Wow! Can you believe it’s December already? I feel like the years just get shorter and shorter. Maybe that comes with getting older, but whatever the case, I hope you’re documenting the days and events important to you. Besides being significant for future generations, your layouts inspire others when they’re posted in our online gallery, helping others create and record memories as well.

In that gallery, we also find layouts to publish in Creating Keepsakes. I’d love to have your help choosing the next Readers’ Pick layout to be featured in the May/June 2010 issue of the magazine. The task is simple and will only take a few moments of your time, but be sure to participate by December 7, 2009. Click on this survey to get started, and then choose your favorite layout. That’s it! Check back on the CK blog later this month to see which page wins.

If you’re not submitting to the online gallery, we’d love to see your work. You never know, your layout may be the next Readers’ Pick page!

—Joannie McBride, assistant editor

P.S. Congratulations to babyroo7 for creating the layout that won last month’s Readers’ Pick choice from the online survey! Her “Photo Shoot” layout will be featured in the March/April 2010 issue of Creating Keepsakes.

Thanks for voting to choose which page we should publish from our online gallery! Truth be told, we loved these entries, and by the amount of votes received, it appears you did, too! Since the response was so great, we’ve decided to publish the two layouts that received the most votes. And the winners are… “San Diego” by lisaleepate and “Proof “by pixiedixie. Congrats to both of our winners this month! These layouts will be featured in the February 2010 issue of Creating Keepsakes in our Reader Gallery column. Thanks to all of you who voted.

Happy scrapbooking!

Joannie McBride
Assistant Editor, Creating Keepsakes

P.S. Don’t forget, today is our last day of the Columbus Day Blow Out Sale over at the Creating Keepsakes online store. Enter code COLU-1492-1DAY at checkout to receive 30% off your entire order! Why not start your holiday shopping early?

Happy February! Love is in the air – and I’m loving all the pages that many of you are submitting to our gallery. Thanks so much for the inspiration. This month we are including five fabulous layouts for you to vote on, like the one below.

Here’s how to vote: check out our survey here.  Look at the pages and pick your favorite. You can vote as often as you like. The page that gets the most votes will be featured in an upcoming issue.  That’s it – super easy, huh?

But you don’t have to wait till the issue is published to see if your voting efforts paid off.  We’ll show you the winning page here on the blog on Wednesday, October 13th.  A special sneak peek for you, our blog readers. Thanks for your votes. May the best page win!

Joannie McBride, Assistant Editor

Thanks for voting to choose which page from our online gallery

we should publish! And the winner is, with 71% of the votes…

How Does Your Summer Grow

By: BabyBokChoy

Congrats! This page will be featured in the January 2010 issue of Creating Keepsakes in our Reader Gallery column. Thanks to all of you who voted.

Have a great weekend!

Joannie McBride, assistant editor

I have been so inspired lately by just about everything around me. It’s made me want to scrapbook even more than usual – Which is really good for me since I have taken over 2000 pictures this summer.  When I scrapbook, I need to fit as many photos as possible onto a layout so I can scrap my favorite memories of this summer.

We asked you to submit 10 photo layouts both here on our blog and also in our online gallery of pages. And boy did you deliver! You created layouts about special occasions, everyday life and anything in between. Here are four pages we’d love for you to vote on as your favorite. The winner will be published in an upcoming issue. It’s really simple!

That Grin by Stephanie Howell

New York, New York by JayKaye

How Does Your Summer Grow by BabyBokChoy

Swish, Zoom by tdavenport

Here’s how to vote: check out our survey, look at the pages and pick your favorite. You can vote as often as you like. The page that gets the most votes will be featured in our January issue.  That’s it–pretty easy!

But you don’t have to wait till the issue is published to see if your voting efforts paid off.  We’ll show you the winning page here on the blog on Thursday, September 3^rd.  A special sneak peek for you, our blog readers. Thanks for your votes. May the best page win!

Joannie McBride
Assistant Editor, Creating Keepsakes

P.S. And now for the moment most of you have been waiting for. In an earlier blog post, we were giving away a Tamron lens to one lucky reader. We received 550 comments as entries to the giveaway (WOW!) and we’re thrilled to announce that Kristyn G is the winner of the lens. Kristyn, please email us at ckblog@creatingkeepsakes.com with your contact information. Congratulations and thanks to Tamron for such a wonderful giveaway.

I really enjoyed Ali’s Studio A this month. I think we sometimes forget to document all of the aspects of our lives as moms, wives, professionals, daughters, and sisters.
And that lens is amazing! My standard lens doesn’t always focus properly (that’s what happens when the strap comes undone and your precious DSLR hits the tile floor–uugghh!!) so this lens would be a VERY welcome addition to our house! Comment by Kristyn G

Happy July everyone! Summer’s in full swing—with so many fun things to see and do! I loved seeing all your warm weather pages this past month in our gallery. So many great pages! Thanks to everyone for sharing your talent and your styles with us. This month we are including 3 wonderful pages for you to vote on, like the one below.

Here’s how: check out our survey here.  Look at the pages and pick your favorite. You can vote as often as you like. The page that gets the most votes will be featured in our December issue.  That’s it – simple, huh?

But you don’t have to wait till the issue is published to see if your voting efforts paid off.  We’ll show you the winning page here on the blog on Thursday, August 6th.  A special sneak peek for you, our blog readers. Thanks for your votes. May the best page win!

Joannie McBride, Assistant Editor

Slide With Me by anke55 is one of the pages you can choose from this month.

Thanks for voting to choose which page from our online gallery we should publish!  We received the most amount of votes we’ve ever had so far for You Be the Judge—1055 total for the 5 selected pages (for more info, see my last post).

So, with no further delays. Your winner is…. (drumroll please)…..

Birthday Cake by Chrispea!

Congrats! This page will be featured in the November 2009 issue of Creating Keepsakes in our Reader Gallery column. Thanks to all of you who voted.

Chrispea, please email me at editorial@creatingkeepsakes.com (with “You Be the Judge winner” in the subject line) so we can go over the next steps.

Thanks again for voting, everyone! Don’t forget to put your pages on the online gallery—we could pick it to be published in a future issue.

–Joannie McBride, Assistant Editor

It’s time once again to choose your favorite page for publication! This time it will be for the October 2009 issue. We’ve chosen five layouts from our online gallery and we’d like you to decide which one we publish.

Between now and May 18 visit our survey site as many times as you’d like to to see the pages and vote for your favorite. The page that gets the most votes will be featured in our October issue. Super easy, right?

But we don’t want you to have to wait too long to see if your voting efforts paid off. So we’ll show you the winning page here on the blog on Wednesday, May 20.  A special sneak peek for you, our blog readers.

Thanks for your votes. May the best page win!

Joannie McBride, Assistant Editor

P.S. Congratulations AngMomof3! You’re the winner of the June CK Insider’s Look blog post: “It seemed like there were more ‘new faces’ in this issue… was that due to your submission call? LOVE all the fresh ideas on new layouts.” See the “Giveaways” tab at the top of our blog to claim your prize!

hi everyone! Thanks for helping us narrow down our choices for publication by voting for your favorite page. (For more info, see my last post.) We received 726 total votes for 5 selected pages. And the winner is I Adore You by Paper-Klipz!

Congrats! This page will be featured in the September 2009 issue of Creating Keepsakes in our Reader Gallery column. Thanks to all of you who voted.

Paper-Klipz, please email me at editorial@creatingkeepsakes.com (with “You Be The Judge winner” in the subject line) so we can go over the next steps.

Thanks again for voting, everyone! See you next time!

–Joannie McBride, Assistant Editor

Former Penn Stater senior editor Vicki Glembocki ’93, ’02g is really seeing her freelance-writing career take off. In addition to the book she released last year and the stories she does for Philadelphia Magazine (and The Penn Stater), she’s got two new articles in major magazines this month.

The April 2009 issue of Reader’s Digest includes a story by Vicki called “You Be the Judge: Should This Soccer Mom Go to Jail?” The subtitle reads: “A woman escaped from prison at 20 and led a law-abiding life for the next 32 years. Should she be required to serve out her sentence?” Vicki tells me that “You Be the Judge” will be a regular feature in the magazine, in which she finds court cases that could go either way, and then present them without bias, letting readers “be the judge.”

Vicki also has an article in the new issue of Parents magazine, called “Should We Have One More?”

Oh, and she’ll be on the Oprah show on April 6! More on that when we get more details.

Tina Hay, editor

The Balestriere/Lanza class action lawsuit against eBay, GoAntiques.com, Neiman’s Jewelers, and George Molayem a.k.a., Hot Jewelry Auctions, Hotja.com, Paramount-Auctions and Jewelry-Overstock-Auctions, may be an interesting lawsuit on the surface, however, when you scratch beneath the surface (and really dig down deep into the allegations), is this lawsuit ALL that it could be?

While the action is primarily focused on shill bidding (as stated within the complaint against eBay and its co-defendants on the eBay Live Auction platform), one may also have to explore (and investigate) how just a few sellers, out of HUNDREDS (Neiman’s Jewelers and Molayem related eBay seller usernames) were able to potentially dominate the jewelry marketplace on both eBay Live and within eBay search results.

What makes a seller successful on eBay? While some fly by the seat of their pants by using a shotgun approach by selling one dollar no reserve items, others can soar to new heights by offering high end merchandise at a big discount, an affiliate program or, by figuring out that they can get from point A to point B by gaming the system. eBay claims (as a tagline) it runs a Fair and Safe Marketplace. That’s a pretty bold statement and no doubt, one better be sure they can fill those BIG Fair and Safe Marketplace claims.

One can go back and look at the Ballestriere/Lanza action to find the mechanism, which was used to “game” the system by the co-defendants, however, sad to report that the mechanism is not found, as the action stays within the confines of alleged shill bidding, a click room and the subsequent bidding up of merchandise by the co-defendants (as alleged by plaintiff’s counsel). However, shill bidding alone, won’t generate the potential millions earned by the co-defendants, if the traffic’s not flowing into eBay Live.

Enter eBay search results manipulation.

eBay claims it’s not a traditional auctioneer (and under their user agreement) have set up a one-sided (take it or leave it agreement) that the user “acknowledges that eBay is not a traditional auctioneer“.

This brings us to former site known as eBay Live Auctions. If eBay is NOT a traditional auctioneer then how could eBay collect 5% of all auction items sold in virtual and “real” live eBay Live events?

The eBay Live buyer pays the eBay Live seller anywhere from 10% upwards to a 20% commission when the hammer falls on eBay Live merchandise and, each every time that hammer fell, eBay collected 5% of the hammer price. However, eBay states it’s not a traditional auctioneer.

The question of alleged shill bidding, by the co-defendants, may have been the result of the title on the seller bid button that was provided by eBay Live. The button was entitled “Floor Bid”. Each and every time the button was clicked, the words “Floor Bid” popped up for every bid cast by the auctioneer on the other end of the mouse.

In other words, if the auction was not really a LIVE auction and was being operated by the auction seller – on the other end (with the click of mouse) sans a live audience, the buyer on the other end may have been under the impression that they were bidding against another “real” bidder who was popping up a paddle. Sad to say, virtual live auctions held on eBay Live were never a battle between a paddle and mouse click – it was auction seller mouse click against buyer mouse click – nothing more. A hard pill to swallow when you learn that you were bid up on auction lots, thinking that you had real competition from fellow sellers, when in fact, you were actually bidding against the eBay Live Auction seller.

In reviewing an email between a former eBay live seller and an eBay Live employee, one can might come to the conclusion of – what was eBay thinking? The contents of that email have been edited, however, the segment displayed below has NOT been edited:

“We are evaluating whether we should submit a project to enable the Live Auctions platform to accept phone, fax and proxy bids. If we did this, we could disable the “Floor Bid” button for sellers that are holding live auctions without an an actual floor”.

The aforementioned email was written by an eBay employee (at eBay Live Auctions) in October of 2007. However, the “Floor Bid” button was active long before October 2007 and even though the email was written in October 2007, the “Floor Bid” button was never changed.

So, it appears as though someone at eBay was thinking that the “Floor Bid” button could have been disabled, as to stop those eBay Live VIRTUAL auction sellers, who did NOT have an “actual floor” from clicking on the “Floor Bid” button, which, in turn, may have created an appearance of shill bidding.

eBay built the system (or owned it) and it stands to reason that they had the ability (or clear responsibility) to modify and/or control the system and how it was used. In other words, it’s their technology, they built, they own it, they derived income from it and had the last say. However, they also picked up a few partners along the way who they split their fees with.

On the front end of eBay Live, bidders may have thought they were bidding against “real” live paddle pushing bidders, when they may have been bidding against themselves and ONLY the Live Auction seller.

On the back end, the game was afoot. Neiman’s Jewelers and Molayem’s related eBay user ID’s were busy listing thousands of items per week on eBay Live. However, they had an advantage in that they were able to drive their listings to front of eBay search results on an hourly basis.

Neither seller shared their new found knowledge with hundreds of other eBay Live auction sellers. Well, not exactly, as the Windsor suit alleges that those at eBay Live knew how at least one of these sellers (Molayem) was gaming the system to his advantage.

Back to the Balestriere/Lanza lawsuit..

For one to allege shill bidding (and prove it) might be an easy task once discovery is underway, however, shill bidding alone won’t generate the traffic to keep the revenues flowing. No, you need a way to drive the traffic into eBay Live Auctions, as eBay Live was directing traffic to a sub-domain known as ebayliveauctions.com. eBay drove traffic into eBay Live via its search results listings on eBay.com – it’s main site. The way eBay drove traffic into eBay Live was by way of flowing eBay Live listings through eBay.com search results. Once an eBay Live auction seller uploaded a catalog, those items would flow through regular eBay listings (at eBay.com) up and until the item came up for auction on the live platform. Nice idea in theory, however, bad idea when it comes down to regular eBay seller listings, who may have paid much more to list their items – then those who listed items on eBay Live.

Yes, there’s much confusion, as to excatly what went on in the case of these defendants and who knew what and when they knew it. Here’s where it gets a bit more interesting…

If Molayem and Neiman’s Jewelers were able to flow their items through regular eBay listings and maintain those listings every hour on the hour in the top jewelry search results on eBay.com, then it stands to reason that regular eBay sellers may have gotten the short end of the stick – when it came their time to climb eBay search results listings, which were flooded with Molayem and Neiman’s Jewelers listings. Was this a FAIR marketplace? You be the judge!

In other words, think dollars and cents, as it may be found that regular eBay sellers, (offering jewelry in the same categories as the co-defendants), may have paid way more more for their listings but, those listings may have never made it to the front of the prime listing space within eBay search results, as they collided with eBay Live co-defendant listings.

The recipe for success for the co-defendants may not only have been attributable to eBay Live’s “Floor Bid” button fiasco but, a combination of non-transparency of the entire eBay Live auction platform and the flooding of eBay.com search results with just a few direct to eBay Live Auction sellers on an hourly (daily, weekly, monthly basis).

Now, the finger pointing may go from the co-defendants to eBay and one could guess what their defense may be..

“eBay built the technology and it was their responsibility to make sure that there was transparency”.

No doubt, GoAntiques made it clear in their TOS that they bid on lots to protect the reserve so, it may be that GoAntiques.com disclosed properly to the consuming public, while eBay pondered whether it should disable the “Floor Bid” button for virtual auction sellers.

eBay is no stranger to lawsuits and was already sued in the past (along with GoAntiques.com) for alleged shill bidding on the very same platform. That suit was settled and one would think all would have learned a valuable six-figure lesson.

When that lawsuit was settled, eBay could have revamped the entire system to ensure that it was a Safe and Fair Marketplace, however, as we have learned – going back as far as October 2007 – an eBay Live employee stated that they were evaluating whether to submit a project to disable the “Floor Bid” button – huh?

Again, the Balestriere/Lanza team should be looking into not only how the alleged shill bidding occured but, how the listings of a few of these co-defendants got their listings to flow through the prime space at the front of eBay.com search results listings. It may be that there are other claims out there concerning non-eBay Live sellers who paid a premium to sell jewelry items, which never received the exposure they paid for, as a collision course, with eBay Live jewelry items, shut them out of the top eBay search result listings.

Let’s add some more fuel to the fire and go as far as to say that any eBay Live Auction seller (and there were hundreds of eBay Live auction sellers direct to eBay – such as the defendants – and there were also hundred’s of clients that went through eBay’s PARTNER Live Auctioneers) who may have also been slighted by the slight of hand listing escapades of a few.

eBay shut down eBay Live Auctions in December 2008 and maybe they simply think that out-of-sight equals out-of-mind. My guess would be that there may be many regular eBay sellers and eBay Live Auction sellers who could be consulting with class action attorneys on this matter. There’s information all over the net concerning these lawsuits and a few Google keyword searches will yield tons of results.

While eBay Live Auction buyers are being represented by Ballestriere/Lanza, regular eBay sellers (and even eBay Live Auction sellers) may want to start digging a bit deeper into the eBay Live Auction lawsuits to learn how they may have been harmed by the actions of a few and the inaction of many.

New UK singer Lemar! New album is in stores right now titled “The Reason”.

Very nice song and video.

-Stay Fly!

Love these girls! Hott track also!

-Stay Fly!

Internationally Acclaimed Fashion Designer Isaac Mizrahi Named Host.

Fashion Luminary Fern Mallis Serves As Judge.

Some of the most respected names in the fashion industry join the panel of Bravo’s newest creative competition series, “The Fashion Show.” Internationally acclaimed designer Isaac Mizrahi shares hosting duties with four-time Grammy Award-winning performer and actress Kelly Rowland. Mizrahi and Rowland will also serve as judges alongside fashion luminary and Senior Vice President of IMG Fashion, Fern Mallis. The competition series is produced by 3 Ball Productions and, as previously announced, will air on Bravo later this year.

More after the jump…

“The Fashion Show” follows professional designers as they strive to make their mark in the dog-eat-dog world of fashion and compete for a chance to have their designs sold for the mass retail market. The designers will face off in challenges and have their fate determined not only by the professional judges, but also by a studio audience. In the end, the winner will have their designs available for sale by a major retail outlet.

Mizrahi is the Creative Director for the Liz Claiborne brand, where he oversees design and marketing for the women’s apparel and accessories line.  As a leader in the design business for almost twenty years, Mizrahi has been awarded four CFDA awards, including a special award in 1996 for the groundbreaking documentary “Unzipped.”  Mizrahi’s women’s collection is available both domestically and internationally and can be seen in fashion magazines around the globe and his menswear collection expanded its distribution in fall 2008.  In 2003, Mizrahi revolutionized the industry by teaming with Target to launch a collection of chic and stylish clothing and accessories for women.  In addition, he oversees various licenses including shoes and home furnishing fabrics.  Mizrahi has created costumes for movies, theater, dance and opera in collaboration with Mark Morris, Twyla Tharp, Mikhail Baryshnikov and The Roundabout Theatre Company among others.  In 2002 Isaac received the Drama Desk Award for his costume designs for The Women.  Most recently, he made his costume design debut at the New York Metropolitan Opera with Orfeo ed Euridice.  In addition to his designs, Mizrahi also wrote a series of comic books entitled “The Adventures of Sandee the Supermodel” and won rave reviews for his one-man, off-Broadway show Les Mizrahi.
Mizrahi is currently shooting his new web show, which can be seen at www.watchisaac.com, and writing his first book “How to Have Style.”

Judge and co-host Kelly Rowland is a best-selling Grammy-winning solo artist and a founding member of Destiny’s Child, the top-selling female recording group of all-time. Rowland proved a major contributing force to the group’s record-breaking global popularity as they racked up sales of more than 100 million records worldwide while earning three Grammy Awards. She successfully debuted as a solo artist in 2002 with the album “Simply Deep,” which sold over 2.5 million copies worldwide and included the hit single “Dilemma.” The duet, with rapper Nelly, earned the Grammy for Best Rap/Sung Collaboration in 2002 and spent 10 weeks at No. 1 on Billboard’s Hot 100. Her follow-up album, “Ms. Kelly,” was released in 2007. Rowland has appeared in a number of television and film projects including the features “Freddy vs. Jason,” and “The Seat Filler,” executive produced by Will Smith and Jada Pinkett Smith, and the television series “The Hughleys” and “American Dreams.” She also served as a choir leader on NBC’s creative competition series “Clash of the Choirs.”

Bravo is a program service of NBC Universal Cable Entertainment, a division of NBC Universal one of the world’s leading media and entertainment companies in the development, production, and marketing of entertainment, news, and information to a global audience. Bravo has been an NBC Universal cable network since December 2002 and was the first television service dedicated to film and the performing arts when it launched in December 1980. For more information, visit www.BravoTV.com.

Brought to you by BRAVO TV in conjuction with SFPL!

-Stay Fly!

]]> http://stuffflypeoplelike.com/2009/02/20/fly-or-die-4/ Fri, 20 Feb 2009 15:12:34 +0000 Gabriel of Stuff Fly People Like http://stuffflypeoplelike.com/2009/02/20/fly-or-die-4/

I love Estelle like a sister and we always dig her style here at SFPL but this scares me….

There is just way too much going on with this look.

I mean, she doesn’t even look happy.

Luckily there were no eggs on the red carpet at the Brit Awards. Jesus.

What do you think?

You know where to meet us….

-Stay Fly!

The Windsor Lawsuit against eBay and Live Auctioneers is beginning to look like a road-map of sorts. Windsor Auctions filed a lawsuit against eBay in December 2007 alleging that eBay broke antitrust laws and various California laws. That lawsuit lumbered along at a snail’s pace, as eBay filed numerous 12B6 Motions to Dismiss. Then one day, a new and improved version of the plaintiff’s case was filed (along with another plaintiff) who alleged that they were also victims of eBay’s willingness to allow a few preferred users on their eBay Live Auction platform to “game” the system to the tune of millions in revenues. As a side note, there are quite a opinions posted on line that Windsor’s antitrust allegations were a long shot at best.

One slight problem with the addition of the new plaintiff. The newly added plaintiff was a registered Delaware corporation and as such, an “in your face” diversity issue arose and the action filed by Windsor had to be dismissed without prejudice against eBay.

Enter Tampa Bay based Saxon/Gilmore. Windsor and Jewelry Auctions (Florida corporations) decided to take the case into their own backyard by filing a new action against eBay and its partner (in the eBay Live Auction platform), Live Auctioneers, located in New York.

eBay, in its infinite wisdom (once again) filed another 12B6 motion to dismiss and Live Auctioneers followed suit. In eBay’s original motion to dismiss they stated that Windsor was “obfuscating” by NOT suing Live Auctioneers, eBay’s partner.

Ralston & Ellison - Founders of Live Auctioneers

Windsor added Live Auctioneers, LLC   (including their CTO John Ralston) to its action filed in Florida. As eBay had done in the past, they filed a 12B6 motion stating that Windsor’s original suit filed in the Northern District of California (and assigned to Judge Whyte) had been dismissed.

Now for some factual information. The antitrust claim was dismissed by Judge Whyte, however, additional allegations within that action were not dismissed. The case was dismissed by the plaintiff’s due to a “crystal clear” diversity issue involving the additional plaintiff. In other words, if the plaintiff’s had NOT dismissed their action voluntarily, the case would have been dismissed (at some point) by either the judge or by eBay counsel when the diversity card was played.

Now comes the revolving door of attorneys. Windsor retains the services of Berliner Cohen located in San Jose, California. The diversity issue (staring down Berliner) gets by those at Berliner and a complaint is filed naming the additional plaintiff from Delaware. Windsor then engages Saxon/Gilmore of Tampa, Florida and a new complaint is filed including not only eBay and Live Auctioneers, but, individuals are named as well. While Bay does business (worldwide), the judge in Tampa, Florida was presented with motions that convinced the court to send all parties back to the Northern District of California. The Florida judge does NOT dismiss the case, he sends it back to California.

John Balestriere

Windsor then files notification of a related case (the case filed by Balestriere/Lanza). The New York firm of Balestriere/Lanza are seeking class certification for their action against eBay, GoAntiques.com, Neimans Jewelers and George Molayem (who operated Hot Jewelry Auctions and Paramount Auctions) on the eBay Live Auctions platform. The allegations? Shill bidding among a litany of other claims. While the Balestriere/Lanza case was filed on behalf of the buyers on eBay Live Auctions, the Windsor/Jewelry Auctions action concerns the sellers who claim that eBay afforded an unfair competitive edge to Mr. Molayem. It appears as though the common denominator in both actions is Mr. Molayem and a platform that was anything but safe or fair. When the suits are placed side by side, Mr. Molayem’s name (and his associated companies) are sprinkled throughout both actions like snow on Christmas Day. The judge presiding over the Balestriere/Lanza case is Judge Marilyn Patel who presided over the Napster case in early 2000.

Never the twain shall meet…

The old saying “East is East and West is West and never the twain shall meet” might be very apropos for the next part of this article.

When we last left eBay, Windsor Auctions, Jewelry Auctions and Live Auctioneers were sent back to the Northern District of California to duke it out. eBay filed a counter answer to Windsor’s notification of related case (the case filed by Balestriere/Lanza) and eBay won another round.

The case was assigned to Magistrate Zimmerman and eBay filed their consent and agreed to Magistrate Zimmerman presiding over the Windsor/Jewelry Auctions action. However, Live Auctioneers filed a notice of declination of Magistrate Zimmerman and the case was then sent back into the pool.

Melina Patterson - Former Cooley Counsel

After all was said and done, the case was assigned to none other than Judge Marilyn Patel who’s presiding over the Balestriere/Lanza case (the case, which Windsor/Jewelry auctions attorneys filed notification of a similar case). eBay has also filed notification with the court that Melina Patterson, one of the Cooley attorney’s assigned to defend eBay against the Windsor/Jewelry Auctions action is no longer with Cooley and no longer represents eBay.

So, the Windsor/Jewelry Auctions case has been on wild ride of sorts. The case began in San Jose, California (was dismissed by the plaintiffs) re-filed in Tampa, Florida (their home state) and was then sent back to California, where it’s finally found a home in Judge Patel’s court. The case was beginning to look like an orphan of sorts but, the plaintiffs continued their quest in seeking their day in court.

In reviewing the notification of the related Balestriere/Lanza case (on the surface) there appears to be many similarities, one of which is Mr. George Molayem. Mr. Molayem operated under a number of eBay user-names, among them Hot Jewelry Auctions and Paramount Auctions. Windsor/Jewelry Auctions contends that Mr. Molayem used a tool which catapulted his jewelry listings to the front of regular eBay listings every hour on the hour, seven days a week (for a number of years). The placement of his listings at the front of eBay core listings, before other jewelry sellers (whether an eBay Live Auction or regular eBay seller), could have been detrimental to the “fair marketplace” claim eBay contends it operates.

In the end, it appears as though Windsor/Jewelry Auctions had father time on its side. Over the course of any legal action, things will change. Judges will retire, motions will be filed and of course, with more than one defendant in the case, it can become a crap-shoot in getting co-defendants on the same page. This case has turned into the classic David and Goliath mother of all eBay cases. While many may not fully understand what this case (and the Balestriere/Lanza case) represent, the plaintiffs (both buyers and sellers) know what’s at stake.

Nonetheless. while the eBay Live Auctions platform was shut down by eBay on December 31, 2008. It’s legacy lives on within the courts.

Teairra Mari performs “Hunt For You” for Fox 5 News.

The news achor mentioned that she is on her way…Beyonce scale?? No ma’am.

Very dry performance but I like the song.

You got allot of work ahead of Tee-Tee…

She also performs “Find My Way Back”. View HERE!

-Stay Fly!

Fabo & Ricky Ross were spotted of the set of The Dream’s “Rockin’ That Thang” Remix video shoot….

What can we say about the outfits in this pic….

I have to give it up to Fabo for rocking pink hardbody. A very brave thing to do. But this new LV logo….are they giving that ‘ish out for free?? It’s a new logo and I am already tired of it. *blank stare*

There is nothing wrong with a dude rocking pink. I like the t-shirt but to rock the headband all together is a little too much. Not to mention the pink shoelaces….

Ricky Ross…A motorcycle MCM jacket? Really? I don’t think so homie.

What do you think?

You know where to meet us…