Ebay thinks Carbon Credits Are BS

Radio Free New Jersey ^ | 6/18/2008 | Tom at RadioFreeNJ

[tcostell]

...Well I don’t know much about that, but I do know something about markets. And it seemed to me that if a big company can make a bunch of money selling whole forests to a guy like Al [Gore], then I should be able to get in on the act too. And as a coincidence, my wife and I had a tree in our yard which was casting a shadow on the solar heater for our pool and we were considering cutting it down anyway. So I said, “Hey wait a minute hon… why should we be so greedy… let’s leave that tree there and let someone buy it as a carbon credit. It won’t be worth much, but at least we’ll be doing our part to assuage the guilt of some jet setting liberal somewhere, and if our pool is ½ a degree colder come September, I think I can live with that.”

Carbon Credit For Sale On Ebay.

Full Text Can be Found Here.

[tcostell]

I don't usually post my Blog threads on FR, but I had a lot of fun with this one and I thought others might get a kick out of it too.

[xcamel]

Carbon Scam Ping - (POGW)

[kevkrom]

Good read.

I think you need to keep pressing eBay and demand, in writing, the exact reason that they pulled your auction (ostensibly, so that you as a seller can avoid having future auctions pulled). I’d love to see their rationale.

[angkor]

I’ve yet to figure out who is the issuer of this fiat currency called “carbon credits”.

[tcostell]

Well if I were seriously interested in selling the thing I might, but I think I made my point. The only thing that might change my mind is if the the thing actually sold, then ebay would be flooded with additional posts from thousands of people... basically everyone with a tree in their yard. And that would rip the bottom out of the "Carbon Credit" market.

That might be kind of fun, but I'm not sure it's worth the trouble.

[kevkrom]

Well if I were seriously interested in selling the thing I might, but I think I made my point.

You've made the main point, but actually getting eBay to go on record will reinforce the point quite nicely.

[steelyourfaith]

 

Beam me to Planet Gore !

[weegee]

Ebay will let you burn a piece of toast and sell it as a naturally occuring religious phenomenon.

[weegee]

Carbon Rod - Is there anything it doesn’t know???

[Clock King]

Only for the Big People, not the little people, don’t cha’ know?

[VastRWCon]

Good one! LOL, I was thinking of something similar myself, I wonder why they wont allow it...

Maybe "The eBay Pirate" knows the answer?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U0hvWGyO5N4

[freespirited]

The real reason eBay pulled your listing is that you mocked a high priest of liberalism. How dare you!

[MrB]

This reminds me of Thomas Sowell’s mocking of and refutation of the concept of common “ownership” of public property.

“Can I sell the part that I own?”

[weegee]

Walter Williams asks if it is OUR body to do with as we want, why can’t we sell an organ?

[MrB]

You know, maybe it wasn’t Dr Sowell that stated the fallacy of common ownership.

I think it WAS WEW.

[tcostell]

Well I never mentioned Al Gore in the Ebay listing, only the associated essay which I wrote several days after they pulled the listing. In fact I actually tried to play it as "straight" as I could manage with the ebay listing, but even if my presentation was poor they still should have left it up.

It's sort of like my "retail value" calculation. That's what I thought it was worth but no one had to actually pay that. If they only thought it was worth $10 I'd have accepted it. In fact I wonder if they would have left it if, like the other carbon credits they have listed, I set a high minimum price that implied that it had some inherent value.

[tcostell]

Sure ... if they would actually go on record, but I’ll bet that they are better at wiggling out of a trap like that than I am at setting one. It’s their whole business afterall.