't under the umbrella of another company.

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Speaker 1: It deserved to be on its own in the market

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Speaker 1: where it could really grow. The board of directors of

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Speaker 1: eBay initially rejected this proposal in January two fourteen, which

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Speaker 1: kind of motivate Icon to start gathering support among shareholders

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Speaker 1: to demand the action to create what is called a

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Speaker 1: proxy battle, and that could have really set up an

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Speaker 1: internal showdown in the company. It was getting pretty ugly. Well.

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Speaker 1: September two fourteen is when eBay changed its tune and

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Speaker 1: said that the two companies would in fact part ways

434
00:25:48,600 --> 00:25:53,280
Speaker 1: by mid now. Why did the company change its mind, Well,

435
00:25:53,320 --> 00:25:55,439
Speaker 1: one was that wanted to avoid this proxy battle and

436
00:25:55,440 --> 00:25:58,840
Speaker 1: it was coming up on a big annual meeting where

437
00:25:58,920 --> 00:26:01,560
Speaker 1: such a such a battle could have been launched. But

438
00:26:01,640 --> 00:26:06,000
Speaker 1: also the landscape had changed rapidly throughout the year with

439
00:26:06,280 --> 00:26:11,080
Speaker 1: different competing services that we're all about payment processing supported

440
00:26:11,080 --> 00:26:14,640
Speaker 1: by companies like Apple and Ali Baba were popping up

441
00:26:14,680 --> 00:26:17,919
Speaker 1: and cutting into PayPal space. It would be a lot

442
00:26:18,000 --> 00:26:20,640
Speaker 1: easier for PayPal to flourish if it could be its

443
00:26:20,680 --> 00:26:24,880
Speaker 1: own company and compete directly against these services, and eBay

444
00:26:25,000 --> 00:26:28,720
Speaker 1: could benefit from using multiple services, not just PayPal, and

445
00:26:28,720 --> 00:26:30,800
Speaker 1: so the companies kind of hugged it out and they

446
00:26:30,840 --> 00:26:34,400
Speaker 1: went their separate ways. Icon by the way, with with PayPal,

447
00:26:34,640 --> 00:26:37,200
Speaker 1: he swapped out his shares of eBay for an equal

448
00:26:37,280 --> 00:26:39,639
Speaker 1: number of shares and PayPal, So that's kind of what

449
00:26:39,720 --> 00:26:42,800
Speaker 1: he wanted all along. Dan Shulman would be named the

450
00:26:42,880 --> 00:26:46,520
Speaker 1: president and CEO of PayPal, the brand new company. In

451
00:26:46,520 --> 00:26:49,920
Speaker 1: two thousand fifteen, Donahoe stepped down and Devin Winning would

452
00:26:49,960 --> 00:26:53,040
Speaker 1: take on the role of CEO for eBay. Some people said, well,

453
00:26:53,080 --> 00:26:55,879
Speaker 1: why would Donahoe step down? He had led the company

454
00:26:55,960 --> 00:26:59,040
Speaker 1: so effectively, and you could argue that one reason is

455
00:26:59,080 --> 00:27:03,199
Speaker 1: that up till two thousand fifteen, he was overseeing the

456
00:27:03,400 --> 00:27:08,120
Speaker 1: enormous company that included eBay and PayPal. At two thousand fifteen,

457
00:27:08,119 --> 00:27:10,840
Speaker 1: PayPal split off, so he would actually be heading up

458
00:27:10,880 --> 00:27:13,720
Speaker 1: a smaller company. It would actually be a step down

459
00:27:13,880 --> 00:27:17,680
Speaker 1: for him from where he had been, and so maybe

460
00:27:17,720 --> 00:27:20,200
Speaker 1: he had done everything he needed to accomplish, and that's

461
00:27:20,200 --> 00:27:23,080
Speaker 1: why he decided to step down as CEO. Devin Winning

462
00:27:23,160 --> 00:27:25,879
Speaker 1: would take over the role. He earned a b a.

463
00:27:26,040 --> 00:27:29,240
Speaker 1: From Union College and a law degree from Columbia University.

464
00:27:29,520 --> 00:27:33,919
Speaker 1: He had acted as CEO of a company called Nastech Pharmaceutical.

465
00:27:34,119 --> 00:27:36,200
Speaker 1: It was a company that his father had founded and

466
00:27:36,280 --> 00:27:40,400
Speaker 1: led until his early passing and when it was still

467
00:27:40,400 --> 00:27:43,000
Speaker 1: in his twenties when he took over that that company.

468
00:27:43,160 --> 00:27:45,560
Speaker 1: He would go on to become an executive for Reuters

469
00:27:45,600 --> 00:27:48,919
Speaker 1: before joining eBay as the president of the Global eBay

470
00:27:48,960 --> 00:27:52,719
Speaker 1: market places back in two thousand eleven and today he

471
00:27:52,840 --> 00:27:55,840
Speaker 1: also serves on the board of directors for General Motors.

472
00:27:55,880 --> 00:27:59,720
Speaker 1: He got elected to that in in September two thousand

473
00:27:59,760 --> 00:28:04,440
Speaker 1: fifth teen, eBay celebrated its twenty years of being a thing,

474
00:28:05,119 --> 00:28:09,159
Speaker 1: It's twentieth anniversary, and in twos sixteen, eBay acquired a

475
00:28:09,200 --> 00:28:12,680
Speaker 1: company called The Expert Maker, which was a virtual reality

476
00:28:12,720 --> 00:28:15,639
Speaker 1: technology company. So I guess we can look forward to

477
00:28:15,640 --> 00:28:18,639
Speaker 1: shopping and virtual stores and malls using eBay as the

478
00:28:18,680 --> 00:28:22,440
Speaker 1: foundation for various businesses. I'm not certain I need that experience,

479
00:28:22,560 --> 00:28:24,480
Speaker 1: as the online approach has worked fine for me. But

480
00:28:24,520 --> 00:28:27,520
Speaker 1: who knows, maybe it will become the next way of

481
00:28:27,520 --> 00:28:32,359
Speaker 1: shopping for stuff. Uh. eBay has also acquired an image

482
00:28:32,359 --> 00:28:36,480
Speaker 1: recognition company called Corrigan, and it also bought an online

483
00:28:36,520 --> 00:28:40,560
Speaker 1: ticket commerce site in Spain called ticket Miss, and there's

484
00:28:40,600 --> 00:28:43,640
Speaker 1: been a recent curfuffle on eBay features meant to create

485
00:28:43,640 --> 00:28:47,080
Speaker 1: incentives for people to buy stuff. Namely, there's this easy

486
00:28:47,120 --> 00:28:50,680
Speaker 1: low Price feature. The idea is that this feature will

487
00:28:50,680 --> 00:28:54,200
Speaker 1: automatically lower the price of an item if no one

488
00:28:54,240 --> 00:28:57,360
Speaker 1: has been on something like if you list an item

489
00:28:57,400 --> 00:29:00,719
Speaker 1: for sale or forbidding and after a certain amount of

490
00:29:00,720 --> 00:29:04,040
Speaker 1: time nothing has happened, it automatically lowers the price for you.

491
00:29:04,280 --> 00:29:06,720
Speaker 1: And some community members felt that this is unfair, it

492
00:29:06,720 --> 00:29:08,400
Speaker 1: will actually hurt them in the long run, it will

493
00:29:08,440 --> 00:29:11,000
Speaker 1: make themselves for stuff then less than what they were

494
00:29:11,080 --> 00:29:14,680
Speaker 1: comfortable doing, and that it really only benefits eBay because

495
00:29:14,720 --> 00:29:17,000
Speaker 1: eBay makes most of its money, or a great deal

496
00:29:17,000 --> 00:29:21,320
Speaker 1: of its money through successful sales, So even if it's

497
00:29:21,520 --> 00:29:24,160
Speaker 1: small successful sales, if there's a lot of them, that

498
00:29:24,200 --> 00:29:26,400
Speaker 1: amounts up to a huge amount. I mean, that's what

499
00:29:26,440 --> 00:29:30,160
Speaker 1: Pierre medi Aer saw when within the first year of

500
00:29:30,240 --> 00:29:34,000
Speaker 1: launching eBay, once he started putting in these fees. A

501
00:29:34,120 --> 00:29:37,160
Speaker 1: report in the UK found that one in three UK

502
00:29:37,320 --> 00:29:41,800
Speaker 1: consumers had mistakenly purchased a counterfeit electrical product online, so

503
00:29:41,920 --> 00:29:45,360
Speaker 1: something that was being marketed as a recognizable brand but

504
00:29:45,440 --> 00:29:48,400
Speaker 1: it turned out that it was a counterfeit uh and

505
00:29:48,440 --> 00:29:52,800
Speaker 1: they purchased these on sites like eBay and also on Amazon,

506
00:29:52,880 --> 00:29:55,200
Speaker 1: so eBay was not alone in this, And there is

507
00:29:55,200 --> 00:29:58,000
Speaker 1: a growing amount of pressure from various consumer groups and

508
00:29:58,160 --> 00:30:02,440
Speaker 1: companies to convince Amazon and eBay and other sites like

509
00:30:02,480 --> 00:30:06,920
Speaker 1: it to really crack down on counterfeiters. And that pretty

510
00:30:07,000 --> 00:30:09,440
Speaker 1: much brings us up to date with what eBay has

511
00:30:09,480 --> 00:30:12,840
Speaker 1: been up to. There's a car lots of other little

512
00:30:12,840 --> 00:30:15,160
Speaker 1: things like features have been rolled out, but that gets

513
00:30:15,200 --> 00:30:18,160
Speaker 1: so granular that I think it's not very interesting. Pierre

514
00:30:18,280 --> 00:30:20,240
Speaker 1: Midi are, the founder of eBay, is still on the

515
00:30:20,280 --> 00:30:23,080
Speaker 1: board of directors. He did recently sell off some of

516
00:30:23,120 --> 00:30:26,400
Speaker 1: his shares in eBay. He spends a great deal of

517
00:30:26,440 --> 00:30:29,680
Speaker 1: his time doing philanthropic work these days. And before I

518
00:30:29,760 --> 00:30:31,520
Speaker 1: go I thought I would list off some of the

519
00:30:31,520 --> 00:30:34,440
Speaker 1: most expensive and some of the strangest things to sell

520
00:30:34,440 --> 00:30:37,200
Speaker 1: on the auction site. And I grab these items from

521
00:30:37,320 --> 00:30:40,440
Speaker 1: various sources, but a lot of them come from eBay itself.

522
00:30:40,720 --> 00:30:43,719
Speaker 1: eBay has a timeline where they kept a record of

523
00:30:43,760 --> 00:30:46,400
Speaker 1: some of the more expensive things that have been purchased

524
00:30:46,440 --> 00:30:50,560
Speaker 1: on the site, and some other places had different things

525
00:30:50,600 --> 00:30:54,560
Speaker 1: listed that We're not on eBay's official list, which makes

526
00:30:54,560 --> 00:30:58,080
Speaker 1: me wonder how how official and real they are. But

527
00:30:58,120 --> 00:31:00,280
Speaker 1: we're gonna we're gonna take it all with a grain

528
00:31:00,320 --> 00:31:02,120
Speaker 1: of salt. So here's a list of some of the

529
00:31:02,160 --> 00:31:07,520
Speaker 1: more expensive things ah that have been sold or auctioned

530
00:31:07,520 --> 00:31:11,640
Speaker 1: off on eBay. There was a baseball card featuring Honus

531
00:31:11,680 --> 00:31:15,920
Speaker 1: hans Wagner, who played primarily for the Pittsburgh Pirates. His

532
00:31:16,040 --> 00:31:19,640
Speaker 1: career stretched from eighteen seven to nineteen seventeen, so this

533
00:31:19,720 --> 00:31:23,600
Speaker 1: is very early and professional baseball. The cards sold for

534
00:31:23,720 --> 00:31:33,120
Speaker 1: one point to seven million dollars. Yikes, yikes. In two

535
00:31:33,120 --> 00:31:36,840
Speaker 1: thousand one, Rob Mitchell coughed up five hundred seventy seven

536
00:31:36,920 --> 00:31:41,880
Speaker 1: thousand dollars for Black Betsy was a baseball bat. Has

537
00:31:41,920 --> 00:31:45,880
Speaker 1: a baseball bat that belonged to Shulis Joe Jackson. Shulis

538
00:31:45,960 --> 00:31:49,040
Speaker 1: Joe Jackson, in case you aren't familiar with that name,

539
00:31:49,160 --> 00:31:52,640
Speaker 1: was one of the players permanently banned from playing professional

540
00:31:52,680 --> 00:31:56,760
Speaker 1: Baseball after the scandal during the nineteen nineteen World Series

541
00:31:56,840 --> 00:32:01,240
Speaker 1: in which several Chicago White Sox players, including Shoelis Joe Jackson,

542
00:32:01,560 --> 00:32:05,560
Speaker 1: conspired with gamblers to throw the series that they were

543
00:32:05,720 --> 00:32:08,360
Speaker 1: having against the Cincinnati Reds, so in other words, to

544
00:32:08,480 --> 00:32:12,960
Speaker 1: lose on purpose. A Gulf Stream to jet sold for

545
00:32:13,080 --> 00:32:16,720
Speaker 1: four point nine million dollars to a charter flight company

546
00:32:16,800 --> 00:32:19,440
Speaker 1: in Africa, so it wasn't sold to an individual but

547
00:32:19,560 --> 00:32:23,520
Speaker 1: rather a company. In two thousand two, one eBay listing

548
00:32:23,600 --> 00:32:26,480
Speaker 1: was for a house that was built inside an old

549
00:32:26,560 --> 00:32:30,560
Speaker 1: missile silo that was constructed during the Cold War. The

550
00:32:30,680 --> 00:32:34,160
Speaker 1: house sold for two point one million dollars. There was

551
00:32:34,200 --> 00:32:37,280
Speaker 1: an in Zo Ferrari, of which only three hundred ninety

552
00:32:37,400 --> 00:32:40,200
Speaker 1: nine were ever made. It went up for auction in

553
00:32:40,240 --> 00:32:42,720
Speaker 1: two thousand four and sold for more than a million dollars.

554
00:32:43,360 --> 00:32:47,000
Speaker 1: The original Hollywood sign, if you're familiar with that, that's

555
00:32:47,040 --> 00:32:51,120
Speaker 1: on the Hollywood Hills. The original sign was replaced back

556
00:32:51,160 --> 00:32:54,160
Speaker 1: in ninety eight, and the original letters, which are fifty

557
00:32:54,200 --> 00:32:56,160
Speaker 1: ft tall, went up for sale in two thousand five

558
00:32:56,200 --> 00:32:59,560
Speaker 1: and sold for four hundred fifty thousand dollars. There was

559
00:32:59,560 --> 00:33:02,680
Speaker 1: the gig yacht that I mentioned earlier in a previous episode,

560
00:33:02,680 --> 00:33:04,840
Speaker 1: it's still a top item. In fact, depending upon the

561
00:33:04,880 --> 00:33:07,240
Speaker 1: sourcer looking at it is the most expensive thing that

562
00:33:07,280 --> 00:33:10,160
Speaker 1: has ever been sold on eBay. It was a fifty

563
00:33:10,200 --> 00:33:13,920
Speaker 1: percent down payment on eBay and that ended up being

564
00:33:13,920 --> 00:33:17,320
Speaker 1: eighty five million dollars. And as far as I can tell,

565
00:33:17,360 --> 00:33:19,520
Speaker 1: it's for a boat that has yet to have been

566
00:33:19,560 --> 00:33:22,800
Speaker 1: built it it still doesn't really exist other than in

567
00:33:22,920 --> 00:33:26,440
Speaker 1: concept form. That sale happened back in two thousand six.

568
00:33:27,320 --> 00:33:31,240
Speaker 1: Also in two thousand six, a chunk of meteorite from

569
00:33:31,320 --> 00:33:34,600
Speaker 1: Mars sold for four d fifty thousand dollars. It had

570
00:33:34,640 --> 00:33:38,280
Speaker 1: crashed in Nigeria. Back in nineteen sixty two, there was

571
00:33:38,320 --> 00:33:43,200
Speaker 1: a bottle of Samuel Alsop's Arctic Ale that was brewed

572
00:33:43,400 --> 00:33:47,720
Speaker 1: especially for the nineteenth century explorer Sir Edward Belcher for

573
00:33:47,800 --> 00:33:50,920
Speaker 1: his visit to the Arctic, because he wanted a beer

574
00:33:50,960 --> 00:33:54,960
Speaker 1: that wouldn't freeze in Arctic temperatures. It sold for five

575
00:33:55,040 --> 00:33:59,960
Speaker 1: hundred three thousand dollars. A bottle of beer for five

576
00:34:00,040 --> 00:34:02,640
Speaker 1: hundred three thousand dollars. Thank goodness, it wasn't a six pack.

577
00:34:02,800 --> 00:34:06,920
Speaker 1: Right At Kate Middleton's wedding to Prince William of England,

578
00:34:07,080 --> 00:34:10,600
Speaker 1: Princess Beatrice wore a hat that I can only describe

579
00:34:11,200 --> 00:34:14,680
Speaker 1: as totally hideous. What do I know, I'm not a

580
00:34:14,760 --> 00:34:18,160
Speaker 1: royalty I got I got no noble blood in me.

581
00:34:18,640 --> 00:34:21,919
Speaker 1: But anyway, this monstrosity, and you really need to look

582
00:34:21,920 --> 00:34:23,920
Speaker 1: at a picture of this. In fact, I'm gonna have

583
00:34:24,000 --> 00:34:27,480
Speaker 1: to show Tari a picture of Princess Beatrice's hat when

584
00:34:27,520 --> 00:34:31,800
Speaker 1: this episode is over. It's sold for eighty one English pounds.

585
00:34:31,800 --> 00:34:36,720
Speaker 1: Back in two thousand eleven, oh during a charity auction,

586
00:34:36,760 --> 00:34:39,720
Speaker 1: eBay offered up the chance to have lunch with Warren Buffett,

587
00:34:39,800 --> 00:34:43,120
Speaker 1: and this has become an annual event since then. And

588
00:34:43,200 --> 00:34:46,680
Speaker 1: the initial lunch sold for three point four million dollars

589
00:34:46,760 --> 00:34:49,840
Speaker 1: and no telling that actually included dessert or not. In

590
00:34:49,880 --> 00:34:54,160
Speaker 1: two thousand twelve, an Italian village called pratt O Richia,

591
00:34:54,680 --> 00:34:57,600
Speaker 1: which was nearly vacant, it was almost abandoned, had been

592
00:34:57,640 --> 00:35:00,400
Speaker 1: auctioned off for three point one million dollars. It is

593
00:35:00,440 --> 00:35:03,320
Speaker 1: not the only town that has gone up for auction

594
00:35:03,480 --> 00:35:09,359
Speaker 1: on eBay. Others include Albert, Texas and Bridgeville, California. Also

595
00:35:09,440 --> 00:35:13,480
Speaker 1: in two thousand twelve, a letter written by Albert Einstein

596
00:35:13,600 --> 00:35:16,880
Speaker 1: sold for three million dollars on eBay. The winning bidder

597
00:35:16,920 --> 00:35:20,440
Speaker 1: was a philosopher named Eric good Kind or good Kind,

598
00:35:20,840 --> 00:35:25,560
Speaker 1: more likely because of the spelling of that name. A

599
00:35:25,600 --> 00:35:30,080
Speaker 1: lot that contained six d seventy five vintage lunch boxes

600
00:35:30,200 --> 00:35:32,719
Speaker 1: dating as far back as the nineteen fifties sold for

601
00:35:32,800 --> 00:35:36,200
Speaker 1: one point seven million dollars in September two thousand thirteen.

602
00:35:36,280 --> 00:35:39,600
Speaker 1: So someone really likes their lunch boxes. The car featured

603
00:35:39,640 --> 00:35:42,080
Speaker 1: at the end of the nineteen seventy eight film Greece

604
00:35:42,320 --> 00:35:46,759
Speaker 1: sold for one eighty thousand dollars in February fourteen. And

605
00:35:46,880 --> 00:35:50,279
Speaker 1: a copy of Action Comics number one, which was the

606
00:35:50,320 --> 00:35:54,480
Speaker 1: first appearance of Superman. It originally sold for ten cents

607
00:35:54,520 --> 00:35:57,920
Speaker 1: when it came out in nineteen thirty eight. This new

608
00:35:58,239 --> 00:36:02,200
Speaker 1: or not new, but this, this well preserved copy of

609
00:36:02,239 --> 00:36:05,240
Speaker 1: Action Comics number one, sold for three point two million

610
00:36:05,320 --> 00:36:08,959
Speaker 1: dollars in an auction in August. Here's some other stuff

611
00:36:09,000 --> 00:36:10,759
Speaker 1: I found while looking for weird things that have been

612
00:36:10,800 --> 00:36:13,840
Speaker 1: up for auction. Now these are from other sites, not

613
00:36:13,960 --> 00:36:18,120
Speaker 1: just eBay's official timeline. So again I wasn't able to

614
00:36:18,120 --> 00:36:21,760
Speaker 1: confirm all of these actually happened, but they're reported widely,

615
00:36:21,920 --> 00:36:25,400
Speaker 1: so take it with a grain of salt Justin Timberlake's

616
00:36:25,440 --> 00:36:28,759
Speaker 1: half eaten fringe toast. Some fan was able to get

617
00:36:28,800 --> 00:36:33,640
Speaker 1: hold of the leftovers that Justin Timberlake left behind after

618
00:36:33,719 --> 00:36:36,600
Speaker 1: eating French toast, and it sold for more than a

619
00:36:36,680 --> 00:36:41,720
Speaker 1: grand In two thousand you a corn flake that vaguely

620
00:36:41,760 --> 00:36:44,800
Speaker 1: resembled the shape of Illinois went up for auction once.

621
00:36:45,520 --> 00:36:49,520
Speaker 1: Various haunted dolls have been sold on eBay. All fans

622
00:36:49,719 --> 00:36:52,040
Speaker 1: of the podcast of My Brother, My Brother and Me

623
00:36:52,440 --> 00:36:55,239
Speaker 1: can attest to this, as they do a Haunted Dolls

624
00:36:55,320 --> 00:36:59,400
Speaker 1: segment occasionally on their show. A derrito chip said to

625
00:36:59,440 --> 00:37:02,040
Speaker 1: be in the shape of the Pope's hat went on

626
00:37:02,160 --> 00:37:06,040
Speaker 1: sale on an eBay auction. Uh, and I mean, come on,

627
00:37:06,120 --> 00:37:08,680
Speaker 1: they all kind of are the shape of a pope's hat.

628
00:37:09,040 --> 00:37:11,920
Speaker 1: There was a cemetery plot that went up for auction

629
00:37:11,960 --> 00:37:16,680
Speaker 1: on eBay, A special cemetery plot in California, located near

630
00:37:16,880 --> 00:37:21,480
Speaker 1: Marilyn Monroe's grave. It was actually occupied. It was not

631
00:37:21,560 --> 00:37:23,920
Speaker 1: an empty plot when I went up for sale. Was

632
00:37:23,960 --> 00:37:28,319
Speaker 1: occupied by Richard Poncher, whose widow decided to put the

633
00:37:28,320 --> 00:37:31,239
Speaker 1: plot up for sales an above ground plot so they

634
00:37:31,239 --> 00:37:34,160
Speaker 1: didn't have to dig anybody up but they decided. The

635
00:37:34,200 --> 00:37:36,480
Speaker 1: widow decided she was going to sell the plot to

636
00:37:37,680 --> 00:37:42,840
Speaker 1: someone on an auction and move her husband's remains to

637
00:37:43,200 --> 00:37:46,400
Speaker 1: somewhere else. It sold for four point six million dollars,

638
00:37:46,440 --> 00:37:49,160
Speaker 1: according to Time, and she had decided to do this

639
00:37:49,200 --> 00:37:52,920
Speaker 1: in order to pay the mortgage on her Beverly Hills

640
00:37:52,960 --> 00:37:57,439
Speaker 1: home and then move somewhere else. Uh. Also, once upon

641
00:37:57,480 --> 00:38:02,000
Speaker 1: a time a user put up for sale or for

642
00:38:02,000 --> 00:38:07,760
Speaker 1: for auction, the Meaning of Life, not the Monty Python movie,

643
00:38:08,360 --> 00:38:13,319
Speaker 1: but this person said that he had supposedly discovered what

644
00:38:13,440 --> 00:38:16,040
Speaker 1: the true meaning of life was and he was ready

645
00:38:16,040 --> 00:38:18,720
Speaker 1: to auction it off to the highest bidder. The highest

646
00:38:18,719 --> 00:38:23,520
Speaker 1: bidder paid the prinsle Lie sum of three dollars and

647
00:38:23,640 --> 00:38:28,120
Speaker 1: twenty six cents. And I suppose they've kept the secret

648
00:38:28,719 --> 00:38:31,720
Speaker 1: because it was hard earned. For less than five bucks.

649
00:38:31,719 --> 00:38:35,680
Speaker 1: They got the meaning of life, apparently, And that wraps

650
00:38:35,800 --> 00:38:38,239
Speaker 1: up this discussion about eBay. It was a lot of

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Speaker 1: fun to look into this company, and I learned a

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Speaker 1: lot going through it, especially about the very uh bold

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00:38:47,280 --> 00:38:51,280
Speaker 1: moves that various eBay executives have made throughout its history,

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00:38:51,360 --> 00:38:56,239
Speaker 1: both to great effect and sometimes too great detriment. UH.

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00:38:56,760 --> 00:39:00,200
Speaker 1: Really kind of a fascinating story overall, and Pierre made Are,

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00:39:00,239 --> 00:39:02,719
Speaker 1: who launched the whole thing, seems like he he's a

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00:39:02,719 --> 00:39:06,759
Speaker 1: pretty cool guy. UM definitely someone who really believes in

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00:39:06,800 --> 00:39:09,440
Speaker 1: giving back to communities. He has done an awful lot

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00:39:09,440 --> 00:39:13,000
Speaker 1: of conservation work in Hawaii as well, and I find

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00:39:13,000 --> 00:39:17,040
Speaker 1: that really admirable. So fascinating story. I can't wait to

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00:39:17,080 --> 00:39:20,680
Speaker 1: look at the next company history. I haven't quite decided

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00:39:20,719 --> 00:39:23,759
Speaker 1: which company I'm going to focus on next. I want

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00:39:23,800 --> 00:39:25,920
Speaker 1: to do a couple of episodes that are not company

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00:39:26,000 --> 00:39:29,880
Speaker 1: focused before I do another story of series because it

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00:39:29,920 --> 00:39:32,120
Speaker 1: gets pretty long having to do three or four episodes

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00:39:32,160 --> 00:39:34,719
Speaker 1: about the same subject. So I'm gonna mix it up

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00:39:34,719 --> 00:39:36,200
Speaker 1: a little bit over the next couple. I hope you

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00:39:36,239 --> 00:39:39,040
Speaker 1: guys enjoy it. And uh, I hope you guys are

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00:39:39,719 --> 00:39:41,680
Speaker 1: ready to let me know what you want to hear.

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00:39:41,840 --> 00:39:45,239
Speaker 1: Send me a message, tell me about any tech companies

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00:39:45,360 --> 00:39:50,080
Speaker 1: or products or trends, or maybe there's a person in

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00:39:50,120 --> 00:39:52,600
Speaker 1: tech you would like me to focus on. Send me

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00:39:52,680 --> 00:39:55,399
Speaker 1: a message. The email address is tech Stuff at house

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00:39:55,440 --> 00:39:57,160
Speaker 1: touff Works dot com, or drop me a line on

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00:39:57,200 --> 00:39:59,480
Speaker 1: Facebook or Twitter. The handle of both of those is

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Speaker 1: tech Stuff H. S W. Don't forget to follow us

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Speaker 1: on Instagram and I'll talk to you again really soon.

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Speaker 1: For more on this and thousands of other topics, because

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00:40:14,080 --> 00:40:25,239
Speaker 1: at how stuff Works dot com