When eBay raised its fees in January, many of the site's sellers were upset, particularly over the timing of the announcement. On January 15, eBay released its fourth quarter results for 2001, showing phenomenal growth and record revenues. Two days later, they told their sellers that the cost of doing business on the site was going up.

One month later, Chris Grubb began publicizing a protest site called FireeBay.com, a domain name he purchased last October. "Please join our crusade with auction users worldwide and let’s FIRE eBay!" the site reads. "Help us reach our goal by filling out your name and email address." The site goes on to say that the names will be forwarded to eBay along with a letter asking them to reconsider their "outrageous" fees. "If eBay will not reconsider, let’s develop a cheaper, more user friendly auction service," the site proposes.

However, there is no privacy policy on the site, and users are not asked whether they would like to "opt in" to a mailing list to be informed of any future service that Mr. Grubb might create, nor whether the names might be sold to third parties for marketing purposes.

After entering a name and email address, users are in fact taken to a site where a message informs them that "BidDeli.com" is coming soon. (Mr. Grubb purchased that domain name in September.) And after signing up, FireeBay.com sends a thank you message stating in part, "We have a team of web professionals and we want to build an auction site for users. Because you helped us obtain crucial user feedback, you are now on the inside track for our special one-time-only offer to new members." There are no instructions in the email on how to "unsubscribe" to avoid getting further emails from FireeBay.com or BidDeli.com.

In interviews, Mr. Grubb makes no secret of the fact that if eBay will not lower their fees he will create an alternative auction site. But unhappy eBay members who think they are simply signing a petition on a protest site may not realize that they may be, in effect, signing up to a marketing list with no indication of how it will be used.