Not really a message for the blogging community (nothing personal, guys, just don't have the time), but for any of my store browsers who happen to click on my ID in hopes of getting an explanation for why my listings don't look like they usually do... My image hosts are physically moving this weekend, starting early this Saturday morning, March 29, 2008. My usual background images are not showing, nor are the thumbnails of the books for sale or the full size images that those thumbnails link to... The good news is that images I upload to eBay for each store listing are identical to the ones currently not showing. The bad new is that aesthetically, my listings just don't look very good right now and for this, you have my sincere apologies. The move is supposed to be done by the end of this weekend, though my experiences with nearly all business involved with the Internet suggests that their ETA for completion will end up being optimistic (and that problems will persist for some time afterword) ... What can I say? I'm a cynic. (which reminds me of the old joke... Do you know what the opposite of an optimist is? ... a realist ;-)

I have managed to cobble together some work-arounds for the various .99 auctions I'll be running over the weeked (mostly starting on Sunday) so those should look OK. Once again, my apologies and thanks for your patience. Have a great week (and don't be fooled on Tuesday).

-Joe

Every once in a while, ya just gotta vent! Apologies in advance for the rambling... this has taken so many trips through draft, I may well have edited all the sense out of it..

In the month of October, I shipped 10 books from San Francisco to Canada. As of late November/early December, five (5!) of those packages have not yet arrived to my customers. Given past experience, the chances are very good that the items are presently in some Customs station backwater, patiently awaiting whatever bureaucratic voodoo they do. There is essentially nothing I (or my customers) can do about it. Oh sure, we can inquire,Customs Form number from the package meekly in hand, and hope that the package will shake loose, but I suspect our efforts are like pressing the 'close door' button on the elevator... It may make us feel like we are doing something but the door will close when it closes...

From a distance, I don't really have any right to speculate but I will anyway... like pushing that (other) button to get the light to change so I can cross the street, it just gives me the feeling that I am doing something. Nothing's going to change but somehow, the rambling helps. So here's my theory:

A long time ago, in a customs office far far way, a particularly difficult and distrustful person was placed in a position of  tremendous authority. And that person's attitude (as bad attitude's have a tendency to do) began to seep into every corner of the organization...Now, there seems to be an institutional predisposition towards confrontation and distrust in any dealings involving the Canadian Customs. From what I hear, that includes the interactions between their Labor and Management as well.

You can see how it can spread. As an employee in such an environment,  you'd have to sail with the prevailing wind just to survive the day without going crazy.

It's important to remember that I'm not saying this is peculiar to Candian Customs. We've all (no matter what country we are from) encountered particularly difficult people... They seem to be especially prevalent in bureaucracies (though I've seen enough of them in non- governmental bureaucracy environments to know that they can exist anywhere). It is easy, standing in line or desperately trying to shake a package loose from customs, to imagine these folks as somehow less than human, a Kafka-esque breed of functionaries placed on this planet to make the lives of the rest of us miserable. But this would be wrong. They are human beings. They've been turned into confrontational drones by their work environment... I actually feel sorry for them. Can you imagine going in to work every day to an environment where confrontation is the norm?

So what can be done... Each time I respond to a customer, I have to fight the desire to imply that theft is involved... I suspect it is NOT but at some level, I have the feeling that spreading the rumor that it IS would ultimately get some action. But the problem with this 'solution' is that it perpetuates the confrontational dynamic. And nothing good can come from that in the long term.

No, I'm afraid that the only long-term solution is an attitude adjustment, a most difficult thing to pull off on the organizational level. It will take a couple of quality people in positions of power to slowly change the attitude. Will it happen? I doubt it. But here's hoping that at some point down the road, my Canadian customers have at least a tolerable chance of receive their packages in a reasonable amount of time.

-Joe

No, not the latest Halloween horror flick...Just my experience with eBay, PayPal and my image hosts over the last couple of weeks. Read this as just another FYI, for any of my customers who happen to click on my ID and see my blog... Currently the biggest problem I have is in not receiving emails from potential buyers who are asking me questions... I see the question on "My eBay" and can respond so it's not that big of a deal, but I feel like I am talking to myself, with no way of knowing whether those that I am communicating with are actually receiving my responses. So if you have asked me a question about any of my listings, and have not received an email response, rest assured, I have answered  Sign in to eBay, click your "My eBay" tab and check for messages. My answer(s) should be there. Well, I guess that assumes your question actually made it to my "My eBay." So on second thought, don't rest assured... if you don't see an answer in your "My eBay," contact me directly.

Also, because of a bug in the way eBay was reading my TurboLister upload, on the advice of eBay help, I had to disable my automatic discounts to US customers buying multiple items. I promise  you will get the discount. You will just have to wait for me to invoice you. My sincere apologies for the  inconvenience.

Next, regular customers know that I provide your tracking information as soon as I get back from my daily Post Office trek.... Those who pay with Paypal usually get that information in an email through Paypal. Unfortunately, the link I use to add that information has disappeared as of yesterday, 10/31/2007. I've emailed Paypal detailing the problem and requesting an ETA for a fix but I wouldn't hold my breath.

In general, I'd be very wary of much involved with eBay these days. It seems that the whole site is one string of code away from unraveling. eBay email, in particular, has been a hit or miss proposition recently. Patience and understanding, while always a good idea, are especially advised when dealing with anything eBay these days.

-Joe

Not really a blog entry but on the off chance any of my customers click my user name and scroll down to my blog, I wanted to let you know that as of early this week (the first time I noticed the problem was on Tuesday, October 9) I am not receiving checkout emails from eBay when you opt to pay by Personal Check or Money Order. I've had nobody opt for Credit Card or 'other' during this time period but I suspect the problem extends to those options as well... I can see that you checked out when I view the  'My eBay'  sold items page but if you had any additional information, questions, a changed address, or concerns included when you checked out, I am not seeing it.

The problem has been reported by others on eBay's checkout forum, though not in the numbers I would have expected so it may not be affecting everybody. I emailed eBay about the problem on Wednesday 10/10 and was told the problem would be forwarded to their engineers.

Thanks for your understanding,

-Joe

It wasn't the first time and it won't be the last. I read about Madeleine L’Engle's death and one of the first things I did was take a quick internal inventory of what books of hers I may have tucked away in the shop... Any signed? Nope. But a couple of unusual ones...early and uncommon editions of her big book... and immediately prepared to list them. There's really nothing wrong with that. After all, as a seller, I have a limited time to attract as many eyes to my auction listings as I possibly can. And nothing attracts searches like a mention in the media... Of course the reality is that sudden exposure in the media usually means bad news.

So if there is nothing wrong, why did I finally get motivated enough to start a blog? I was raised Catholic so good ol' fashioned guilt comes to mind. Yeah, that'll work. Confession, it's what's for dinner...

At this point, it would be great to write a redemptive account of how her writing influenced me as a youngster. How I read her as a child and was never the same. It would be great. But it would be a lie. That's right. Your friendly neighborhood bookseller is embarrassed (there's that guilt thing again) to say I have never read one of her books, not even  A Wrinkle in Time, one of the cornerstone works of modern children's literature. What can I say? It just didn't cross my path at the right place and time. So instead, you're stuck with a crass reflection on the nature of buying and selling, supply and demand.

Ever wonder why I list so few books at auction? It's eBay's dirty little secret for me... Auction is not a good format to sell my books. Oh sure, there are some books that are perfect for auction, books and/or authors that are always being searched for. But for the average book, attempting to attract at least two pairs of eyes with motivated buyers attached to them is a challenge. Try a little thought experiment. Imagine going into a good sized used bookstore. Now find an average used book and slip a medium denomination of your favorite local currency inside the book in a place where it will be seen if the book is opened. At the gutter of the page where the book is priced would work. For the purposed of this experiment, we'll stipulate that it should be paper currency. The question is, how long will that bill last before somebody finds it. A day? A Week? A Month? Never? And when it is found, notice who got it. Was it a buyer? Or another seller, just checking prices to see if he or she might find an undervalued edition?

If you already see the parallels to eBay, then you're probably a seller. Your average item doesn't get that many looks. And of the looks you get, even the ones who pause long enough to decide to 'watch' your item, a certain percentage (some may even say a high percentage) are not really buyers but sellers just trying to see how the book does on the marketplace.

What's a seller to do? My regulars know my solution. List in the store environment. While the search exposure isn't as good, the length of time the book is listed maximizes the chance that a motivated buyer will find my item and buy it... For those of you who know it, this is The Long Tail: Why the Future of Business is Selling Less of More, a concept coined and popularized by Chris Anderson in the book of the same name. Highly recommended reading for all e-tailers, if just to understand where we fit in. Unfortunately, when eBay increased the cost of listing in the store environment, they essentially 'taxed the tail' and made it much more difficult, at least in the realm of books, to be able to afford to keep those seldom sought after books in the eyes of the buying public at the moment they are looking for them. In the words of another recently deceased literary giant... And so it goes.

Mind you, there is no blame here. I'm sure you all know the Book/Bumper sticker/T-Shirt saying... So Many Books, So Little Time ... There are simply too many books out there for the average buyer to remember to search for everything they want in any particular seven to ten day window. And with eBay's primitive wants/matching system, at least with regard to books (a topic for another blog), I as a seller must take advantage of the occasional windows of demand that are opened by Media coverage, even a sad event like an author's death, to maximize the looks.

There you go... From Madeleine L’Engle to The Long Tail to Kurt Vonnegut and back again.