Here is mine:

"Hi. I'm a lampwork bead artist that currently sells under your Jewelry
& Watches Loose Beads Lampwork, Crystal & Glass Handmade Lampwork US
category.

This category was created to represent artists who sell their handmade glass
beads, however, it is increasingly being used for sellers who sell mass
produced, imported, glass beads. Some may be handcrafted, but it is by
sweat shops in India or China.

Because of the increase in these listings, the lampwork artists listings get
buried and sales decrease.

In this regard I, as well as other lampwork artists would like to request a
new cagetory for Self-Representing Artists in the Lampwork category that
would exclude mass produced, imported, glass beads.

I believe that if something doesn't change, complaints to eBay will increase
on a daily basis. Thank you for your consideration.

Lori Greenberg
lorigreenberg on eBay"

--
--------------------------------------
Lori Greenberg
www.beadnerd.com
ebay:
http://cgi6.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dl...origre enberg


"Kalera Stratton" wrote in message
...
A few lampworkers have been discussing lately something which concerns most
of us here... the lampwork categories on eBay. We were talking about how
lots and lots of us emailed eBay and they gave us a new category; lampwork
handmade US. Unfortunately, that category is woefully inadequate, as it
really doesn't specify what we *need* it to specify, which is whether it is
artisan lampwork, and whether it's made in the US is irrelevant. Narrowing
it to US lampworkers only hurts non-US lampwork artisans and the customers
who are looking for good-quality artisan work, regardless of counrty of
origin.

The thing this dedicated focus group (HAW) of lampworkers came up with is
the category "Lampwork - handmade - self-representing artists". This was
actually Lori Peterson's brainchild, if I understand correctly! I think
eBay would be amenable to that because they already have a category in
paintings for self-representing artists... which they won by emailing eBay
and asking for it.

It wouldn't keep liars and scammers from posting their mass-produced
lampwork there, but it would at least be a more accurate category for all
self-representing lampwork artisans worldwide, and that would benefit both
sellers and buyers of lampwork. If anyone here thinks this is a good idea
and one that we beaders as a whole could benefit from, please take a
moment to email eBay and ask them to make this change.

Here's the link for making uncsolicited suggestions (they made it a bit
hard to find)

http://pages.ebay.com/help/welcome/suggest.html

This is what I said in my suggestion:

"Hi,

I am a self-representing lampwork artist selling on eBay, and I'd like to
suggest the addition of the category "Lampwork - Handmade -
Self-representing artists".

The current category, "Lampwork - Handmade - US" was a step in the right
direction, but unfortunately it excludes a great many of our international
colleagues and doesn't specifically narrow the offerings to artists
selling their own work. I think that the self-representing category will
make it easier for lampwork customers to find the kind of work they want,
and will exclude those reselling mass-produced, imported (but still
handmade) lampwork, while including exceptional talents worldwide who are
selling their own work.

Thank you for considering this suggestion."
--
-Kalera
http://www.beadwife.com
http://www.snipurl.com/kebay