Ambassador program - why is eBay using British English spelling?
I read about the Ambassador program and it sounds very interesting.
What I want to know is why is eBay using British English spelling of the word "favorite"? I thought eBay was an American company so why are they spelling favorite the British English way "favourite"????
I know it's a small thing but I gives me the distinct feeling that this is not an American program.
What gives, eBay?
49 comments
wri-8727
·10 months agoRiders mount from the left
 
So why would you suppose drivers would do the opposite? Especially since in the early days of horseless carriages the road was shared by horses and motorists, (of course.)
FWIW Model T Fords had one door on the right-hand side. The left-hand side had a fake nonoperational door for aesthetic purposes. It's is also interesting to note, (on a conspiratorial level), that Henry Ford got his start-up money from Jesse James.
Anyroad, driving on the right-hand side is the prevalent
 
wri-8727
·10 months agoIt is Canadian spelling also
wri-8727
·10 months agoAfter long consideration I've determined the British drive on the left- hand side of the road and sit in the right-hand seat in order to facilitate auto-jousting (left hand on the wheel while the right hand holds the lance out the right-hand side of the vehicle (towards on coming traffic) whereas in the US you drive on the right hand side of the road and sit in the left-hand seat with the left hand on the wheel keeping the right hand free for firing out the left-hand side or the right-hand side and depending on the windscreen forwards and depending on the body style backwards out of the vehicle. YMMV
itsjustasprain
·10 months ago...and depending on whether you are actually the legal owner of the vee-hickle...
bdmh-enterprises
·10 months agoTHIS IS ABSOLUTELY OUTRAGEOUS!!!!!! PRESIDENT TRUMP NEEDS TO ARREST THE ENTIRE COMPANY!!!!! THE WOKES IN CHARGE CANT BE ALLOWED TO FORCE AMERICANS TO READ ENGLISH!!!!!
selsa84
·10 months agoGood stuff. Haha
jdbelt1960
·10 months agoMaybe because the language Americans use is English (England/Britain).
hartungcards
·10 months ago"Maybe because the language Americans use is English"
That's a very 1950s statement.
jdbelt1960
·10 months agoActually we used the English language in the 50's and here in 2025 we still speak English.
chapeau-noir
·10 months agoOh GAWD, and if this isn't bad enough, we're using Arabic numerals in this country. The outrage just never ends. ðŸ˜
chapeau-noir
·10 months agoJust say no to insularity. 🙄
marnotom!
·10 months agoSomewhere in the UK, someone is probably upset that eBay is spelling "programme" the American way.
grann-4629
·10 months ago'Somewhere in the UK'
Maybe somewhere, but most people with a brain wouldn't care. The meaning is the same and it sounds the same both ways. No problem with misunderstanding what it means when someone says it or writes it, or converts either spelling to smoke signals to send it to the next waypoint.
valueaddedresource
·10 months agoFYI, yes, it is available in the UK where they also dare to spell program with an extra m and an e.
https://www.ebay.co.uk/sellercentre/news/2025-october/ambassador-programme
Not sure where OP is looking but maybe they found a UK page by mistake? The US one appears to spell favorite the US way in multiple places.
https://ambassador.ebay.com/
my-cottage-books-and-antiques
·10 months ago@donnajosbooks I don't know whether the program is offered in the UK or not. However, I'm in the US, registered on the dot com site (often referred to as the US site) and I began the process of opening an Ambassador store a few weeks ago, so if your question is: are American sellers eligible, yes, definitely. So, I'm not sure what you mean by "not an American program"?
jameshen1
·10 months agoIf this was such a big issue in my life I would consider myself very blessed indeed. And then I would forget about it and move on. But that's just me.
duffy4444
·10 months ago@donnajosbooks:
You're right... It's a small thing -- VERY small. Who really cares?
Some of my friends spell things like that, and it's endearing. It's also a reminder of American roots.
Get over it.
Cheers, Duffy
donnajosbooks
OP10 months agoObviously, I care. We are American not British. Pretty rude to tell me to get over it. You could have left that part off and the response would have been fine.
johnrj1226
·10 months agoAmericans are people that originated in beaucoup countries from all around this planet. For myself my Dad was from Bari, Italy. On my Mom's side my grand father was from Mora, Sweden. All came to the US in the early 1900's. Heck Texas used to be part of Mexico.
hartungcards
·10 months ago"Heck Texas used to be part of Mexico."
Yeah, but that was when East Texas was next to the Gulf of Mexico.
jdbelt1960
·10 months agoThat is good it is next to the Gulf of America now!
hartungcards
·10 months agoYes, I think everyone in the Gulf of America used to speak Spanish, but now they speak English. Make the Gulf of America Great Again.
chapeau-noir
·10 months agoWe should be speaking AMERICAN.
lacemaker3
·10 months agoEveryone in the Gulf of America has drowned by now.
Someone should organize a memorial.
itsjustasprain
·10 months ago...and I am wondering how in the world New Mexico is allowed to remain that way. It's a disgrace.
chapeau-noir
·10 months agoYes! If New Mexico wants to join the USA they're gonna have to change their name to New America.
johnrj1226
·10 months agoYeah but the words fixin' and aimin' meaning different things in Texas than it does above the Mason Dixon Line Being hooked up with a Lone Star Lady from Central Texas for 44 years taught me that.
In England they refer to an 18 wheeler as a Lorry - always thought it was a girls name until I went England - "what the"I say. The Brits taught many countries to drive on the wrong side of the road too.
In conclusion, fully believe that we all speak some form of "Americaese" in all 50 states.
bennotbill
·10 months agoThat's news to me. "Artics" is by far the common term for those sort of big trucks.
johnrj1226
·10 months agoBrits call large goods vehicles "lorries" due to a historical shift in terminology from older, horse-drawn wagons, which were referred to as lorries. The term "lorry" likely comes from the dialect verb "lurry," meaning to drag or pull, and was used to describe a type of flatbed wagon. As motor vehicles took over, the word "lorry" was adapted to describe the new, self-powered, large-capacity vehicles.
johnrj1226
·10 months agoBrits call large goods vehicles "lorries" due to a historical shift in terminology from older, horse-drawn wagons, which were referred to as lorries. The term "lorry" likely comes from the dialect verb "lurry," meaning to drag or pull, and was used to describe a type of flatbed wagon. As motor vehicles took over, the word "lorry" was adapted to describe the new, self-powered, large-capacity vehicles.
itsjustasprain
·10 months agoYes - from 'articulated lorry'. A regular lorry is a plain truck (not a semi).
chapeau-noir
·10 months agoI hear anything and everything truck-like called a lorry unless it's a van, even though 'truck' in one context or another has been in use since the 18th century.
And it's the left side of the road, not the 'wrong' side of the road.
grann-4629
·10 months agoI remember when they tried to change the driving lane to the left side here. In order to avoid confusion, they started with trucks (lorries?) and busses only. Needless to say, it didn't work out well so we went back to driving on the right side.
The Brits have been driving a lot longer than we have, and they probably started with horse drawn carts, so when they changed to the left hand side, it was a lot easier.
Just sayin' ...
toomuchstuffagain35
·10 months agoJust for the record, favourite isn't "British English" (there's no such thing), it's ENGLISH.
Please stop the pearl clutching. We have bigger things to worry about.
lacemaker3
·10 months agoPot, meet kettle.
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Actually, standardized spelling is fairly recent, as world history goes. (Not referring to North American history, which is totally Johnny-come-lately.)
Originally, English-speakers simply wrote words the way they sounded, and some used pretty *flamboyant* spelling, just because they liked it, and they could. And it looked cool.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English-language_spelling_reform
From the implementation of printing in around 1350, printing houses developed their own spelling "styles". It wasn't until the 16th century, that English committees started to meet and pontificate about standardizing spelling. This accelerated in the 19th century, with Webster's dictionary in the forefront (and some Americans following their lead).
Re: "favourite" -- I like the traditional spelling. It has a lot to recommend it. It's a very well accepted, well understood spelling, all around the world. Why would anyone get upset about the use of a few extra pixels for the letter u?
What do you have against u? Or against the pixels that desperately need the work?
luckythewinner
·10 months agoWhy would it matter where the program originated?
That aside ...
"Favourite" is also how English people in Australia, Canada, and India tend to spell it too.
grann-4629
·10 months agoBecause it's the right way to spell it?
Remember who came first.
donnajosbooks
OP10 months agoIt isn't the right way to spell it in the US. Britain may have come first but the US won the war.
grann-4629
·10 months agoWell, firstly I'm not in the US, and I will continue to spell it the way it is spelled by the majority of English speaking people in the world ... NOT American, but English.
Secondly, about the war, you're right ... win a few, lose a few, but I don't think we need to do win/loss stats here 😌
hartungcards
·10 months ago"What I want to know is why is eBay using British English spelling of the word "favorite"?"
This is due to an annual increase in system activity experienced during this period, which has caused processing delays.
movieman630
·10 months agoMaybe the employee that wrote it is in the UK?
bennotbill
·10 months agoMaybe it's someone from the UK working in the USA.
For example the last time I looked more than half the ebay UK forum reps were registered in different countries.
ebay seems multi-national no matter what country you are in.
johnrj1226
·10 months agoDo you know that the Pilgrims came to North America from England and are part of our Thanksgiving celebration.
fullers_uk
·10 months agoAh, ebay has multiple sites, the US site may of bought the service of operating the ambassador programme from the UK, so the UK could charge ebay US a chunk of money to avoid tax.
slippinjimmy
·10 months agoMy guess would be that the text you are seeing this was written for the UK version and then used unchanged for the US version.
a_c_green
·10 months agoThat's almost certainly what happened, yes. eBay US has often brought over coding from eBay in Europe without making changes, and this is probably just the latest incident of that.
For example, to this day, your Shipping label confirmation email that's sent to your off-eBay email account (under the Subject line of "Your shipping label is ready") shows your buyer's address in European format instead of U.S. format, with the ZIP (postal) code in front of the City Name instead of at the end, and the State Abbreviation missing altogether.
The current version of the Shipping form, when introduced several years ago now, was first created for the eBay UK site, and when copied over to the US site, its first draft showed instructions referring to British Pounds instead of US dollars.
Obviously there's no need to reinvent the wheel if another of your sites already has a solution that could be adapted for Over Here, although it would be good if someone on the U.S. side would proofread things before dumping them into Production.
caldreamer
·10 months agoYikes, I see what you mean about the spelling. Someone made a Royal screwup. This program is available in the USA (see weblink at the bottom of the page). My understanding is that if you see a product you like on EBAY that you love, you show it on your social media page and if someone clicks on your page and then purchases that item on EBAY (you get a commission).
The eBay Ambassador Program is designed for beginners and allows users to earn commissions by promoting eBay listings. Here are key points to understand:
Open to All Users
How It Works
Benefits for Beginners
Getting Started
Join eBay Ambassador | Earn eBay Affiliate Commission and Create an eBay Storefront
chapeau-noir
·10 months agoIt's a plot.