I think I've had my head stuck in an eBay hole too long.

When asked, "Where is the best place to sell my items online?" my knee-jerk reaction would be to respond, "eBay!" Why would anyone want to go anywhere else? After all, that's where the traffic is, isn't it? The over 12 million served must know SOMETHING.

Well, I'm beginning to wonder.

I'm not a rebel, I don't consider myself a malcontent, but once in a while the spirit of Peter Finch takes over my body and I stick my head out the window and yell, "Ebay, I'm not going to take it anymore!"

Here's my story...

Over the past year, I've had two items prohibited from eBay: An air gun from the 1950's and my latest yard sale find...a set of Jarts.

You know, those metal-tipped lawn darts that evidently have wiped out entire lineages at family picnics. I guess Uncle Jed left the family reunion one too many times with a Jart sticking out of his head. The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission quickly intervened, and now Jarts are a distant memory. Now, while I agree that a Jart, used improperly, can be deadly, so can a Furby when it's hurled underhand at a high rate of speed. The point is, I doubt that either toy manufacturer intended for their product to maim or kill. Anyway, eBay does allow Furbys on its auction site. It doesn't allow Jarts.

But I digress. This story isn't about Jarts, it's about fresh starts.

After years of eBay inertia, I decided to pack up my Jarts and trundle off to another site to see if I could peddle my killer toy elsewhere. What I discovered in the process was that eBay isn't the only game in town, although many of us seem to think it is. Better late than never, I suppose.

I decided to try my luck on Yahoo Auctions. After all, I had heard rumors that their search engine was pretty fair...I'd give them a shot. I had, in my younger, wilder online auction days, registered with Yahoo Auctions, but had never done business with them.

I was pleasantly surprised by how easy it was. Heck, it was a lot like eBay, but with the addition of some very intuitive features. The first thing I noticed was a nice little button for uploading images. No more cutting and pasting my image URL into a text box. No FTPing an image to my server. I could simply hit the Browse button and choose the file from my hard drive that I wanted to upload. Automatically. I could even add up to 3 images if I felt daring.

It got even better. When I was faced with choosing a length for my auction, I didn't have to choose between a 3, 5, 7 or 10 day auction...I could choose ANY INTEGER IN BETWEEN! In addition, I could actually set the time that my auction would end! No more staying up until midnight to post my auction so that it would end 7 or 10 days later at the same time. I could set an auction length of 8 days that started at 4:41pm and have it end at 9:00am if I wanted to. I could go wild! Yahoo Auctions had really taken the time to consider sellers' needs.

Better yet, Yahoo Auctions welcomed my Jarts with open arms! They willingly accepted my eBay contraband. They gave my user-defined ending times, and...sniff...they even got me BIDDERS! Yes, my Jarts found a home at the end of my auction.

To top it off, I even got a nice little end of auction email. Not 1-2 days later...but less than 5 minutes after my auction had closed!

My goodness! An auction site that allowed me all the flexibility I needed as a seller, allowed me to post items that were prohibited on that other, bigger auction site, and got me a decent price on my item. How much would this all cost me? Well how about the low, low price of $0?

It doesn't take a Jart to hit me in the head.

I'll still post auctions on eBay. After all, they do have the traffic. But, it was exciting to stretch a little and explore other options that were available to me as a seller. And you know, I've heard rumors that there are even OTHER auction sites out there!