Skype Not Enough To Save eBay In China

from the shocking,-yes? dept

As you may recall, one of the big reasons given for eBay shelling out billions of dollars to buy Skype last year was that Skype was big in China and somehow (no one ever explained how), that would help get more people in China using eBay. Not surprisingly, that never happened. Rather, as many pointed out before the merger, China has been pretty proactive in blocking VoIP services and (more importantly) there's simply no reason to think that because you use Skype you'd be any more likely to use eBay. So, it should come as little surprise that eBay is shutting down their Chinese efforts, and handing control over to a local Chinese company they'll partner with going forward. So much for that plan.
Hide this

Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.

Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.

While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.

–The Techdirt Team


Reader Comments

Subscribe: RSS

View by: Time | Thread


  1. identicon
    Stu, 18 Dec 2006 @ 3:08pm

    Super success in any endeavor, combined with more money than they know what to do with breeds a kind of arrogance.

    Sort of "They don't have as much money as we do, so what could they know?

    link to this | view in thread ]

  2. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 18 Dec 2006 @ 4:10pm

    One of those deals that make you say, "Hmmm, maybe I am smart enough to be a CEO. Actually, maybe I'm not a CEO because I'm TOO smart..."

    link to this | view in thread ]

  3. identicon
    bob, 18 Dec 2006 @ 4:39pm

    haha. true. so true. and wow talk about when-billion-dollar-deals-go-bad.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  4. identicon
    David Binkowski, 21 Dec 2006 @ 6:20pm

    I just picked up a "I'm Huge in China" t-shirt on Ebay for a steal :P

    link to this | view in thread ]


Follow Techdirt
Essential Reading
Techdirt Deals
Report this ad  |  Hide Techdirt ads
Techdirt Insider Discord

The latest chatter on the Techdirt Insider Discord channel...

Loading...
Recent Stories

This site, like most other sites on the web, uses cookies. For more information, see our privacy policy. Got it
Close

Email This

This feature is only available to registered users. Register or sign in to use it.