interesting. ebay app hides seller description but shows AI generated description w/o clicking

[siamjane8]

I just noticed that when viewing a listing on my phone android), the pages shows the complete item description without any extra clicks- BUT ONLY IF YOU HAD USED THE AI GENERATED DESCRIPTION TOOL.

     If you view a listing that the seller put time and effort into an accurate description themselves- the view as you scroll down still hides the description behind a "see full description" button, requiring extra click to see the most important part of the listing.

    Why the hypocrisy? - So a sellers description clutters the view and needs to be hidden, requiring an action to see but the Ebay generated AI description is shown on main page, in plain site??

    And i am confused- for 20 years ( and as recent as last week) ebay has been telling sellers that clean simple descriptive bullet points and not repeating any info from the title.   Even the listing tool chastises you and makes you click 3x to add a color font or change the size of the print! A simple listing is betterit warns you...........

    Enter new AI description generator-   Makes a 8 sentence paragraphs to describe simple attributes. It uses flowery descriptions that are more fluff and poetry than anything.  9x out of 10 it is completely wrong and needs to be corrected anyway.   It is long form and artsy.  And that is shown to buyers without extra clicks???

    I just don't get the logic here.   Exactly opposite of what ebay tells us to do.

Not even to mention the user fatigue of seeing the exact same written format for every listing whether it is a shoe or a pool light , or an antique vase, or 10 pack of #2 pencils.    The result will be - buyers quickly skimming over to run-on sentence of a description looking for the actually details of the item, possibly missing the details that are buried in "a story." 

     Push comes to shove i could not care less about the AI story teller BUT ebay should show the rest of our descriptions ALSO instead of forcing extra clicks to see it.

[valueaddedresource]

@siamjane8 how can you tell the description was written with the AI tool? Do you have an item number for reference?

[my-cottage-books-and-antiques]

I was going to try to duplicate this, because I used ebay's magic on one of my listings, but can't remember which one LOL. I'll try adding it to a new listing today and check my phone (Android).

I agree, if ebay is going to show the entire Magical description but continue to hide my description....I will not be happy. Maybe the trick will be to let ebay work its magic, then basically completely rewrite it by editing it, and see what happens to the heavily edited "magic"?

[hartungcards]

I think you may be confusing "hypocrisy" with "incompetence" in the IT Department.

[siamjane8]

@valueaddedresource I know because I know the seller and they tried the Al out on their most recent 2 listings and the rest of their listings are not with the tool. Also you can spot the tool magical description from 1000 miles away because nobody writes description like that. 

[valueaddedresource]

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@siamjane8 wrote:

@valueaddedresource I know because I know the seller and they tried the Al out on their most recent 2 listings and the rest of their listings are not with the tool. Also you can spot the tool magical description from 1000 miles away because nobody writes description like that. 

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@siamjane8 thanks but....if you could share an item number that would help those of us who would be interested in testing this out so we don't just have to randomly click on thousands of items hoping to find one that looks like it used the AI generator. 😉

[iamalwaysright]

Interesting

Hmmm, maybe it was never ebay that actually decided to hide your descriptions with that extra click. Bare with me here. Maybe, just MAYBE, it's the AI itself that went into ebay's developers programming code and decided to hide all human generated descriptions and only allow it's own AI generated ones to be shown.

That would totally explain ebay IT and developer's obliviousness to some of these designs that they don't know how to remedy.

The reason for the AI's actions here remains to be seen. It may be the first step to a much larger global plan to conquer all things that we know and hold dear. 

[itsjustasprain]

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@valueaddedresource wrote:

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@siamjane8 wrote:

@valueaddedresource I know because I know the seller and they tried the Al out on their most recent 2 listings and the rest of their listings are not with the tool. Also you can spot the tool magical description from 1000 miles away because nobody writes description like that. 

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@siamjane8 thanks but....if you could share an item number that would help those of us who would be interested in testing this out so we don't just have to randomly click on thousands of items hoping to find one that looks like it used the AI generator. 😉

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 I have to say that it is PAINFULLY obvious when a lazy seller has used a ChatGPT description generator. While I agree that examples will help - I think that pointing out individual listings for their useless descriptions might fall under the Naming and Shaming rule... 😉

If someone wants to volunteer one of their their own listings to demonstrate this issue that might help.

[valueaddedresource]

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@itsjustasprain wrote:

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@valueaddedresource wrote:

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@siamjane8 wrote:

@valueaddedresource I know because I know the seller and they tried the Al out on their most recent 2 listings and the rest of their listings are not with the tool. Also you can spot the tool magical description from 1000 miles away because nobody writes description like that. 

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@siamjane8 thanks but....if you could share an item number that would help those of us who would be interested in testing this out so we don't just have to randomly click on thousands of items hoping to find one that looks like it used the AI generator. 😉

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 I have to say that it is PAINFULLY obvious when a lazy seller has used a ChatGPT description generator. While I agree that examples will help - I think that pointing out individual listings for their useless descriptions might fall under the Naming and Shaming rule... 😉

If someone wants to volunteer one of their their own listings to demonstrate this issue that might help.

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@itsjustasprain good point but I don't see any reason we have to comment one way or the other on the description itself and wasn't planning to violate that rule.

I agree that the style does often provide a strong hint, I'm just trying to avoid having to go through who knows how many listings before finding one. 😂

[valueaddedresource]

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@valueaddedresource wrote:

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@itsjustasprain wrote:

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@valueaddedresource wrote:

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@siamjane8 wrote:

@valueaddedresource I know because I know the seller and they tried the Al out on their most recent 2 listings and the rest of their listings are not with the tool. Also you can spot the tool magical description from 1000 miles away because nobody writes description like that. 

---

@siamjane8 thanks but....if you could share an item number that would help those of us who would be interested in testing this out so we don't just have to randomly click on thousands of items hoping to find one that looks like it used the AI generator. 😉

---

 I have to say that it is PAINFULLY obvious when a lazy seller has used a ChatGPT description generator. While I agree that examples will help - I think that pointing out individual listings for their useless descriptions might fall under the Naming and Shaming rule... 😉

If someone wants to volunteer one of their their own listings to demonstrate this issue that might help.

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@itsjustasprain good point but I don't see any reason we have to comment one way or the other on the description itself and wasn't planning to violate that rule.

I agree that the style does often provide a strong hint, I'm just trying to avoid having to go through who knows how many listings before finding one. 😂

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Just to add - if anyone wants to provide an example but not publicly, feel free to PM...I'm just really curious to test this one out.

[my-cottage-books-and-antiques]

Just listed this, with only slight edits to the ebay supplied description. Yes, I must be lazy LOL:

166285515703

Might take a while before it shows up.

"Stars And Stripes Flag Patriotic Silk Neck Tie American Legion Made In USA"

[onthescrews]

It’s possible I’m missing something or not understanding but the listing looks the same as every other listing on the app on my phone. 

[siamjane8]

1st 3 pics of the AI..... Last pic of the non AI. 

 

 

 

 to be fair I am now occasionally seeing a non AI description on first page if it is only one sentence long....but most are still you must click for description

[toomuchstuffagain35]

That reads like the descriptions of NIB stuff where the seller has just lifted the prose from an AMZ (or other) website.

[robbie31415]

I've written multiple descriptions that show up without the see full description link.

I'm not exactly sure what does it. I thought maybe if it was short or had a short paragraph then that was it, but that result isn't consistent.

It just randomly happens for all I know, but I do know it's not only because of the AI tool.