Thanks to a tip from a reader of yesterday’s article (see “More eBay Policy Developments Regarding PayPal“), I looked a little more into the Google-related developments with eBay’s policy changes in Australia (see ““PayPal Only” eBay Developments In The News“).
This article on AuctionBytes – “Oops! Google Outed in Objection to eBay Oz Policy” – reports that one of their readers, in reviewing the file properties of an anonymous filing to the regulatory agency in Australia (currently reviewing the “PayPal-only” policy proposed by eBay), found that evidence suggests it was drafted by Google.
Per the review of the PDF document:
…it appears to have been created from a Word document titled, “ACCC Submission by Google re eBay Public 2.DOC”, indicating the filer was likely Google.
Google’s own payment service, “Google Checkout”, is not a payment option for eBay users as part of the auction service. An excerpt from the “anonymous” ACCC (Australia Competition and Consumer Commission) submission suggests:
eBay’s real purpose, or one of eBay’s substantial purposes, is to substantially lessen competition in the Market for Online Payment Processing Services, by preventing or hindering competitors of PayPal from competing effectively against PayPal in that market. eBay and PayPal are related bodies corporate. eBay is acting to increase PayPal’s share of the Market for Online Payment Processing Services, thereby increasing the revenues to the eBay group as a whole.
Further Reading:
The Sunday Morning Herald (smh.com.au):
ars technica (arstechnica.com):
It appears the 38 page document has since been removed.
Jason De Bord