[Sigia-l] is bad design a choice?

[Lyle Kantrovich]

On 10/17/05, Dave Heller <dheller at gmail.com> wrote:
> 17 million people trust eBay (and I use that term loosely) b/c there
> isn't another game even close to eBay in the arena. Monopolies allow
> for a lot of bad design.

Dave,

Not sure how much you've used eBay, but saying people "trust eBay"
just sounded strange.  I don't use eBay a lot, but I've used it enough
to know I don't "trust eBay".  I trust eBay's rating system...and I
have my own gauge of what sellers on eBay appear to be trustworthy. 
In the end, eBay is just a facilitator of a sale between me and a
third party.  The biggest risk in that situation (in my opinion) is
with the third party, the one that gets MOST of the money in the
transaction, and the party that has to deliver the goods.  The sellers
provide content (product descriptions) and conduct the transaction. 
eBay just helps get buyer and seller together and provides that all
important rating system that facilitates trust between buyer and
seller.

Any serious IA who's really looked at eBay much knows that it'd be a
huge challenge to try to create a half-decent taxonomy for them or to
try to design a system whereby a user gets decent search results every
time.  (Not that I wouldn't like to take on that challenge.)  The
content's always changing and you don't own it or control it. 
Classify that!  Best bets?  I think not.  Facets?  Hah!  No simple
answers work.

Of course eBay's design could be improved in many ways, but someone
here should acknowledge that their designs have a whale of a problem
to solve...whether or not the company's a monopoly.

FWIW, if someone here can make a immensely better design for an
auction site, you should give it a go.  Google proved that a better
design and product can trump the market leader quickly.  Just
think...that "monopoly" relies on its sellers to refresh their
inventory almost daily so it can stay in business.  If you can do it
better/faster/cheaper you could win their market share in a matter of
months!  :-)

--
Lyle

--------------------------
Lyle Kantrovich
Blog: Croc O' Lyle
http://crocolyle.blogspot.com