The Talking Machine Forum — For All Antique Phonographs & Recordings

Check this out. It's a Red Banner Edison Home portable. Free shipping from India!!! Look at the last picture and you'll see the Red Edison Home banner on the lid!!
Harvey Kravitz
http://www.ebay.com/itm/ANTIQUE-GRAMOPH ... 2608494025

For posterity.

When eBay was new, I bought and sold there- a lot... but it always bothered me that they seemed to allow things like these crap-o-phones when they state all over in their rules that counterfeits and replicas are strictly NOT ALLOWED. I never understood why collectors could report, report, report these things but nothing was ever done. It seemed almost as if eBay tacitly encouraged these fakes.

Then, one day I stumbled on this little article:

https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/ ... or/375624/

This made it all clear to me. eBay management itself is actually working with counterfeiters to bring fake collectibles to the marketplace! The Devin Wenig guy bragging about how they are doing this and how efficient they are about it is the same Devin Wenig that is now CEO of eBay.

I just shake my head at this. There is, by eBay's own unapologetic admission, actually a corporate approved culture of making a profit by ripping off collectibles buyers with fake junk made in China... and India.

Interesting article. Not only does Ebay look the other way when China sells that stuff, they actually encourage and promote it.

Well none of this comes as a surprise to me.
As with most everything else, it can all be
easily understood by the motto of:
"Follow The Money".

Obviously there are plenty of suckers out there
to buy up this garbage.

Ebay cashes in, the makers of the fake junk cash
in, the suckers who buy the junk are happy.

P.T. Barnum said it best:
"There's a sucker born every minute"

phonogal wrote:Interesting article. Not only does Ebay look the other way when China sells that stuff, they actually encourage and promote it.

They actively go out and solicit people to make fake stuff to sell on eBay!

Yeah, why not? They are in it to make money.

Just because some exceedingly small minority
of people know it's a fraud, that does not
change the fact that the vast majority of people out
there today do not know, and could care less about
such things.

To them these fakes are just curious knick-knacks
to be purchased on a whim and displayed with other
cutsie "retro" items.

In short, the general public is so thoroughly
dumbed down these days that such an obvious fraud
goes completely undetected.

After all, most of them are too busy on their
smart phones to even hardly take a close look
at their newly purchased Crap-O-Phone.

Chuck wrote:Yeah, why not? They are in it to make money.

Just because some exceedingly small minority
of people know it's a fraud, that does not
change the fact that the vast majority of people out
there today do not know, and could care less about
such things.

To them these fakes are just curious knick-knacks
to be purchased on a whim and displayed with other
cutsie "retro" items.

In short, the general public is so thoroughly
dumbed down these days that such an obvious fraud
goes completely undetected.

After all, most of them are too busy on their
smart phones to even hardly take a close look
at their newly purchased Crap-O-Phone.

I don't know... to me, when your rules state that "replicas and counterfeits are NOT ALLOWED" and then you actively solicit them to be sold on your site... that seems like fraud.

It is an interesting article, showing the power of the use of personal data sharing in all transactions we do in our daily lives. I do not see anything particularly damning to EBay, they incentivize production of reproductions, and according to the article these reproductions are identified as such. In our hobby, the mass-produced modern reproductions are easily identified and will not fool collectors. The cottage productions and frankenphones are harder to pinpoint, but then I don't think EBay has any interest in such home-made articles.

In a broader reflection, this is only a small evidence that our private lives are now essentially public, and our daily steps are controlled by a small group of large data processing organizations that use that information to make money.

Well sure, in an ideal world that would be true.

In other words, make rules against fraud and
deception, and then stick to them.

However....out here in the real world of people
and businesses, such as they are at the present time,
we see all sorts of "rules" in place that get enforced
for a certain segment of the population, while being
conveniently overlooked for some other segment.

Again, it makes perfect sense to me within the context
of modern society. (which does at times tend to resemble
a rather uncivilized society if it can even be called a
society at all...)

It all boils down to "Follow The Money"

Apparently Ebay and the makers in India have made
a partnership that makes them both rich to varying
degrees.

The guys in India probably earn approximately
30 cents per hour to make those, while Ebay
rakes in millions of dollars.

I tend not to blame any of them for the stupidity of this.

I instead blame the current mindset that the average
person within the general public has, these days.

Look around! Then ask yourself if you are really
that surprised that this business model can
survive. Because, in order for anything to be able
to survive, it must have a favorable environment in
which to exist.

It's a perfect match: We have a greedy big business,
partnered with uneducated slave labor selling
to a clueless market. Makes perfect sense to me!