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Auction Site Selling Itself on eBay

You might call it the ultimate full-circle moment: Two guys fed up with paying eBay listing fees are now selling their own alternative to the online auction business - on eBay.

"We've taken it a long way and now it's just time to move on to a new project," said Peter Michaud, who created the site MightyBids.com in 2003 with Jeff Ramaglia.

Unlike eBay Inc. which charges sellers for listing and selling an item, Montreal-based MightyBids charges only when items sell, Michaud said.

Michaud said he came up with the idea for the site four years ago while making a living selling art on eBay. He would try to sell 50 to 100 items a month on the site and was incurring fees of about $1,200 a month, he said, even when only a few of his items actually sold.

EBay will credit users for unsold items by refunding a listing fee if the item is re-listed on the site, but there is still a charge for the second listing.

So why list on the site whose practices drove him away in the first place?

"It's marketing. It's getting a lot of attention and puts them to the test," he said.