General Discussions

**BamaStangGuy** · 08-15-2006, 03:58 AM

Quote:

1. eBay.com

Founded: Pierre Omidyar, 1995, US

Users: 168m

What is it? Auction and shopping site

You cannot buy fireworks, guns, franking machines, animals or lock-picking devices on eBay, the internet's premier auction site, but almost everything else is OK: sideburns, houses, used underwear and of course Pez dispensers.

Pez is where it is said to have all begun for eBay's ponytailed founder Pierre Omidyar when he responded to his fiancee's worries that she would no longer be able to expand her toy collection when they moved to Silicon Valley. Omidyar developed a car boot sale anyone could use wherever they were, and without the need for getting dressed. The name sprang from Echo Bay Technology Group, Omidyar's consultancy company, and the first sale was a broken laser pointer.

Things have moved on a little since then. We spend more time on eBay than any other internet site. There are more than 10 million users in the UK. And eBay is far from just a second-hand stall. New items are sold by global companies; many people have abandoned their jobs to eBay full time, and normally sane people fret about 'negative feedback' and being outbid by 'snipers'. eBay owns PayPal and Skype, making dealing almost effortless.
Simon Garfield

2. wikipedia.com

Founded: Jimmy Wales, 2001, US

Users: 912,000 visits per day

What is it? Online encyclopaedia

As a young boy growing up in Hunstville, Alabama, Jimmy Wales attended a one-room school, sharing his classes with only three other children. Here he spent 'many hours poring over encyclopaedias', and faced the familiar frustrations: their scope was conservative; they were hard to navigate and often out of date.

In January 2001 he created a solution. Wikipedia was a free online encyclopaedia and differed from its predecessors in one fundamental regard: it was open to everyone to read, and also to edit. If you had something to add - from a pedantic correction to an entire entry on your specialist subject - the Wiki template made this easy. The software enables entries to be updated within minutes of new developments. There is nothing you cannot find - how best to make glass, the use of the nappy in space exploration - and if something isn't there, you may wish to take matters into your own hands.

Like any fast-moving venture - the site attracts 2,000-plus page requests a second - it has not been slow to attract criticism. Occasionally a libellous article will lie undetected for months, as happened with an entry linking one of Robert Kennedy's aides with his assassination. But Wales says his creation is abused only rarely, and swiftly corrected by other users. 'Those who use Wikipedia a lot appreciate its true value and have learnt to trust it,' he says. 'Sometimes a prankster will substitute a picture of Hitler for George Bush, and within an hour someone would have changed it back.'
SG

The rest: http://observer.guardian.co.uk/revie...843263,00.html

**BamaStangGuy** · 08-15-2006, 04:00 AM

lol pretty cool that the hometown of the creator of Wikipedia is Huntsville

**imported_Luke** · 08-15-2006, 05:15 AM

Yeah, and if you look at the concepts behind those two site they are simple and easy to use and basically do exactly what the user wants.

No matter what site you make, as long as it gets the user involved and does something they want/require then your onto a winner!

**PeterLancs** · 08-15-2006, 06:47 AM

gosh id have thought google would have been one of the 1st two!

**imported_Luke** · 08-15-2006, 06:59 AM

A great read, surprising that many sites make it big often by luck. I wonder how many used blackhat seo to get to the top :P

**Sygon** · 08-15-2006, 07:41 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by PeterLancs

gosh id have thought google would have been one of the 1st two!

Or yahoo

Edit: There is both 13 + 14

**Plugin-Developer** · 08-15-2006, 08:19 AM

eBay is really an amazing story. It's really a fusion of social culture and technology that was meant as a big community that sold stuff. I wrote a paper on eBay a while ago and unearthed some fascinating details in the process.

By the way, I believe the founder, Pierre Omidyar, has a personal blog somewhere. I think that's very interesting.

-Nick

**imported_feros** · 08-15-2006, 10:58 AM

What the hell is myspace doingat #8? With two random sites I've never heard of above it?

Edit:

OMG wtf and Google is about 10 places too low. This is a fairly interesting article but sheesh some of the placements are off by a big margin.

**Next** · 08-15-2006, 06:50 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by nickohrn

eBay is really an amazing story. It's really a fusion of social culture and technology that was meant as a big community that sold stuff. I wrote a paper on eBay a while ago and unearthed some fascinating details in the process.

By the way, I believe the founder, Pierre Omidyar, has a personal blog somewhere. I think that's very interesting.

-Nick

Yeah and how their fee's can compare to price gouging along with horrible support! :thumbdown:

**Vi5** · 08-16-2006, 03:10 AM

Quote:

The search method devised by Larry Page and Sergey Brin was instrumental to Goggle's success.

tut tut

**unionisnotdead** · 08-16-2006, 03:15 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by nickohrn

eBay is really an amazing story. It's really a fusion of social culture and technology that was meant as a big community...
-Nick

They also ban sellers under the SPA9 clause which gives ebay the right to ban your account for any activity deemed suspicious without giving you any specifics. In addition ebay pulls your auctions without warnings. With such poor business practices it is no surprise Ebay is losing market share to yahoo, amazon and google.

**Bookworm-SEO** · 08-21-2006, 08:10 PM

And in a few years, we'll hopefully be seeing Earners Forum there

**andonz** · 09-10-2006, 08:25 AM

google rocks

gotta love it, every 1 would be lost with out it :P

**vorboompsio** · 09-13-2006, 07:34 AM

You can create your own order - anyone care to predict the 21st -or fastest rising star in next year?

**matrixlover** · 09-13-2006, 12:28 PM

I read it, and it's great inspiration to me. Hopefully one day I'll create the new Google, and then I'd come back to Earners Forum and laugh at how little Lee makes :-P

**Bryan Le** · 09-16-2006, 12:26 AM

A wonderful read. I've saved it for future inspiration

**stanhansen** · 09-16-2006, 12:06 PM

Not sure weather to tank you or not - but my site is not in the top 25 best either.

Stan :-(

**spol555** · 09-20-2006, 03:39 PM

Ebay is a real goldmine.It has opened up new doors of opportunities for the online money seekers.It is really wonderful.

**jhuskisson** · 09-20-2006, 05:18 PM

Friend's reunited changing the world?

Did they even use the site's before they put them in that list? Friend's reunited is a terrible, terrible site to use

**Jawie** · 02-23-2007, 04:09 PM

The fact is many sites are still doing their best to top. And yah!!! they somehow create a new world for the surfers and the users. A new advance way of negotiating your business which probably makes a fast and wide network for your market.

Thanks for the webmasters and to all the wide minded intellect people out there.

Having this concerns make me share a little but for me a meaningful way of communicating to you fellows.

Have a great day.