as the holidays are upon us there always seems to be that one gift that controls your life while looking for it.  back in the early 1980s it was the cabbage patch doll, then many years later tickle me elmo was the hit (i remember that $30 item going for $2500 on a radio station).  it is amazing what we do as humans to satisfy others.

Many Christmases ago, I went to buy a doll for my son. I reached for the last one they had, but so did another man. As I rained blows upon him, I realized there had to be another way.

this year, it seems to be the nintendo wii.  my mother-in-law was putting all the game shops on speed dial and trying to flirt with them to hold one when she got in.  weird thing is about 2 months ago lisa and i got one for our festivus raffle and they were plenty in stock where i shopped (best buy).  i guess they aren't now, and there is a frenzy to get some. (side note: at our party there was some serious bidding going on to the winners of the wii, people were offering cash on the spot.)

yesterday my sister-in-law called me and was at toys-r-us and said they had a bunch of wii consoles in stock.  she of course wanted me to let my m-in-law know, which i did.  i also come to find out that my sis-in-law decided to be a bit of an entrepreneur and picked one up for herself.  not to sell to someone who was looking for one.  not to pick one up for a friend.  nope.  that's right, ebay.  she wanted to capitalize on the frenzy as well.

she just called me to say she sold it for $490 on ebay and was asking all sorts of questions about paypal, etc.  i explained some things the best i could over the phone.  she then said that the winner had an unverified address in the virgin islands.

wooop, wooop, wooop (my best attempt at writing a siren sound)

my fraud alert went off and i shared my concern with her.  i think she might be about to get screwed.  it reminded me about n00b ebayers and some guidelines they should use.  here's my rules (even as a 'veteran' ebayer)..

for ebay sellers

• list items with real pictures...don't use the mfr pictures...include a link, but take a good photo of the item.  good photos of the actual item will sell it, not people wondering what it will look like
• if you have all the original packaging, etc. -- note that
• require instant payment -- you may lose 1% of bidders, but it is piece of mind for you
• don't forget to set a reserve price if you are looking for a specific amount.  don't set it too high though or people will just walk away
• state your bidding rules clearly in the listing
• state your shipping rules clearly in the listing: i require united states only and a verified shipping address only.  i also make it clear where (city, state, zip) it is being shipped from and that buyer will pay all shipping/handling costs from that location...
• offer incentives: i usually have a buy-it-now price and offer free shipping
• don't put unnecessary bling on your listing -- i don't know why ebay offers sellers to put a counter on the listing -- the only person caring about the counter would be you -- reminds me of the 'hit counter' icons that were so cool in the mid 1990s.
• when you get a buyer that you are satisfied with, leave feedback promptly
• when an item is paid for, email the paypal user email address with confirmation of receipt of money and confirmation of address.  this is an additional fraud step for you (and them) and shows good communication
• pay attention to your email -- ebay lives on email communication -- if you don't check your email often, get off ebay please.

for ebay buyers

• be sure to see pictures of the actual item -- if they aren't there -- be suspicious and email the seller
• only buy from reputable ebayers -- ebay has a decent reputation system...research the seller, look at the number of transactions they have...if they have none and are selling a brand new XBOX, be suspicious :-)
• be cautious of buying 'overseas' -- this applies for US buying from non-US and vice versa.
• look for fast ship options
• look for return policies, it might not be important but if there is one, note it
• don't leave feedback until you received your item as expected
• PRINT OUT THE LISTING -- ebay purges listings over time and you might want to keep a record of more significant purchases
• use respected payment vendors, be cautious of money-order only sales...paypal has always worked well for me
• check your email/spam filters

paypal tips

• get a premier account -- if you plan on buying/selling on ebay, upgrade your account.  i think this requires you to supply a verified checking account, but it is worth it
• verify your address -- this may be a part of the premier account process now, but don't make your paypal account look suspicious
• make sure your ebay username/email and paypal email are similar.  if your ebay email is [email protected] but your paypal account is [email protected] it looks like two different people
• make sure your transaction is covered by their fraud protection -- do the research on the amount, etc.
• consider using paypal secure id cards (something new they are testing) for added security

those are some of the rules i follow and have never been frauded (almost have but i followed my steps and discovered it before anything was shipped).  i think rookie ebayers/paypalers simply don't pay attention to the finer details and end up having to ship something to singapore and gave a fixed shipping rate of US$10...then realize they are screwed...among other mistakes.

so this holiday season, ebayer beware.

while i'm not an entirely michael moore theorists, i do like that he makes me think.  sicko, his recent movie, made me think.  it was hard to listen to peoples' stories because i've always worked for a company that has had great health coverage and made it a priority benefit for their employees -- for that i'm entirely grateful after countless emergency room visits, 2 children, a few surgeries, and tons of medications.

well this weekend, i'm starting to even hate how i'm being treated even though i still do have great coverage.  on saturday, the day of festivus for our family, i awoke to a kidney stone.  i went with my daughter to the grocery store in the QC for our weekly donut treat in the morning.  before i left i noted to my wife 'i feel like someone kicked me in the <nuts/family jewels/gonads/groin/pick-your-word>' and i left.  honestly i barely felt like i was going to make it home.  i came in, buckled in pain and went to my secret stash of demoral (after 2 previous incidents it is my new american express card).  it wasn't working (probably because it was 3 years old...yeah, i know...lecture me later).  after a few minutes of trying to deal with the pain, i called out to lisa and said 'find someone to watch the kids, we need to go to the er, like 10 minutes ago.'  in my neighborhood we have a private hospital (gilbert hospital) which promises to get you seen in less than 31 minutes.  since it is a private hospital, it isn't usually covered by health plans.  who cared, i needed to get some IV meds ASAP.  i went in and was immediately placed in a wheel chair and brought to a room -- before they even asked my name -- they let my wife deal with stuff.  48 minutes later i was discharged.  in that span of time i did:

• brought in immediately, placed in a hosp gown
• vitals taken
• iv w/saline put in
• morphine injected...oh sweet morphine
• taken for a CT scan
• saw the actual doctor 3 times
• full explanation of details
• received prescriptions and discharged

booya.  i say.  sweet.

but this rant is not about my problem.  not more than 2 days later we were back in the emergency room.  on monday, my wife (a cyclist) was out for a ride with her friend.  at about 10 minutes until the end of their ride, she was struck by a car.  (note: i was in los angeles.)  because of where we live, she was air-evac'd to a trauma center in scottsdale (about an hour drive from our home).  they took great care of her.  the aftercare...hmmm...this is where i start getting pissed.

today i start making calls to meet with an orthopedic surgeon for her.  *every* doctor i called, their first question had nothing to do with the injury, how my wife was doing, etc. -- their first question was "what level of insurance do you have?"  argh.  even when we were calling dr. offices to find out who they normally refer, they asked what our insurance was.  i said 'pretend we're paying cash in a briefcase, it doesn't matter...the health of my wife does.'  they just didn't get it.  one dr. we called, their second question was 'were you in an accident and is insurance involved?' -- technically yes and no.  our claim stuff hasn't made it's way through obviously.  but when we explained the accident they refused to make an appointment and said they don't help those situations.  un-friggin-believable.

i guess america is such a litigous society that people don't care anymore really...and i mean in the sense of *care* about people.  medicine has turned too much into business, not health.  which is a sad state of affairs.

oh well, needed to get this off my chest.  the medical industry is weird.  if you go in for something and they don't diagnose anything because they can't figure it out -- don't you think you shouldn't have to pay?  i mean in the tech industry if you don't deliver the answer, you are expected to compensate accordingly (or not bill).  i think i'm in the wrong industry.  "doctor" is quickly approaching my list of easiest jobs in some regard (although meteorologist for a news station is still #1).

thanks for being a soundboard internet.  you are too cool.

pdc for 2008 has been announced so you can save the date.

the professional developer conference 2008 will be 27-30 OCTOBER at the Los Angeles Convention Center.  if you want the details (minimal now other than what i just said), you can visit the pdc2008 site.

wow, some great news from the tfs group... i'm not sure how this slipped my feeds, but must have been while i was out...at any rate, if you want to hear some good news on the team foundation server front.  i love it when companies listen.

from bharry's blog (emphasis mine):

We made one significant licensing change for TFS with the release of TFS 2008.  We've gotten a lot of feedback over the past 2 years that there are classes of users who make very light use of TFS and for those users a $500 CAL (list price) is just too much.  Most of these scenarios involve some kind of very infrequent access to work item tracking.  We've decided to tackle one of the scenarios with licensing changes in 2008.

The new licensing provisions are designed to make it easy if you want to allow lots of people in your company to use TFS to file bugs, feature requests, etc and have them available for your development team.  Specifically they allow an unlimited number of users in your company to create any work item, query for work items they have created and view or update any work item they have created all without a CAL.  This right comes with your Team Foundation Server Standard Edition server license and requires no additional purchase.

Please keep in mind that this is focused narrowly at this scenario.  If this works well, customers like it, people understand the restrictions and use it properly, I expect we'll look at trying to simplify licensing around other similar scenarios in future versions of TFS.

The bad news part of this is that we really don't have any UI that restricts users to exactly this scenario right now so it's hard to know you are in compliance.  We have committed to producing software changes within the next year that would allow organizations to feel comfortable that their users are in compliance.  We've talked about permission changes and UI changes.  My favorite option (which we are pursuing) is to add a new page to Team System Web Access that focuses precisely on this scenario and enable permissioning the site appropriately so that organizations can point their broad user base at that page and feel comfortable that users are staying within their license rights.  For now, you may consider building your own custom web page for doing something similar or you may just try to explain to your users what they are and are not allowed to do.

I hope this change addresses a concern that many of you have expressed to me.  Please read the updated End User License Agreement that comes with Team Foundation Server 2008 for an official statement of the licensing terms.  If you have questions or comments on this licensing change or others you would like to see, please let me know.

very cool.

looks like the flame is making its way to the other side of the coast...the east coast.  looks like in a week (15 DEC) the silverlight firestarter will be happening in the philly area (malvern to be specific).  you can find the agenda here at dani's blog.

it looks like a great line-up of speakers as well.  although i've not met pete brown in person, i've 'conversed' with him via e-mail and he's a sharp dude.  peter laudati -- well, if you are in the northeast, a microsoft developer, and don't know peter...what's wrong with you? ;-).  and then there is dani.  don't stand too close or his energy might be infectious.  seriously, he's a fun guy to be around.

the topics are spot on for a well-rounded discussion of development of interactive web sites using silverlight with topics on expression, core xaml, media, and the future of silverlight.  looks like some giveaways will be provided as well!

what a great opportunity for a day of silverlight in that area.  be sure to spread the word about it and make sure you register.  since it is the east coast (and on the day of my wife's birthday) i won't be there, but hopefully someone can live blog so i can be there in spirit and see how it is going.