Yeah, he's been sending them out.
As long as he insists that full real names be displayed, I won't even think about going there. Been burned before when he suddenly did that out of the blue and retroactively revealed our full names on the boards. Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.
He was already told that some of us prefer to keep a little anonymity online for security reasons. We don't have any problem giving out our full names to people we know and to administrators. And we don't mind having our first names tossed out every once in a while. But to have it all out in public along with our online usernames can be a problem.
My previous stalking issue has been resolved. I don't want to have to deal it that again.
That's the reason why I NEVER ever bought another item from BidStart after racking up 10K+ items purchased. Does any buyer really want their name out for public display? Until I see signs of him back-tracking on this policy and officially stating so (not that I would be confident he wouldn't arbitrarily change his mind again), I won't consider trying it.
Just my opinion.
I guess my own opinion is that it is incredibly easy to find information on the web. I doubt that there is any way to hide from someone who wants to find information about you.
Let's take social security numbers - remember when people were told to engrave their social security number on valuables? Remember when most people had their social security numbers on their checks, and if you didn't they would ask you for it at the store if you wrote them a check.
Times change - right? Not so fast - they tell you not to carry your social security card in your wallet - ever. Then when you turn 65 they send you a Medicare card that you are supposed to carry in your wallet at all times. Your identification number - printed in large letters is ...... your social security number. With the new requirement for all medical records to be computerized your number can be viewed by anyone who has access to your medical records, probably the least secure of all large scale systems.
Failing that it is allegedly possible to buy your SS number online for under $10. That used to cost you around $50 to have a PI procure for you.
"You can run but you sure can't hide" - oft used paraphrase of the Joe Louis quote - not the song.
I'm not worried about financial issues or identity theft. It's something only those who have had to deal with stalkers would understand.
Also, just because someone can get info about you if they really wanted to, doesn't mean that I should make it any easier for them, and definitely don't need anybody's help to make it easier. It's a trust issue.
When you register you are not required to have your full name displayed.
All I know is that the full names are showing up in his forum. We were not allowed to opt out of that when he suddenly instituted that policy at BidStart.
That being said, I know a lot of people don't have a problem with that or don't care. For those silly people like me who don't like being stalked, it would be advisable to check on his current policy on posting in his forum. I admit, I didn't bother to go ask, because I don't know what his policy tomorrow might be.
Looks like Mark is back. Just went and looked at HipStamp and it is laid out very well. I see a lot of names I recognize.
Will have to see how it goes. Looks like BidStart (SG) is on the way out, and I can see why.
"All I know is that the full names are showing up in his forum. We were not allowed to opt out of that when he suddenly instituted that policy at BidStart."
Well, I went on HipStamp and did some shopping. The site still needs some work (can't go from Watching to Cart??!!), but I made my first purchase on there.
The seller: none other than Luree, our own purrfin2. I had been looking for Aland 185 (block of 4 ducks) for quite a while, she had it, and now *I* will have it.
(Got to spend SOME of that hard earned money on stamps, right?)
BOB
Obviously, I still have an axe to grind. So this will be my last post on this matter.
"Both of the forums I frequent in my other hobby require you post with your real name. That was done to flush out the trolls who were always causing problems."
I just checked out Hipstamp and found it to be a mess of a jumble! I tried to browse the United States category. There are a few sellers who dominate, one Paul Cook with 467,000 listings. The next four have 92,000 listings,65,000 listings, 62,000 listings and 58,000 listings. It's obvious this was done to pump up the site and make it look full. Even at the penny a lot listing price, you can see nobody here actually paid that. 467,000 listings would be $4,670 in listing fees.
The problem with this is that some of them have listed 20-50 of the same exact item! So you wind up seeing entire pages with 48 of the same item. I then tried their sorts. Sorting by Country / Catalog number and that was useless as well because it seems their listing method doesn't require people do so. The first page of my USA /Catalog number sort gives me the first three entries are foreign stamps. Then it starts with Scott 918, the Albania stamp from the Overrun Countries set... I stopped counting at 50 entries from the same two sellers... same fricking stamp... mint, used, blocks, pairs and even way overpriced ones in PSA jackets.
That right there was enough to get me to never go back to the site.
If it is set up the same way as the pre-SG BS, then you should be able remove specific sellers from your search. Mark was always very good about including a lot of filters.
See, no rant.
Obviously done for numbers but no different than when Bidstart had Poppe with his 2 million listings - almost all at full Scott or more regardless of quality.
There is no listing fee for store items, by the way. The 1 cent fee is for auctions only. Final value fee is 8 percent.
This is truly in Beta right now .. the main difference between this new site and the current Bidstart/SG site is communication - it exists.
Duplication is a problem and always has been. Paul has the same identical 470,000 stamps on the Stanley Gibbons Marketplace (and Bidstart)- even the big guys feel they need the numbers for "show".
Well, I just took a peek. It looks like he hasn't implemented a lot of the filters he used to have. Give him a little time. He's obviously still adding on stuff, and I would expect several more search filters to be available in time.
I'd at least expect him to mimic the eBay categories, as nearly every other sales site had... where is USA- Pre 1900 etc for instance. That would have got me to browse a bit deeper. Click on USA and wade through many pages of recent to current US stamps at ambitious prices.
Agreed that there aren't any bargains here, but I'm game to pay for something that just hits me as 'gotta have' occasionally.
And if he's going to indulge dealers putting 50 of the same stamp in, go to an Amazon format showing one entry, with "57 choices" below it. Then people could wade through them all to find the perfect specimen.
It's in beta. That's how StampWants started. He steadily added "features" over the years.
The drill downs most closely resemble the last ones from when Gibbons was dictating what they wanted with a few of the more egregious flaws removed. Visit again in a month and you will no doubt see a different website. What is there now were things that could be easily grabbed and made to work together,
I will say watching the progress of Stampwants/Bidstart way back when that the lack of false starts and the speed of site development were pretty darn good. The SG debacle appeared to be the result of constant change requests from SG - I've been involved on and off with system development since the late 70's and it was pretty easy to see where the problems were.
Mark's trying to bring back the old StampWants atmosphere, but the appearance is very much like the Gibbons Marketplace, which he put together. The stores with large numbers of stamps in them were synced over from eBay. StampWants had that too. I understand that the sync from Gibbons wasn't working at one point. I don't know if that was fixed.
And yes, a user's full name will appear in the Forums. Handles are allowed in the selling area. I saw no place where to shut off the full name and just use a handle even though it says that full names are "optional".
I don't know how long I'll hang on over there. I don't want to get involved with the Forums. I have plenty to do over here.
just went there... clicked on Confederate stamps... 13 listings... 9 of the 13 listed as facsimiles. LAME.
Responses to a couple of the recent comments:
Mark said in one of the forums today that, for now, sales will be via stores only. Auctions will come later and I haven't seen any sort of schedule or priorities for major additions to the site. Also, a few days ago he said other collectibles would have their own sites and didn't offer a timeframe, but indicated it would be a while before those other sites are developed. He obviously has his hands full with HipStamp (and I suppose HipComic which has apparently been live for a few months. It's not clear to me if he has staff assisting or not, but he's personally responding to all the comments and questions in the forums as far as I can tell.
As of a few minutes ago the sync with BidStart was still down. It was down when I first registered on the 11th. I think it's been down continuously since then. However, even without the sync, Mark was able copy my BidStart listings to HipStamp with very few problems. Since sales at Bidstart/SGM have been rare this year, I disabled the sync feature at HS. No point in syncing to a void. Of course, part of that is due to my limiting sales to the US about a year ago. At some point soon, I've got to re-evaluate that issue.
Kim, I am surprised you still get Mark's emails. I get none, so I must be on his "s--t list".
I hounded him before on the listing protocol..but he just would not see it as he was really set in his ways. Still I never came to "blows" with him, and never was banned, so I guess I did not make an impression to deserve an email.
Here was the number one issue in my mind: Unless you can provide in the list of sortable parameters a cat number (and cat type) field(s) and thus sort on cat numbers, it will spew garbage, lots of garbage, especially on the low cat numbers. Same thing about the Year, abreviated to 2 digits or not!
I wonder if he is going to address it here, or just duplicate the old site, warts and mistakes as well. As far as Dicussions, I am like you. I won't post there. But I will take a look at the stores being set up.
As far as Mark is concerned, I suppose that having been fired from SG, he is free to compete with them. But most company purchases (for the symbolic $1 or more) have non compete causes, so I wonder what his legal standing is. Probably safe, given that he was fired, but I still wonder.
When I sold my old company, I had a 5 year non compete clause. They did everything they could to keep me and not fire me, to avoid my potential competion. I eventually left on my own but waited the 5 years before re-entering the field. Wonder if SG was savvy enough about the legal ramifications of firing him, or if they had a special contract that can be enforced?
I do wish him well. He definitely brought something significant to the stamp e-collecting world with StampWants (renamed BidStarts).
Any chance of an inverted Jenny contest this time?
rrr..
"Any chance of an inverted Jenny contest this time?"
I will be using HipStamp only as another site to buy stamps on. I already see a few favorite sellers that I have missed.
BOB
Ok so had a look, tried to search for some HK stuff but overwhelmed by the duplicate entries. Filters totally non existent. Descriptions of items I did look at were way off the mark. What in my opinion constitutes VFU which seems, in the sellers eyes, to include heavy wavy line obliterations.
Guess, unless it improves a thousand fold, somewhere I will not be purchasing any stamps from.
I'm not terribly fussy but come on folks lets have some honest descriptions of the items that are for sale.
sheepshanks, why paint with such a broad brush when there are over 150 individual stores set up at HipStamp? Surely, you're not claiming to have reviewed all of them!
rrr,
"Unless you can provide in the list of sortable parameters a cat number (and cat type) field(s) and thus sort on cat numbers, it will spew garbage....Same thing about the Year."
If I'm understanding your comment correctly, Mark has addressed this at least in part. The cat # can be entered separately along with the year, stamp type, stamp format, condition and stamp topic. This is true for individual listings and in the use of the bulk lister.
Since I'm a seller (of my accumulation) and haven't been a buyer in years, I'm wondering how best to list stamps in this new (to me) setup. I normally have included all (or most) of that info in my titles to the extent I could. Mark has lengthened the titles at HS to 80 characters and I'm wondering how important it is for buyers to continue including all of that (duplicate) information in the description.
I'd appreciate thoughts on how buyers prefer to see this handled!
"... I suppose that having been fired from SG, he is free to compete with them. But most company purchases (for the symbolic $1 or more) have non compete causes, so I wonder what his legal standing is. Probably safe, given that he was fired, but I still wonder. When I sold my old company, I had a 5 year non compete clause. They did everything they could to keep me and not fire me, to avoid my potential competion. I eventually left on my own but waited the 5 years before re-entering the field. Wonder if SG was savvy enough about the legal ramifications of firing him, or if they had a special contract that can be enforced?"
Keesindy, I searched whatever got thrown back at me in the following;
I searched first under a broad "Hong Kong" title and got 98 pages, and within the first 9 pages of 48 images there were many duplicated listings with the same photos, so presumably the same item. Have the sellers listed the same item many times or do they really have identical postmarked items.
I then went and tried entering search as "Hong Kong Scott #636a as an individual number, no joy, I tried to search for a set using The scott set numbers within the country, inconclusive results. The items returned did not include the word "Litho" an did not have the (a) numbers.
In these days of drop down list choices it is not difficult for a program to sort on multiple parameters. Ancestry does it for every search.
It would appear that the listing format and program have not been related to each other. Make the listings comply with rules and write the program to investigate them in any order.
If I go to the "other" site and search for Honk Konk; Honk Kong; or Hong Konk; I get different results back each time, with the addition of did I mean Hong Kong.
The HipStamp site will only be as good as the program that has been written if it has the means to interrogate the sellers descriptions.
If it works for you as a seller fine but it did not work for me as a buyer so all the "stores / sellers" have lost a potential customer. Something which with a declining hobby they can ill afford.
Right now all of the listings have been transferred from Bidstart, some by synch and I believe some by other means.
The platforms are different - some things will probably require sellers to manually change things around. Some things will be able to be fixed somewhat by programming. If items are entered individually there is no problem.
This is little different from what now happens when Ebay is synched with Bidstart and/or SGM.
That 150 sellers have joined since early April, almost exclusively from Bidstart, speaks volumes for the belief that things will work (as they did a decade ago). Many of those joining are members here. The world of collecting stamps and postal history is a small one.
"I'm wondering how best to list stamps in this new (to me) setup."
Hi rrr,
I agree. If I remember correctly Doug used to request this on StampWants on a regular basis!
rrr, thanks for that explanation.
I had about 550 items that Mark copied to HS from BidStart. The information for four data fields (country, cat #, condition and stamp format) was successfully pulled from my titles and populate those separate fields. I've been slowly going through my listings and manually putting the year, topic and stamp type in those three fields since they weren't populated with that data. I've done about 20% of my old BS listings. So it's doable for someone like me with only a few hundred previously listed items. Anyone who had far more listings at BidStart and didn't maintain separate data fields locally (like me!) will find it far more challenging to overcome the old BidStart data limitations for those old listings.
Eventually, once I learn how to use the new bulk lister, it would probably be easier to reconfigure my spreadsheet for those separate data elements and then re-upload everything via CSV files. It's not my forte and I need to wait for some instructions before diving into using that new lister.
If I understand how the searches work, the new HS system allows for cleaner searches, but those searches are tainted by the old listings that can't fully take advantage of the new separate data fields. Correct? If that's the case, I guess the searches would remain tainted until the sellers get their data cleaned up to take advantage of the HS capabilities.
Yes Nigel, I did. Never got it. I was hopeful when I saw Hipstamp categories. There's a little bit there, but not fully what I envisioned by any stretch.
The following message is being displayed - anyone have any info besides the obvious??
"Due to a current legal issue, the purchase and sale of items has been temporarily disabled for this week. Please rest assured that all of your data is safe, and we are doing everything in our power to resolve the current issue. During this time, no credit cards and/or store subscription fees will be charged. We’ll provide an update as soon as we have one. We apologize for any inconveneince."
Probably non-competition clause with Gibbons, or he's using code from the Gibbons Marketplace. My speculation.
Interesting, and I am going to do some guessing.....If he was fired, then he can compete. But if he uses ANY of the intellectual property of SG, then they can shut him down. He has to do it all from scratch and at arms length, and need to document it.
Rare that anyone is shut down, unless the other party can show to a judge some due cause with clear evidence backing their claim. I think Mark may have tried some short cuts, which may be understandable since he created both systems and cannot tell the boundaries.
He cannot use any of the material he sold to SG to start his new business, not even the structure that is now the property of SG.
The feel of his new business has to be quite different from the old one, and I don't think it is, from what I have seen at HipStamp. Going after the old customer base may be another thing he is restricted from doing, even if he was fired.
Also the why he was fired may enter the equation.
But the source of this new business information has to be assembled from scratch, and not from old business correspondance, or business cards, nor from their site. The old contact lists are not his property anymore.
Having been in a situation vaguely similar in one of my former companies, I can recommend that he should be working very conservatively with a lawyer, before making a return splash, and should be avoiding not only the actual, but the appearance of using similar software code. Anything he did at BS is no longer his.
Lawsuits are often also tactical, as his pockets are not as deep as theirs, but it is also very rare that a business is halted at this stage by the legal system.
rrr...
In business today, many companies include a Non-Compete Letter in the new hire package. I know that the consulting company I'm associated with does. It states that I cannot use their intellectual property, I cannot work for or solicit any client that I was introduced to through them for a year. Pretty standard.
Even if fired, companies will hold your final pay and anything due you hostage in return for signing papers that often include the non-compete wording.
"... If he was fired, then he can compete ..."
Agreed Ikey and I am NOT making any statement or speculation about Mark's character. What I am saying is that non compete clauses are usually uninforceable if one is fired. If one quits, it is different, especially if you were paid the minimum symbolic dollar or more. So the circumstances of Mark leaving SG are relevant.
A person is entitled to work in their area of expertise, and US court rarely if ever inforce them.. No matter what is written. But one has to be extra careful because you have to avoid the appearance of doing something wrong, or taking any short cut... And this is easy to do when you are the one who did it all before... Not implying intent , but even if what is in your brain is not the other person's property, still you must avoid the appearances of having used any short cut! The courts will inforce intellectual property ownership.
What I find interesting is that it seems his business is temporarily shut down. The biggest hurdle to any start up is a distraction, and law suits are the worse distractions and among the costliest too.
I am sorry for Mark.
Rrr...
It's interesting that in less than a month and a half more than 200 dealers are on line (most from Bidstart) and that there are more than 2,000,000 listings if memory serve.
I realize that has no bearing on litigation but if the temporary shutdown is due to action by SG I wonder if they have considered that since Bidstart/SG make up such a small percentage of most dealers sales that pulling their store from SG is a viable option (there are exceptions).
3 years ago Bidstart accounted for 75 per cent of my sales. Last year it was less than 10 per cent and except for losing a place to park inventory it wouldn't bother me at all to part ways with SG.
Has anyone else received an e-mail from Mark Rosenberg, former owner of StampWants/bidStart? It seems he has created a new website dedicated to buying and selling of stamps, HipStamp.com. The site address puts him in NC.
The site doesn't look much different than some of the SG/bS pages. Will have to wait and see on this one.
re: Mark Rosenberg E-mail
Yeah, he's been sending them out.
As long as he insists that full real names be displayed, I won't even think about going there. Been burned before when he suddenly did that out of the blue and retroactively revealed our full names on the boards. Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.
He was already told that some of us prefer to keep a little anonymity online for security reasons. We don't have any problem giving out our full names to people we know and to administrators. And we don't mind having our first names tossed out every once in a while. But to have it all out in public along with our online usernames can be a problem.
My previous stalking issue has been resolved. I don't want to have to deal it that again.
That's the reason why I NEVER ever bought another item from BidStart after racking up 10K+ items purchased. Does any buyer really want their name out for public display? Until I see signs of him back-tracking on this policy and officially stating so (not that I would be confident he wouldn't arbitrarily change his mind again), I won't consider trying it.
Just my opinion.
re: Mark Rosenberg E-mail
I guess my own opinion is that it is incredibly easy to find information on the web. I doubt that there is any way to hide from someone who wants to find information about you.
Let's take social security numbers - remember when people were told to engrave their social security number on valuables? Remember when most people had their social security numbers on their checks, and if you didn't they would ask you for it at the store if you wrote them a check.
Times change - right? Not so fast - they tell you not to carry your social security card in your wallet - ever. Then when you turn 65 they send you a Medicare card that you are supposed to carry in your wallet at all times. Your identification number - printed in large letters is ...... your social security number. With the new requirement for all medical records to be computerized your number can be viewed by anyone who has access to your medical records, probably the least secure of all large scale systems.
Failing that it is allegedly possible to buy your SS number online for under $10. That used to cost you around $50 to have a PI procure for you.
"You can run but you sure can't hide" - oft used paraphrase of the Joe Louis quote - not the song.
re: Mark Rosenberg E-mail
I'm not worried about financial issues or identity theft. It's something only those who have had to deal with stalkers would understand.
Also, just because someone can get info about you if they really wanted to, doesn't mean that I should make it any easier for them, and definitely don't need anybody's help to make it easier. It's a trust issue.
re: Mark Rosenberg E-mail
When you register you are not required to have your full name displayed.
re: Mark Rosenberg E-mail
All I know is that the full names are showing up in his forum. We were not allowed to opt out of that when he suddenly instituted that policy at BidStart.
That being said, I know a lot of people don't have a problem with that or don't care. For those silly people like me who don't like being stalked, it would be advisable to check on his current policy on posting in his forum. I admit, I didn't bother to go ask, because I don't know what his policy tomorrow might be.
re: Mark Rosenberg E-mail
Looks like Mark is back. Just went and looked at HipStamp and it is laid out very well. I see a lot of names I recognize.
Will have to see how it goes. Looks like BidStart (SG) is on the way out, and I can see why.
re: Mark Rosenberg E-mail
"All I know is that the full names are showing up in his forum. We were not allowed to opt out of that when he suddenly instituted that policy at BidStart."
re: Mark Rosenberg E-mail
Well, I went on HipStamp and did some shopping. The site still needs some work (can't go from Watching to Cart??!!), but I made my first purchase on there.
The seller: none other than Luree, our own purrfin2. I had been looking for Aland 185 (block of 4 ducks) for quite a while, she had it, and now *I* will have it.
(Got to spend SOME of that hard earned money on stamps, right?)
BOB
re: Mark Rosenberg E-mail
Obviously, I still have an axe to grind. So this will be my last post on this matter.
"Both of the forums I frequent in my other hobby require you post with your real name. That was done to flush out the trolls who were always causing problems."
re: Mark Rosenberg E-mail
I just checked out Hipstamp and found it to be a mess of a jumble! I tried to browse the United States category. There are a few sellers who dominate, one Paul Cook with 467,000 listings. The next four have 92,000 listings,65,000 listings, 62,000 listings and 58,000 listings. It's obvious this was done to pump up the site and make it look full. Even at the penny a lot listing price, you can see nobody here actually paid that. 467,000 listings would be $4,670 in listing fees.
The problem with this is that some of them have listed 20-50 of the same exact item! So you wind up seeing entire pages with 48 of the same item. I then tried their sorts. Sorting by Country / Catalog number and that was useless as well because it seems their listing method doesn't require people do so. The first page of my USA /Catalog number sort gives me the first three entries are foreign stamps. Then it starts with Scott 918, the Albania stamp from the Overrun Countries set... I stopped counting at 50 entries from the same two sellers... same fricking stamp... mint, used, blocks, pairs and even way overpriced ones in PSA jackets.
That right there was enough to get me to never go back to the site.
re: Mark Rosenberg E-mail
If it is set up the same way as the pre-SG BS, then you should be able remove specific sellers from your search. Mark was always very good about including a lot of filters.
See, no rant.
re: Mark Rosenberg E-mail
Obviously done for numbers but no different than when Bidstart had Poppe with his 2 million listings - almost all at full Scott or more regardless of quality.
There is no listing fee for store items, by the way. The 1 cent fee is for auctions only. Final value fee is 8 percent.
This is truly in Beta right now .. the main difference between this new site and the current Bidstart/SG site is communication - it exists.
Duplication is a problem and always has been. Paul has the same identical 470,000 stamps on the Stanley Gibbons Marketplace (and Bidstart)- even the big guys feel they need the numbers for "show".
re: Mark Rosenberg E-mail
Well, I just took a peek. It looks like he hasn't implemented a lot of the filters he used to have. Give him a little time. He's obviously still adding on stuff, and I would expect several more search filters to be available in time.
re: Mark Rosenberg E-mail
I'd at least expect him to mimic the eBay categories, as nearly every other sales site had... where is USA- Pre 1900 etc for instance. That would have got me to browse a bit deeper. Click on USA and wade through many pages of recent to current US stamps at ambitious prices.
Agreed that there aren't any bargains here, but I'm game to pay for something that just hits me as 'gotta have' occasionally.
And if he's going to indulge dealers putting 50 of the same stamp in, go to an Amazon format showing one entry, with "57 choices" below it. Then people could wade through them all to find the perfect specimen.
re: Mark Rosenberg E-mail
It's in beta. That's how StampWants started. He steadily added "features" over the years.
re: Mark Rosenberg E-mail
The drill downs most closely resemble the last ones from when Gibbons was dictating what they wanted with a few of the more egregious flaws removed. Visit again in a month and you will no doubt see a different website. What is there now were things that could be easily grabbed and made to work together,
I will say watching the progress of Stampwants/Bidstart way back when that the lack of false starts and the speed of site development were pretty darn good. The SG debacle appeared to be the result of constant change requests from SG - I've been involved on and off with system development since the late 70's and it was pretty easy to see where the problems were.
re: Mark Rosenberg E-mail
Mark's trying to bring back the old StampWants atmosphere, but the appearance is very much like the Gibbons Marketplace, which he put together. The stores with large numbers of stamps in them were synced over from eBay. StampWants had that too. I understand that the sync from Gibbons wasn't working at one point. I don't know if that was fixed.
And yes, a user's full name will appear in the Forums. Handles are allowed in the selling area. I saw no place where to shut off the full name and just use a handle even though it says that full names are "optional".
I don't know how long I'll hang on over there. I don't want to get involved with the Forums. I have plenty to do over here.
re: Mark Rosenberg E-mail
just went there... clicked on Confederate stamps... 13 listings... 9 of the 13 listed as facsimiles. LAME.
re: Mark Rosenberg E-mail
Responses to a couple of the recent comments:
Mark said in one of the forums today that, for now, sales will be via stores only. Auctions will come later and I haven't seen any sort of schedule or priorities for major additions to the site. Also, a few days ago he said other collectibles would have their own sites and didn't offer a timeframe, but indicated it would be a while before those other sites are developed. He obviously has his hands full with HipStamp (and I suppose HipComic which has apparently been live for a few months. It's not clear to me if he has staff assisting or not, but he's personally responding to all the comments and questions in the forums as far as I can tell.
As of a few minutes ago the sync with BidStart was still down. It was down when I first registered on the 11th. I think it's been down continuously since then. However, even without the sync, Mark was able copy my BidStart listings to HipStamp with very few problems. Since sales at Bidstart/SGM have been rare this year, I disabled the sync feature at HS. No point in syncing to a void. Of course, part of that is due to my limiting sales to the US about a year ago. At some point soon, I've got to re-evaluate that issue.
re: Mark Rosenberg E-mail
Kim, I am surprised you still get Mark's emails. I get none, so I must be on his "s--t list".
I hounded him before on the listing protocol..but he just would not see it as he was really set in his ways. Still I never came to "blows" with him, and never was banned, so I guess I did not make an impression to deserve an email.
Here was the number one issue in my mind: Unless you can provide in the list of sortable parameters a cat number (and cat type) field(s) and thus sort on cat numbers, it will spew garbage, lots of garbage, especially on the low cat numbers. Same thing about the Year, abreviated to 2 digits or not!
I wonder if he is going to address it here, or just duplicate the old site, warts and mistakes as well. As far as Dicussions, I am like you. I won't post there. But I will take a look at the stores being set up.
As far as Mark is concerned, I suppose that having been fired from SG, he is free to compete with them. But most company purchases (for the symbolic $1 or more) have non compete causes, so I wonder what his legal standing is. Probably safe, given that he was fired, but I still wonder.
When I sold my old company, I had a 5 year non compete clause. They did everything they could to keep me and not fire me, to avoid my potential competion. I eventually left on my own but waited the 5 years before re-entering the field. Wonder if SG was savvy enough about the legal ramifications of firing him, or if they had a special contract that can be enforced?
I do wish him well. He definitely brought something significant to the stamp e-collecting world with StampWants (renamed BidStarts).
Any chance of an inverted Jenny contest this time?
rrr..
re: Mark Rosenberg E-mail
"Any chance of an inverted Jenny contest this time?"
re: Mark Rosenberg E-mail
I will be using HipStamp only as another site to buy stamps on. I already see a few favorite sellers that I have missed.
BOB
re: Mark Rosenberg E-mail
Ok so had a look, tried to search for some HK stuff but overwhelmed by the duplicate entries. Filters totally non existent. Descriptions of items I did look at were way off the mark. What in my opinion constitutes VFU which seems, in the sellers eyes, to include heavy wavy line obliterations.
Guess, unless it improves a thousand fold, somewhere I will not be purchasing any stamps from.
I'm not terribly fussy but come on folks lets have some honest descriptions of the items that are for sale.
re: Mark Rosenberg E-mail
sheepshanks, why paint with such a broad brush when there are over 150 individual stores set up at HipStamp? Surely, you're not claiming to have reviewed all of them!
re: Mark Rosenberg E-mail
rrr,
"Unless you can provide in the list of sortable parameters a cat number (and cat type) field(s) and thus sort on cat numbers, it will spew garbage....Same thing about the Year."
If I'm understanding your comment correctly, Mark has addressed this at least in part. The cat # can be entered separately along with the year, stamp type, stamp format, condition and stamp topic. This is true for individual listings and in the use of the bulk lister.
Since I'm a seller (of my accumulation) and haven't been a buyer in years, I'm wondering how best to list stamps in this new (to me) setup. I normally have included all (or most) of that info in my titles to the extent I could. Mark has lengthened the titles at HS to 80 characters and I'm wondering how important it is for buyers to continue including all of that (duplicate) information in the description.
I'd appreciate thoughts on how buyers prefer to see this handled!
re: Mark Rosenberg E-mail
"... I suppose that having been fired from SG, he is free to compete with them. But most company purchases (for the symbolic $1 or more) have non compete causes, so I wonder what his legal standing is. Probably safe, given that he was fired, but I still wonder. When I sold my old company, I had a 5 year non compete clause. They did everything they could to keep me and not fire me, to avoid my potential competion. I eventually left on my own but waited the 5 years before re-entering the field. Wonder if SG was savvy enough about the legal ramifications of firing him, or if they had a special contract that can be enforced?"
re: Mark Rosenberg E-mail
Keesindy, I searched whatever got thrown back at me in the following;
I searched first under a broad "Hong Kong" title and got 98 pages, and within the first 9 pages of 48 images there were many duplicated listings with the same photos, so presumably the same item. Have the sellers listed the same item many times or do they really have identical postmarked items.
I then went and tried entering search as "Hong Kong Scott #636a as an individual number, no joy, I tried to search for a set using The scott set numbers within the country, inconclusive results. The items returned did not include the word "Litho" an did not have the (a) numbers.
In these days of drop down list choices it is not difficult for a program to sort on multiple parameters. Ancestry does it for every search.
It would appear that the listing format and program have not been related to each other. Make the listings comply with rules and write the program to investigate them in any order.
If I go to the "other" site and search for Honk Konk; Honk Kong; or Hong Konk; I get different results back each time, with the addition of did I mean Hong Kong.
The HipStamp site will only be as good as the program that has been written if it has the means to interrogate the sellers descriptions.
If it works for you as a seller fine but it did not work for me as a buyer so all the "stores / sellers" have lost a potential customer. Something which with a declining hobby they can ill afford.
re: Mark Rosenberg E-mail
Right now all of the listings have been transferred from Bidstart, some by synch and I believe some by other means.
The platforms are different - some things will probably require sellers to manually change things around. Some things will be able to be fixed somewhat by programming. If items are entered individually there is no problem.
This is little different from what now happens when Ebay is synched with Bidstart and/or SGM.
That 150 sellers have joined since early April, almost exclusively from Bidstart, speaks volumes for the belief that things will work (as they did a decade ago). Many of those joining are members here. The world of collecting stamps and postal history is a small one.
re: Mark Rosenberg E-mail
"I'm wondering how best to list stamps in this new (to me) setup."
re: Mark Rosenberg E-mail
Hi rrr,
I agree. If I remember correctly Doug used to request this on StampWants on a regular basis!
re: Mark Rosenberg E-mail
rrr, thanks for that explanation.
I had about 550 items that Mark copied to HS from BidStart. The information for four data fields (country, cat #, condition and stamp format) was successfully pulled from my titles and populate those separate fields. I've been slowly going through my listings and manually putting the year, topic and stamp type in those three fields since they weren't populated with that data. I've done about 20% of my old BS listings. So it's doable for someone like me with only a few hundred previously listed items. Anyone who had far more listings at BidStart and didn't maintain separate data fields locally (like me!) will find it far more challenging to overcome the old BidStart data limitations for those old listings.
Eventually, once I learn how to use the new bulk lister, it would probably be easier to reconfigure my spreadsheet for those separate data elements and then re-upload everything via CSV files. It's not my forte and I need to wait for some instructions before diving into using that new lister.
If I understand how the searches work, the new HS system allows for cleaner searches, but those searches are tainted by the old listings that can't fully take advantage of the new separate data fields. Correct? If that's the case, I guess the searches would remain tainted until the sellers get their data cleaned up to take advantage of the HS capabilities.
re: Mark Rosenberg E-mail
Yes Nigel, I did. Never got it. I was hopeful when I saw Hipstamp categories. There's a little bit there, but not fully what I envisioned by any stretch.
re: Mark Rosenberg E-mail
The following message is being displayed - anyone have any info besides the obvious??
"Due to a current legal issue, the purchase and sale of items has been temporarily disabled for this week. Please rest assured that all of your data is safe, and we are doing everything in our power to resolve the current issue. During this time, no credit cards and/or store subscription fees will be charged. We’ll provide an update as soon as we have one. We apologize for any inconveneince."
re: Mark Rosenberg E-mail
Probably non-competition clause with Gibbons, or he's using code from the Gibbons Marketplace. My speculation.
re: Mark Rosenberg E-mail
Interesting, and I am going to do some guessing.....If he was fired, then he can compete. But if he uses ANY of the intellectual property of SG, then they can shut him down. He has to do it all from scratch and at arms length, and need to document it.
Rare that anyone is shut down, unless the other party can show to a judge some due cause with clear evidence backing their claim. I think Mark may have tried some short cuts, which may be understandable since he created both systems and cannot tell the boundaries.
He cannot use any of the material he sold to SG to start his new business, not even the structure that is now the property of SG.
The feel of his new business has to be quite different from the old one, and I don't think it is, from what I have seen at HipStamp. Going after the old customer base may be another thing he is restricted from doing, even if he was fired.
Also the why he was fired may enter the equation.
But the source of this new business information has to be assembled from scratch, and not from old business correspondance, or business cards, nor from their site. The old contact lists are not his property anymore.
Having been in a situation vaguely similar in one of my former companies, I can recommend that he should be working very conservatively with a lawyer, before making a return splash, and should be avoiding not only the actual, but the appearance of using similar software code. Anything he did at BS is no longer his.
Lawsuits are often also tactical, as his pockets are not as deep as theirs, but it is also very rare that a business is halted at this stage by the legal system.
rrr...
re: Mark Rosenberg E-mail
In business today, many companies include a Non-Compete Letter in the new hire package. I know that the consulting company I'm associated with does. It states that I cannot use their intellectual property, I cannot work for or solicit any client that I was introduced to through them for a year. Pretty standard.
Even if fired, companies will hold your final pay and anything due you hostage in return for signing papers that often include the non-compete wording.
re: Mark Rosenberg E-mail
"... If he was fired, then he can compete ..."
re: Mark Rosenberg E-mail
Agreed Ikey and I am NOT making any statement or speculation about Mark's character. What I am saying is that non compete clauses are usually uninforceable if one is fired. If one quits, it is different, especially if you were paid the minimum symbolic dollar or more. So the circumstances of Mark leaving SG are relevant.
A person is entitled to work in their area of expertise, and US court rarely if ever inforce them.. No matter what is written. But one has to be extra careful because you have to avoid the appearance of doing something wrong, or taking any short cut... And this is easy to do when you are the one who did it all before... Not implying intent , but even if what is in your brain is not the other person's property, still you must avoid the appearances of having used any short cut! The courts will inforce intellectual property ownership.
What I find interesting is that it seems his business is temporarily shut down. The biggest hurdle to any start up is a distraction, and law suits are the worse distractions and among the costliest too.
I am sorry for Mark.
Rrr...
re: Mark Rosenberg E-mail
It's interesting that in less than a month and a half more than 200 dealers are on line (most from Bidstart) and that there are more than 2,000,000 listings if memory serve.
I realize that has no bearing on litigation but if the temporary shutdown is due to action by SG I wonder if they have considered that since Bidstart/SG make up such a small percentage of most dealers sales that pulling their store from SG is a viable option (there are exceptions).
3 years ago Bidstart accounted for 75 per cent of my sales. Last year it was less than 10 per cent and except for losing a place to park inventory it wouldn't bother me at all to part ways with SG.