eBay

partfinds · ‎01-17-2023

Everytime I want to find out from other sellers their experineces and solutions , my thread is being moved to different board away from everyone else’s view? It seems Ebay wants us to stop exchanging viewpoints esoecially related to technical issuesthat are never resolved anyway. So what is the reason that the discussion is being moved if it doesn’t get Ebay’s attention?

https://community.ebay.com/t5/Share-eBay-Technical-Issues/Do-you-have-trouble-with-price-in-the-list...

sapphire_studio · ‎01-17-2023

Yeah you always start out with 4 threads you can see and then every time you hit "view more" you only see another 6 or 8. That part is annoying but if they could at least save your spot after you've hit "view more" like 10 times when you click on a thread and then go back then it would be a lot less annoying so you don't have to redo the whole process of hitting "view more" a ton of times to get to where you were.

pburn · ‎01-17-2023

@zamo-zuan wrote:
I've often wondered why they use Khoros, though? I assume it might just be a contract between the entities.

I imagine eBay puts out an RFP, don't you suppose? And from my limited experience with software providers, it becomes very complicated to dump one and switch to a completely different one.

@zamo-zuan wrote:
And eBay representatives have expressed that they don't have much control over the changes that happen, which just seems odd to me.

Again, that's not unusual with an outside software provider. Quite often (although not always), if the software is changed/altered/amended for one client, the change applies to all clients. So Company A may want XYZ feature, but Company B might not.

@zamo-zuan wrote:
Kinda weird that a tech company is relying on another tech company to run a pretty basic forum?

Shhhhh! Don't give them any ideas! 😉

I'm going to go out on a limb and suggest it's the actual moderation component eBay doesn't want to mess with. I'm sure eBay employees worked closely with Khoros on the now infamous redesign of the forum software, and it's clear the revision to the Community Guidelines, for example, were written by someone less skilled in creating that kind of document. That was pretty clearly eBay staff.

zamo-zuan · ‎01-17-2023

@sapphire_studio wrote:
Yeah you always start out with 4 threads you can see and then every time you hit "view more" you only see another 6 or 8. That part is annoying but if they could at least save your spot after you've hit "view more" like 10 times when you click on a thread and then go back then it would be a lot less annoying so you don't have to redo the whole process of hitting "view more" a ton of times to get to where you were.

Meanwhile the rest of the internet uses the "infinite scrolling" design pattern in 2023.

partfinds · ‎01-17-2023

@sapphire_studio wrote:
Yeah you always start out with 4 threads you can see and then every time you hit "view more" you only see another 6 or 8. That part is annoying but if they could at least save your spot after you've hit "view more" like 10 times when you click on a thread and then go back then it would be a lot less annoying so you don't have to redo the whole process of hitting "view more" a ton of times to get to where you were.

“Meanwhile the rest of the internet uses the "infinite scrolling" design pattern in 2023.”

and the responses/replies are right under with indentation.you don’t have to jump around to look what someone responded to.

pburn · ‎01-17-2023

@partfinds wrote:
and the responses/replies are right under with indentation.you don’t have to jump around to look what someone responded to.

That's controlled by a toggle on the "Options" drop down menu. Posts can be sorted by either "Threaded format" or "Linear format." You're describing the "threaded format." I prefer the "linear format."

Check that "Options" drop down menu (on the desktop, anyway) and see which way yours is set up.

wastingtime101 · ‎01-17-2023

@sapphire_studio wrote:
and the real part that actually gets annoying is when you click on any thread and then you go back it refreshes everything so that you can only see 4 again and you have to hit "view more" many many times to get back to the same spot you were.

When I view the boards on mobile @sapphire_studio, I don't tap the link to open a thread, but instead I tap & hold which will pull up a menu (like right clicking with a mouse) and you can open the thread in a new tab. Then when you're done close out the new tab and your main forum page is still in the same spot.

GLORIOUS!

Seller Guide: Nonstandard Packaging

sapphire_studio · ‎01-17-2023

Omg!

You. Are. A. Genius!!!!!!!!!!!!!

chapeau-noir · ‎01-17-2023

@zamo-zuan wrote:
@wastingtime101 wrote:
@zamo-zuan wrote:
Modern forum design also has other solutions for this type of problem. For example, modern design principles dictate that Selling/Shipping/Technical Issues (for sellers) can ALL be combined in to a single "Seller" forum and just have a "Tag" that will mark a little stamp or color bookmark for those different type of issues, and these could be filtered out if you don't want to see them. This type of design ensures adequate traffic for the forum while keeping things nice and organized by type of post.
Yes, I've thought this for a while that a tag or label system we could filter based on our own interests would be great. Fewer forums with a way to customize and see several topics in one place, then filter out the topics we don't want to see.

Primarily have one area for buying, one for selling and one for "official" eBay content.

I don't know if Khoros offers this.
They do. They're called "labels" on their own forum.

I've often wondered why they use Khoros, though? I assume it might just be a contract between the entities. But, well... Khoros doesn't seem to do much in terms of user engagement on here at all. And the software doesn't offer anything that any of the (much cheaper) popular alternatives have. It's quite inferior on features, truthfully. And eBay representatives have expressed that they don't have much control over the changes that happen, which just seems odd to me.

Kinda weird that a tech company is relying on another tech company to run a pretty basic forum?

Before they used Live World, which did a much better job (I know I'm gonna get slapped again for this). When the forums were overhauled and Khoros, formerly Lithium, took over, the eBay Suit in charge of the transition was completely ignorant of what the boards even were, despite being "director of communications" or some such. He had never even been to the boards. They were destroyed, loads of legacy information and important archives deleted, whole longstanding communities broken up, and we have rather amateurish effort we see now. I suspect the eBay suit led the destructive effort and Lithium set up the boards with these parameters. The badges and the like are painfully childish.

Hell is empty. And all the devils are here.

inhawaii · ‎01-18-2023

You can discuss anything you want with other sellers.

Feelin' Stronger Every Day - Chicago

zamo-zuan · ‎01-18-2023

@pburn wrote:
@zamo-zuan wrote:
I've often wondered why they use Khoros, though? I assume it might just be a contract between the entities.
I imagine eBay puts out an RFP, don't you suppose? And from my limited experience with software providers, it becomes very complicated to dump one and switch to a completely different one.

@zamo-zuan wrote:
And eBay representatives have expressed that they don't have much control over the changes that happen, which just seems odd to me.
Again, that's not unusual with an outside software provider. Quite often (although not always), if the software is changed/altered/amended for one client, the change applies to all clients. So Company A may want XYZ feature, but Company B might not.

@zamo-zuan wrote:
Kinda weird that a tech company is relying on another tech company to run a pretty basic forum?
Shhhhh! Don't give them any ideas! 😉

I'm going to go out on a limb and suggest it's the actual moderation component eBay doesn't want to mess with. I'm sure eBay employees worked closely with Khoros on the now infamous redesign of the forum software, and it's clear the revision to the Community Guidelines, for example, were written by someone less skilled in creating that kind of document. That was pretty clearly eBay staff.

I'd imagine they do have and RFP or a binding document of some type at this point. I don't think they would have invested as much without one.

Regarding the software changes, oddly enough it seems that they haven't really reconfigured the features and are missing features that are included in the software itself (such as "labels"/tags). But to clarify, when they did the forum revision, it sounded pretty clear that they're not even control of their css/style sheet file. Basically, this is file that makes it super easy to tweak the visuals (our font sizes/white space/formatting/etc on here). If I take a peek in the browser, it's literally called "ebay.css" so we can be sure there's one made exclusively for eBay, but it sounded like Khoros has full control of what's included and eBay is limited in what they can request.

Oh how I've wished just to have 5 minutes to edit that file to fix these spacing issues/font sizes to be more standard and allow more posts to be visible on a single page!

It's probably true that moderation is the biggest factor. At the premium I'm sure Khoros is getting, a team could be hired for that. I'm just surprised at the combination of giving up so much control alongside the larger investment just for forums. Maybe it's also some sort of liability issues, because otherwise who wants to pay more for less control?

partfinds · ‎01-18-2023

„Ideally, things should be designed in a way that the traffic and posts are balanced across them. ”

that is the key and that is the reason possibly the threads are being moved/hidden in those other forums where noone visits apart from ebay contributors that make you look like you are the problem. They don’t want other people to join thread and report . They don’t want anything to get fixed. Maybe this is a request of the provider of the listing tool Ebay purchased. Maybe they don’t want Ebay to find out it is troublesome so contract is not revoked.

wastingtime101 · ‎01-18-2023

@partfinds wrote:
the threads are being moved/hidden in those other forums where noone visits apart from ebay contributors that make you look like you are the problem.

It's very difficult to get eBay to fix issues. This is why we first rule out any potential factor on the user's end that might be causing the problem - because that's so much easier to control and fix and the goal is to help you solve the problem.

Nobody makes it out that you are the problem. We rule out things on the user's end because in order for eBay to address a problem we need to show eBay that it's not stemming from something on the user's end.

GLORIOUS!

Seller Guide: Nonstandard Packaging

partfinds · ‎01-18-2023

Ok supergenus 😉

katzrul15 · ‎01-18-2023

@partfinds wrote:
Ok supergenus 😉

Sorry..........what is a "genus" and what makes it "super"?? 😐

p.s. Wasting is pretty smart and tech savy.........he probably does know what a "genus" is........🙃

....... "The Ranger isn't gonna like it Yogi"......... Boo-Boo knew what he was talking about!

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