CHECK EBAY

[iliketogrow2]

before anyone buys anything i would highly advise checking out ebay. as long as you dont mind a package arriving at your home full of growing equipment its a great source for cheap cheap products

there are tons of air-cooled reflectors for under 100$ not to mention 400, 600, 1000W systems galore. please before you go and spend $500 at a hydroponic store check out ebay.

 

[Guest]

always remember, you that get what u pay for!
you may find a deal on used equipment that you know is good quality and that isn't used up. but to buy cheap ballasts, i wouldn't recommend it.
the local guy i use knows internet prices and is always willin to talk price. sometimes he can match it , sometimes he can't.
just tryin to keep it local for me.

 

[iliketogrow2]

my local guy is the only one in the area and charges aweful prices

 

[alphacat]

It's an old cliché, but you really want to buy this shit in person with cold, hard cash in hand. No credit cards, no checks.

_________________________

http://research.yale.edu/lawmeme/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=925

eBay to Law Enforcement - We're Here to Help

Posted by Ernest Miller on Monday, February 17, 2003 @ 09:09:15 EST

With Nimrod Kozlovski

Joseph E. Sullivan, Director of Compliance and Law Enforcement Relations, Senior Counsel, Trust and Safety for online auction powerhouse eBay, recently addressed a group of law enforcement officials regarding eBay's policies for cooperating with government investigations. Below are verbatim quotations from his briefing at the recent CyberCrime 2003 conference:

We [eBay] try to make rules to make it difficult for people to commit fraud and easy for you [law enforcement agencies] to investigate. One is our Privacy policy. I know from investigating eBay fraud cases that eBay has probably the most generous policy of any internet company when it comes to sharing information. We do not require a subpoena except for very limited circumstances. We require a subpoena when we need the financial information from the site, credit card info or sometimes IP information.

In other words, without a subpoena, eBay will provide all sorts of information to any law enforcement agency for any reason whatsoever. For more about eBay's law enforcement-friendly policy, read on.

Without a subpoena, eBay will provide the following information regarding an eBay user to law enforcement:

Full Name, User ID, Email Address, Street Address, State, City, Zip Code, Phone Number, Country, Company, Password, Secondary Phone, Gender, Personal or Business, Shipping information (Name, Street Address, City, State, Zip)

In addition eBay will provide the following transaction information:

Bidding History on an Item, Other Items for Sale, Feedback about a user, Bidding history of a user, Prices paid for items, Feedback rating, and Chat Room/Bulletin Board (!).

This can be verified through eBay's policy page (eBay Help: Policies). Indeed,
under our privacy policy basically anybody who signs up to use our site when they click accept they accept this paragraph. And it basically says, you can read, we will use your user information, refer to law enforcement anytime that there is anything that causes any kind of a legal liability for eBay or for you.

Here are the paragraphs that he is referring to:
eBay cooperates with law enforcement inquiries, as well as other third parties to enforce laws, such as: intellectual property rights, fraud and other rights. We can (and you authorize us to) disclose any information about you to law enforcement or other government officials as we, in our sole discretion, believe necessary or appropriate, in connection with an investigation of fraud, intellectual property infringements, or other activity that is illegal or may expose us or you to legal liability.

Additionally, eBay reserves the right (and you authorize eBay) to communicate any information about you (including, but not limited to your policy violations, ended items, and item status) to other users, law enforcement and VeRO members as we in our sole discretion determine necessary or appropriate to maintain a level of trust and safety in our community and to enforce our User Agreement, Privacy Policy and any posted policies or rules applicable to services you use through our site.

Sullivan continues, "So, that really opens the door for us. That means that what our policy is that if you are law enforcement agency you can fax us on your letterhead to request information: who is that beyond the seller ID, who is beyond this user ID. We give you their name, their address, their e-mail address and we can give you their sales history without a subpoena."

That's all you need, a fax on law enforcement letterhead. No reason, no justification, and eBay starts feeding information to law enforcement. Remember when everyone got excited about the bookstore that was subpoened by Ken Starr in order to determine what books Monica Lewinski purchased? Remember how the bookstore fought the subpoena? eBay doesn't even require a subpoena. eBay would have turned over the info with a mere request.

But it gets worse, we will probably tell you too that you might want to get a subpoena because we are looking for credit card info and you ask that. We cannot turn over that other information [without a subpoena]. Remember that eBay now owns PayPal, which many people use as a bank. How do you like the idea of your bank telling police, "you might want to get a subpoena"?
How much would law enforcement agencies pay? Don't answer yet ...

because eBay's surveillance services also include:

We also do other things to facilitate your [law enforcement] investigation by looking and doing some searches around on our own, typically to see if there are some other user ID?s associated with that thing. eBay is not only "The World's Online Marketplace" but the world's online informant.

We [eBay] are doing a lot of work with law enforcement agencies.

I'll bet."

 

[Ono Nadagin]

for ballast and bulbs of all types... http://www.1000bulbs.com/ cheap and reliable

And as someone that has been scammed on Ebay for a lot of $$ I can tell you that I think the reason Ebay cooperates with the law in the manner they do it to fight fraud not ppl buying items that 'could' be used in an illegal manner(pot growing)... not that it couldnt happen but you would have to have been the subject of a prior investigation to warrant a a query to Ebay for your personal info and buying history... so your kinda already hosed

 

[Dreamscape]

It's an old cliché, but you really want to buy this shit in person with cold, hard cash in hand. No credit cards, no checks.

Agreed ... If thats not an option - Go get a money order and send that with an address to ship it to ... most companies are pretty discreet about their return address so you dont have "HYDROPONICS" all over the package ya know ...

 

[Guest]

just don't use UPS.

 

[Guest]

one of my couple local guys, is one of the eBay guys you guys search. eBay is cool, but be careful who you buy through. some aren't legit.

 

[marx2k]

just don't use UPS.

I know why you say not to UPS, but other people might not. You might want to follow your statement up with a reason as to why not to use UPS.

http://www.ups.com/content/corp/code_conduct.html
----------------------------------------------------------------
Transportation Regulations
The handling and transportation of many items by UPS are regulated by various national and local government authorities. These regulations cover such items as hazardous materials/dangerous goods, pharmaceuticals, alcoholic beverages, and other special commodities.

We conduct our business in accordance with the requirements imposed by external authorities in a manner that protects the safety of our people, our customers, and the public in all modes of service. We establish standards and procedures related to the handling and transportation of these items and embed them into our everyday business processes. We are all responsible for complying with applicable governmental laws and regulations worldwide and for understanding and adhering to established UPS procedures related to these transportation issues.

UPS employees, representatives, and customers are expected to comply with all applicable governmental laws and regulations, and UPS-specific requirements.

Additional information on each of these programs is available from Corporate Compliance.

 

[Guest]

thanx for the posting tip there mark. i'll make a note of it.
you might wanna loosen that tie and get outa them tighty whiteys. heh

 

[marx2k]

haha hey do I seem uptight? haha maybe it's cause I havent smoked since last July... ugh

 

[stealthballer]

ebay users will fuck you over, and not only that some are complete dicks out to fuck you over

 

[hogwild]

thats a generalization, you just need to make sure the dude has good feedback and lots of it. I work at ups and if you package the shit properly its a great way to ship, i suggest taping the box to the point where there is no exposed cardboard, that will increase your boxes strength tenfold, also make sure to package everything inside tight to where nothing can crush the box and bust it open. As long as there is no chance of the box opening, ups is completely safe. If you put one strip of tape on there, and I unload your box and get a sniff of weed, ill probably throw it and it will break and ill get some free smoke... be smart, we have found boxes with cash and weed together before, and im sure it will happen again so be careful about how you package your stuff.

 

[stealthballer]

ya I worked at ups unless we broke the package accidently we didn't give a damn what was in it. Got some wierd as hell stories about things that popped out of broken packages. One time it was fake limbs but we all thought it was a chopped up body. Closed the whole place down...Was a good night that night.
oh and preload rocks!!! unloaders are droolers!!!
sorry ups brainwashed me

 

[Guest]

hey mark2k, just kiddin ya man. bummer on the smokin tho. hope a ain't got much longer to go.

hogwild and steaalthballer, yeah , i know people that work for ups and they have the same kinda stories. it's a mentality thats bred into those guys. those guys look at every package hoping to find something.
if i was to use ups or any other shipper for that matter i would make sure that the package had more tape than cardboard. lol

 

[BlindDate]

I bought some 600 watt bulbs once on Ebay. I should have known the price was too good to be true. Guess what? They were used. The guy then ran away.

 

[marx2k]

I haven't had ANY negative experiences with EBay so far. You really do get what you pay for and you DO need to check people's feedback. Growing related, I have purchased a 400W no-name ballast that has worked for me for 5 years now. I also purchased 50 pounds of horse manure for another hobby of mine and that came with minimal problems (the box was very damaged but luckily the manure was contained in a black garbage bag INSIDE the box).

I did buy radar detectors that worked at first then just conked out.. I did buy small gadgets that met the same fate.

If the person has really good feedback (for instance, there ARE people on EBay who make a business from selling ballasts/reflectors), they should be trusted. The same goes for bulbs. But a lot of the time you can still find online vendors that will either beat or match prices on EBay.

If you had the choice between EBay and a vendor, go with the vendor. But if you find something crazy on EBay and the person has great feedback and you're not signing your house over to cover the expense, go for it.