*LONG* Mike, "feedback", and "attacks" (WAS: anonymous postings, etc.) - Printable Version +- HP Forums (https://archived.hpcalc.org/museumforum) +-- Forum: HP Museum Forums (https://archived.hpcalc.org/museumforum/forum-1.html) +--- Forum: Old HP Forum Archives (https://archived.hpcalc.org/museumforum/forum-2.html) +--- Thread: *LONG* Mike, "feedback", and "attacks" (WAS: anonymous postings, etc.) (/thread-14325.html) |
*LONG* Mike, "feedback", and "attacks" (WAS: anonymous postings, etc.) - W. Bruce Maguire II - 01-17-2002 Dave:
I think you have a legitimate concern about anonymous (no E-mail
As for Mike's feedback goes, Dave, you of all people should know that
One of the last (and probably one of the final) deals I did on eBay (not
Now, I'm sure Mike doesn't have the same feedback practices, but did you
Anonymous character assassination is not acceptable, but I don't think
But, most importantly, I'm tired of hearing a defense for Mike that is
I'm going to include the whole E-mail exchange that I had with Mike, and ----------BIG email exchange below!----------
Below is the very first time I ever communicated with
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Now, a short one week later I was interested in
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Was I "whining"? In Mike's eyes, everyone who hesitates to pay
And the following is priceless:
Here, Mike explains that since I'm not willing to pay his fees, he has
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Mike doesn't really care about anyone but Mike, he makes it pretty clear
Bruce.
I have 3 Comments - Mike - 01-17-2002 One: You sayNice and pleasant exchange, right? I then went on to press him as to why this was his policy.
I say Two: You say that it is easy to compile 700+ without a single complaint and have it NOT represent the facts. Let me ask you and everyone else reading this. How is it that YOU have had 12 transactions, and fully 30% are negative (or less than positive)? How is it that YOU can't maintain a spotless, 100% positive record, if it is not your attitude, that is the problem? Could it be that it is not that easy, as you claim? Could it be that you are the problem and not I? How is it that YOU even bid on one of your own auctions, so that you could further b1tch. It is very easy for anyone who wishes to do a search on your email address on eBay and see YOUR record. Anyone who knows anything about ebay and the feedback system can verify that people who are negative (as you) get negatives. I have never had a problem with you. It is YOU that have had a problem with me. I get along with people. Many don't use PayPal and have stated so here. You just choose to fly off the handle because I wouldn't accept it. Three I can't ask people to back me up. I'm quite sure that I have 500 to 1 support rather than complaints. But that is up to them, to decide, if they wish to post support for me.
But I have not resorted to using fake names, to support my own case, as you have done.
Mike: you're a liar. - W. Bruce Maguire II - 01-17-2002 Mike:
You said: Let me ask you and everyone else reading this. How is it that YOU have had 12 transactions, and fully 30% are negative (or less than positive)? Mike: Not only are you a jerk, you are a liar. My eBay ID is "buytxn", and this is my feedback:
0 neutrals.
1 negatives. 1 are from unique users and count Go look it up, Mike. That *ONE* negative is the one I explained in my letter. How's that shoe taste, Mike? That's the last time I will respond to any of the bile that comes from you.
Bruce.
Re: *LONG* Mike, "feedback", and "attacks" (WAS: anonymous postings, etc.) - Brian Ashbach - 01-17-2002 I have purchased from Mike before, and found him to be courteous and helpful. Both the items I bought from him were exactly as described. Yes, Bidpay is expensive, but money orders at my bank are only $3.00. I don't know and don't care how much money people make off a purchase, I focus on the price of the item and whether I want it at that price. If someone doesn't take PayPal, I factor in the additional costs and potential for being taken advantage of.
For the record: - W. Bruce Maguire II - 01-17-2002 For everyone on this Forum: My eBay ID is "buytxn" (I work at Texas Instruments, get it ;-) You can check my feedback. I have 118 positives, and the *ONE* negative from the retaliatory-feedback guy that I mentioned in my letter to Dave. If you look closely in my post, you can see this in the second E-mail:
> >> > Question from: buytxn
Bruce.
A few comments - Dave Hicks - 01-17-2002 A few comments. First, thank you for an honest and well-documented post. Second, I can't really control someone else's perception of who I am "appearing to defend" so I'm not going to get overly concerned about it. Those people who have been around here for awhile should think back to the other times I've caught people posting under multiple IDs to enhance their story and consider whether I'm supporting one side over another or simply pointing out the use of fake personas. On Feedback I stand by my original comment: "I realize that Ebay's feedback system is far from perfect but not ONE complaint in more than 700 transactions???" I will just add that people comment on communications all the time on feedback - feedback does not only cover receiving the product. Again, far from perfect, but then so is a thread with comments from one person pretending to be three. I was attempting to balance out the imperfections at least a little with what little information I could find. As for the moot point - well honestly Bruce that's what I was thinking too. You, me, and Mike can all see from a prior exchange that you wouldn't be bidding on his auction so I don't see the worry about the shipping charge. His charge probably includes packaging and maybe an allowance for time, gas etc. If you don't feel you should pay for those, there are plenty of other auctions on ebay to choose from. I think that some people get hung up about what they "should" pay but in a free market, sellers try to get as much as they can and buyers try to pay as little. It's not so much a matter of "should" as "can" on both sides. Honestly, from reading the transcript provided, I don't understand why the conversation continued beyond the first exchange. Buyers and sellers all have their conditions and ideas of a fair price. In a free market some will connect and others won't. You want Mike to do something that he doesn't want to. I don't understand why that wasn't the end of the discussion. This is, by the way, exactly what I was thinking when I read "John Smith's" claim that Mike "more or less" told "John" to "go to hell with his money". On the less side, perhaps all Mike really said was that he refused to accept Paypal. By the way, as for Mike's "warped" logic I saw someone complaining about being charged back by Paypal on another forum just two days ago. Apparently he never read the terms of use before clicking the agree button. Among the responses were several along the lines of: "That's why I won't take Paypal". I do agree with you that ebay is generally slanted in favor of the seller. As I said in another post that's why I prefer to sell there. I think you'll find that sellers not shipping until they have cash in hand is rather common however. I also feel that as a seller, taking higher risks can lead to greater rewards. However, just as some people prefer CDs to Stocks, some sellers don't want to take risks. I am not saying that Mike is right or that you are right. You've simply made incompatible choices. You should chose a seller who is more compatible with you. " I figured that that was fair enough---he'd just go about it without my patronage!" Exactly. It took a long time and some admitted ranting to get there but this is totally fair and reasonable bottom line. Sometime I'll have to tell you about the time my first question to an ebay seller got a response that started with "You know where you can shove it!" and went down hill from there. (Don't worry folks - it wasn't a calculator.)
Maybe over a beer sometime...
Thanks for the great service Mike - Greg Harris (Sydney Australia) - 01-17-2002 I have purchased from Mike three times, and found him to be VERY helpful. The most important thing is that the items I bought from him were exactly as described. Also, I purchased an item from some nerd (sorry over emotional comment), who would not ship outside the US (all this involves is writing a one line longer address on the package). Mike agreed that he would trans-ship the item for me along with the HP67 I had purchased from him at the same time. This is really going out of the way for your customer, thank you again Mike; I look forward to being one of your customers again in the future. Yes, I find his payment methods expensive, but so are the calculators, I went into the deal knowing what rules were.
All the best Re: *LONG* Mike, "feedback", and "attacks" (WAS: anonymous postings, etc.) - Dale Richmond - 01-17-2002 Hello to all, You must have MULTIPLE accounts then - Mike - 01-17-2002 I have never done business with you. I had no idea what your eBay account was. I searched based on your email. How many accounts do you have? Do you drop bad feedback accounts? You are using maguire@ti.com here as your email adddress. It is quite easy to go to eBay, click Search, click "by bidder", enter the email address here, and press search. What I stated is what comes up! If you search on my email address, mikesdavis, comes up. I have only ONE account. How many do you have? There is NOTHING that I have lied about. So, is this your account on eBay (a-made-guy)? If not, why is he using your email address?
Anyone is free to search and verify for themselves.
Re: *LONG* Mike, "feedback", and "attacks" (WAS: anonymous postings, etc.) - arie nobel - 01-18-2002 Just a general note after reading the diatribe of "Bruce": I have just finished dealing with Mr. Davis and have found him to be both fair and also even somewhat accommodating. I am amazed that someone should think that he has the right to almost "force" someone to change his business practices in order to do business with him. Mr. Davis not only dealt quite fairly with me, but also answered a large number of questions which he surely did not have to do at all, for which I thank him publicly. For the REAL Record - Mike - 01-18-2002 I did some checking after he called me a liar, to see if I could have been mistaken. You will notice in this exchange that Bruce uses 3 (count them) 3 different email addresses. Yes, he uses w.b.maguire@ieee.org now and it returns (buytxn) BUT he also uses maguire@ti.com in THIS email exchange and in the post on this forum. Guess what that email returns? It returns a 2nd and possibly discarded account (a-made-guy) that had 12 transactions, one of which he bid on his own auction. AND 30% less than positive. And he has the unmitigated gall to call me a liar. He knew about the other account, when he made this accusation. The telling thing is that the complaint, in the 2nd account, was that it used PayPal and the guy he bought from claimed, "Money Order only auction-Demanded to send check-NEVER DID!! a-made-what? " Notice the demanded. Doesn't that sound familiar? Notice how he tried to dictate the terms in that auction, just as he did in mine.
Please check it out for yourselves. Go to eBay, click search, click advanced options, select search by "bidder", enter maguire@ti.com email address and see what it returned.
Re: *LONG* Mike, "feedback", and "attacks" (WAS: anonymous postings, etc.) - Giorgio Ungarelli - 01-18-2002 I am also one of the eBay members that has purchased several times from Mike. Every time the items bought from him were exactly as described in his clear auction descriptions and the pictures he takes are always of the item for sale (which is much more than can be said about a lot of other sellers on eBay). In addition I have found Mike to be very helpful. For example, he fixed the gummy wheel problem on an HP-67 that I did not buy from him, free of charge. I had the calculator sent to him, he fixed it and I (obviously) paid for the shipping back to me. I also wanted to point out that Mike does (as of the last couple of months) accept PayPal, at least from me. I don’t know if this is the case with everybody or just people he has had previous dealings with. As for the “additional fees”, as an eBay seller myself I also charge $0.30 + 3% of the winning bid if the buyer wants to pay me with PayPal. Lastly, I could not agree more with Dale Richmond (previous post on this thread) that Mike is a great asset to the HP "community", and with Arie Nobel (also previous post on this thread) that Mike does not have to change his business practices in order to do business with a bidder that does not accept his payment methods and rules. Regards,
Giorgio Ungarelli, Geneva, Switzerland.
Re: *LONG* Mike, "feedback", and "attacks" (WAS: anonymous postings, etc.) - Frédéric ALBERT (from France) - 01-18-2002 How to be sure that these four last posts haven't been posted by this dear Mister Mike ???? Isn'it Mister Bruce !!
Fred
sounds like Mike needs to hire Clinton's PR guy - union goon - 01-18-2002 ..
this is the very first positive I ever read - 67 owner - 01-18-2002 out of hundreds...
ASSET???? Shirley, you jest!!!! - 67 owner - 01-18-2002 May I suggest that you in the 1%?
Re: *LONG* Mike, "feedback", and "attacks" (WAS: anonymous postings, etc.) - Giorgio Ungarelli - 01-18-2002 And, Fred, how do we know you're not Mister Bruce?
Re: ASSET???? Shirley, you jest!!!! - Giorgio Ungarelli - 01-18-2002 Somehow I don't think so. But even if I was, hey, I'm a happy customer of Mike's and I have the right (just like you do) to make my opinion known to the rest of the readers of this forum.
how about an example? - a colllector, not a dealer - 01-18-2002 An example? take a look at the bid history of Ebay Item # 1319962659
I agree wholeheartedly - 67 owner - 01-18-2002 And I'm glad you are happy. But it appears you are in the tiny minority.
Re: how about an example? - Giorgio Ungarelli - 01-18-2002 Your point being???
GREED - amazed - 01-18-2002 ..
Re: GREED - Giorgio Ungarelli - 01-18-2002 Why greed? Anybody else could have bid as well! That's the whole point of Dutch auctions on eBay.
watch for them on Ebay - hp67 owner - 01-18-2002 in a few days. He will try to sell them back to the people he sniped. At 10X the price. PT Barnum was right. There'a a sucker born every minute. Every 30 seconds overseas.
Somewhat misrepresented - Gene - 01-18-2002 Bruce's ID that you reference has 8 positive feedback comments. 1 neutral from someone no longer registered...note that ANY comment left from someone who becomes no longer a registered user is converted to neutral. This one does not count. There is 1 negative comment from a user. Apparently, this was one deal that went "bad". There is then a neutral comment that Bruce posted FOR HIMSELF to explain about the negative comment. The negative comment guy then left another neutral comment. So, you are quite wrong, IMO, to represent the feedback for Bruce's ebay account in such strongly negative terms. He had one bad experience while using his work email address/ID. Negative experiences happen! My OWN ebay ID has two negatives. One was from an idiot who sent an email that bounced because a server was down and left a negative feedback "to get your attention". What a nut. The other negative feedback involves a buyer from Italy and was a bizarre situation where neither of our emails ever reached the other. Since I never heard from him, I left a negative feedback. His MO arrived the next day. I felt terrible. Mailed his package off. Unfortunately, all he saw was my negative feedback comment, so he left me one. Point is that negative feedbacks sometimes happen. Note too, that he quit using this ID for feedback and/or completed buying back in April of 1999. Certainly not recent.
Just my thoughts, Not at all - Look again... plus - Mike - 01-18-2002 He called me a liar for referencing this dropped account, when all along he knew it existed. He has lied by omission. You are misinformed about a neutral from a non-registered user as not counting. These are NEGATIVES that were converted to neutral. You will notice that the non-registered users are left in the listings. His last item is from a non-registered user. THAT was a negative. I can prove that statement. Go to my account. Scroll to the 3rd page. You will find a non-registered user that left a positive. Positives are not neutralized when someone becomes unregistered. ONLY negatives are converted to neutral. Also, anyone that knows anything about eBay knows that neutrals are negative as well. Just not as bad negatives. I have not misrepresented anything. I stated the 100% truth and told people to look for themselves and judge for themselves, as you have done. I respect that. But this person has lied to everyone by not admitting to his multiple eBay accounts that show other negatives. Plus, the complaints match his attitude here and the one that he displayed in his email exchange. So, that in fact means he had 2 that were negative in 7 transactions (when you discount that one was his own bid). 2 negatives in 7 bids is 28.57% (hardly an exaggeration). Further, what I said was that it was less than positive. Absolutely true! Further, the negative comments show that the problem was the same as what he listed in his email exchange. He is hard to deal with and tries to dictate the terms of the auction. He is consistent in that approach.
He is insinuating that my record does not reflect my customer relations. He attacks me and says that my record is misleading. That coming from a man that 1) uses alias's to back up his story, on this forum; switches accounts on eBay to cover up less than positive feedback; cannot maintain a 100% record; attacks people that support me to dissuade others from backing me up. Hardly a man that is credible.
Sigh...quote from ebay's site - Gene - 01-18-2002 From ebay's site "When a user's status is changed to Not a Registered User, all feedback left by this user remains unaltered. Prior to 1999 however, as noted in some profiles, feedback was converted to neutral when a user became no longer registered." Which is exactly as I said. I did not and am not commenting on any other part of your conversations with others here. My analysis of his "feedback" is accurate as I presented previously.
Gene
Re: watch for them on Ebay - Giorgio Ungarelli - 01-18-2002 What's wrong with making a profit? Isn't that what a market economy is all about? If you generalize, then we are all suckers, because for everything we buy, somebody is making a profit.
Let's cut through some Crap - Dave Hicks - 01-18-2002 The following IDs belong to one person: "Ebay Reg", "67 owner", "a colllector, not a dealer", " hp15c owner", "god", "union goon", "amazed", "92 owner", "HP92 Owner" (I am omitting IDs from this list that could identify him even partially.) The following IDs also belong to another person: "HP 67 User 2", " Ebay Watcher", "Collector", "Goody2shoes", UK calc enthusiast, "Observer", "UK calcman", "jr (Texas)". As with the first fake ID user, I have omitted the names which would identify him. "John Smith" is also "John Mills" though he usually posts under a label rather than a name. Since that label represents his usual identity here I'm not going to specify it. It should be noted that two of these users have occasionally added an email address (in a non-existent domain) to their posts. I assume this is an attempt to appear legitimate. By contrast, the people who have posted in this thread supporting Mike, all appear to be separate individuals. In addition, their IP addresses make sense. For example, the IP addresses map to the domains given in their email addresses and the guy who claims to be from Australia posted from an Australian IP. In looking through all these posts I find 4 people who are mad at Mike. Bruce and one person who posts under an aliases including "John Smith" don't like the fact that Mike doesn't (or didn't) take paypal. Personally I find this one to be much ado about nothing but they are well within their rights to choose to only buy from people who take Paypal. The other two people (let's call them Ebay Reg and Ebay Watcher). Do not wish to have their identities known for reasons that are not entirely clear to me. Both of them are substantial users of ebay and appear to have issues with the way Mike uses Ebay. Part of the their anger appears to extend from the fact that Mike is allegedly able to buy an HP-71 for $47 one day on ebay and resell it on ebay for $470 the next. Is so, I have to say I'm impressed and amazed and more power to him. As I pointed out in another thread I've been warning people about ebay prices for a very long time. However, this was always meant to point out alternatives to buyers. It was never meant to condemn ebay or ebay sellers. In my opinion, Ebay was always meant to be a money machine not a social gathering of collectors. (And also in my opinion, that's OK.) My local bookstore will buy a used book back, mark it up 100% and put it on the self the next day. Why only 100% and not 1000%? Is it because they're "nice"? No, I think it's because if they marked them up 1000% they'd have a huge supply/demand imbalance and other stores would appear and destroy them. Similarly the local used Honda dealer has prices on his late model Hondas that exceed the MSRP of equally equipped new cars. Why? Because he can. Thus, I'm amazed at the idea that Mike can mark up %1000 and not be undercut by the competition, but if he can, all I can say is wow! Maybe someone else should get into the business and mark em up only 900%? I don't know Mike or the people posting under aliases. I've never had any business with any of these people that I can remember. I will say, however, that I feel that the people posting under these aliases are weakening whatever case they think they have. Apologies for typos - this was posted in haste. Dave
Re: watch for them on Ebay - Todd G - 01-18-2002 That statement is beyond idiotic.
If you paid $20 for a MIB HP-70, and the seller made a profit, would you consider yourself a sucker? I don't think so.
Re: watch for them on Ebay - Giorgio Ungarelli - 01-19-2002 I don't think it's idiotic at all. What is, IMHO, is the tactfulness (or lack thereof) that you put in your terse posting. But, hey, I am not the repository of all knowledge. First of all I challenge you to find a MIB HP-70 for $20 to "prove your point". Secondly, and in all cases, if the seller made a profit, that means you could have bought it for less than what you paid for it.
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