FYI: Microsoft Video Vulnerability in Internet Explorer

Yesterday Microsoft announced a vulnerability in the Microsoft Video ActiveX Control. This effects Internet Explorer on Windows XP and Windows Server 2003. No patch exists yet, but a workaround is available. In the meantime, we suggest the following security measures:

• Enable auto-update for your Windows system.
• Install anti-virus, firewall, and anti-spyware software and update their signatures. eBay has links to trial and discounted providers in the Security Center.
• Follow good security practices: don't run untrusted software, click unexpected attachments, or follow links to untrusted websites.

See more information on this vulnerability from eBay or Microsoft.

Amended API License Agreement for eBay Developers Program

eBay Developers Program Members:

eBay has made some important changes to the eBay API License Agreement—now called the eBay Developers Program & API License Agreement ("Amended Agreement"). In addition to reorganizing and simplifying the content of the agreement, we have clarified permitted uses and privacy requirements, and changed a number of terms.

To more efficiently manage the Developers Program worldwide, we've revised local terms to create a single global contract in U.S. English that will govern our relationship with developers in all countries.

Please make sure you read through and understand the Amended Agreement because it affects your rights and obligations. You can find the Amended Agreement here: Amended Agreement. You can find the current, unamended Agreement here: Current Agreement. In addition, we have also emailed all of our members about these important changes.

The Amended Agreement becomes effective thirty days from today on March 28, 2009. If any term in the Agreement is unacceptable to you, you must terminate this Agreement and your access to the developer program tools and the API by sending a termination notice to developer-relations@ebay.com before March 28, 2009.

For developers in France, Germany or the UK, please follow the termination directions provided in the email sent to you regarding your localized API agreements.

By using any of the developer program tools or the API after March 28, 2009, you are representing and warranting that you understand and agree to the Amended Agreement.

Thank you,

eBay Developer Relations

No Immediate Plans to Block Active Content

As mentioned in June, we have been looking at ways to make it safer to shop on the site.

One of the things we’ve started doing is hosting user-generated content (the content in the Item Description) on a separate domain. This protects buyers from having their purchase interfered with, while still allowing sellers to provide a visually rich, informative shopping experience. You’ll see the domain split on more and more pages as the new View Item page ramps up across the site.

We had also been looking at limiting sellers to a smaller, safer subset of HTML to minimize the possibility of interfering with the buyer experience on the View Item page. That project has been put on hold while we re-evaluate our plans. When we decide to consider it again, we will give you plenty of warning and will involve you in the discussion. This basically means that we do not plan to block user-generated active content at this time.

eBay Acquires Positronic Search Firm

In case you blinked, eBay corporate blogger and all-around good guy Richard Brewer-Hay last week confirmed blogging reports that Christopher Payne, co-founder of Positronic, had joined eBay as VP of Search. Additionally, Positronic co-founder Dane Glasgow has joined eBay as VP of Engineering. eBay acquired Positronic to help with efforts at leveraging machine learning to provide a more predictive and compelling customer experience.

Founded in 2007, Positronic has created predictive models and a machine learning platform that is vital for developments in search-based initiatives.

Breaking news by blog and LinkedIn profile update - news travels fast in a social Web world, folks.

- Delyn

eBay is #1 Most Trusted Company for Privacy on the Web

Developers building eBay and PayPal applications using our Web services platforms will be interested to know that privacy and information management research firm Ponemon Institute along with Internet privacy leader TRUSTe, have announced the results of their fifth annual survey of Most Trusted Companies for Privacy. eBay is ranked second overall, behind only American Express (#1 for the fourth year in a row) and ranked first among Internet companies.

Read the press release and the eBay Ink blog for additional detail. Developers who rely on the scalability, stability and monetization opportunity of the eBay platform will be interested to know who are the Web companies that make the list -- and who doesn't.

- Delyn

What Does the Future Hold? Find Out by Using the Dev Program API Calendar

You may have noticed that there's a lot of change happening on the eBay site. Stay informed about what is happening and when by checking out the eBay API Release Schedule calendar.

I've color coded the events to give you a sense of the likely impact. Here is what the colors mean:

Red = Must adopt by date. May break listing or other important functionality.
Yellow = Should adopt sometime. May be technically optional, but important to seller strategy.
Green = Nice to adopt. May still want to adopt as a differentiator.
Blue = Developer Program events like DevCon.

Note that the impact may be higher or lower for you depending on your individual application and business model.

Features

In the Month view, you get an overview of everything released or enforced that month.

Click the Agenda tab and you can use it as a checklist for adopting upcoming features.

 

Click the event and a detail balloon pops up. You can also copy that event to your own calendar.

 

And since it's powered by Google Calendar, you can subscribe to it just like any other public calendar. Subscribe just to the High Impact calendar, or subscribe to all of them.

Caveats

Dates are subject to change. But the benefit of the dynamic calendar is that you find out immediately after I do.

Where possible, exact dates are given. Otherwise, a window is given. And yes, sometimes that window is very big. As I get more information, I make the window narrower.

If there's a project you'd like to see on the calendar, email me at developer-webmaster@ebay.com. I won't always be able to find a release date for you, but I will do my best.

Developer Impact: Displaying Quantity on View Item

As Subha Shetty announced here, listings that have more than 10 items for sale will display the value "more than 10 available" on the View Item page.

Developer Impact:
There is no change to the API for this feature. API calls like GetItem will continue to show the actual quantity of the listing.

State of the eBay Platform: Great!

You may have noticed that eBay has been in the news a lot  lately. Our news from here at the eBay Developers Program is that  we are eagerly moving forward on all of our platform initiatives, and that eBay  is making an unprecedented amount of investment in the platform.

  Here's a little bit of what is going on for the platform:

• Not only are we continuing to improve and expand our existing collection of eBay Web Services, we are also working  on exciting new initiatives like Project Echo. Sign up for the Project Echo  beta and be among the first developers to get a chance to embed your  application directly in the eBay site.
• We're serious about investing in platform across all the eBay  properties: eBay, PayPal, Skype, and so on. In fact, we recently hired thought  leader Mark Carges as Senior Vice President, Global Platform—reporting directly to CEO John Donahoe—to  look at all these pieces as a whole.
• We're gearing up for an excellent 2009 eBay Developers Conference!  Watch the blog and the eBay DevCon site for more details soon.

  These are just a few reasons why it's a great time to be a  developer working with the eBay platform, and why the eBay Developers Program is the best ecommerce opportunity on the web!

Max Mancini
eBay Developers Program

New eBay Features and Promos

Today Dinesh Lathi announced these new features and promotions.

• New look for Product Pages
• Free Subtitle for Media from now through end of the year
• New listing upgrade: Featured First
• No relist fee credits for Fixed Price (starting Oct 22)
• Best Match sort for Store listings in Search Expansion Box

Check out his announcement for more details. See the Trading API Release Notes for details on how the features are implemented in the API. You can post any remaining questions in the comments.

Maximum Shipping Cost Values in Media Now Enforced

As Kristina Klausen reminded us, Media categories now have limits on the maximum shipping cost. Enforcement was turned on this morning.

For more information on the developer impact, see Developer Impact: Shipping Charge Limits in Media.