Here are some unedited personal notes on OpenBazaar I wrote up while in my first crypto winter at Coinbase in April 2016. I think another attempt at eBay as a protocol would be interesting today given all the progress with the underlying crypto infrastructure.
High-level thoughts
Finding good items/shops is hard — there are 3 ways to find items on the OpenBazaar client: 1) search for #tags 2) whatever stores you follow and 3) the Random tab.
Slow UX with learning curve (slightly off from traditional commerce design patterns)
Feels more Yahoo! (directory) and less Google (search engine)
Mainstream adoption question: compare friction of opening up a new tab vs. open up a new app; lack of a quality mobile client
What is for sale?
Physical goods
Harmless
Legos
Organic, small-batch food (e.g. honey, hot sauce, spices)
Bitcoin-themed jewelry, clothing
Electronics, hard drives, GoPro, Raspberry Pi
Semi-precious stones
2nd-hand clothing, shoes
Custom 3D printing
Old physical media: console games (Xbox, SNES), vinyl records
Gray market
Sex toys
Precious metals
Gift cards
Adult content
Fake watches
Generic but regulated pharmaceuticals
Guns, weapons
Illegal
Drugs
Digital goods
Steam accounts/video game skins/game key (CS:GO)
Ethereum/Bitcoin (a la Local Bitcoins)
Pirated software (e.g. MS Office)
Services
Sysadmin services
OpenBazaar 24/7 hosting
OpenBazaar consulting services
Q&A session, therapy phone call
Ecosystem
Hosting — If you download the official OpenBazaar client, the OpenBazaar shop is only online if the client is running. There’s currently also no way to determine if a given shop is online or offline. For more serious shops, a set of OpenBazaar VPS hosting services are available ranging from $10/mo to $100/mo. This involves running the OpenBazaar Server.
Moderation — When a given OpenBazaar transaction between a buyer and seller is disputed, the protocol supports the concept of moderation. Moderators advertise via the “Discover” tab or reddit.com/r/OpenBazaarModerators.
Opportunities
Search engine / curation
Alternative desktop/web client
Assumes you want to sell (problem with eBay as well)
Orient around search terms, not stores
e.g. with both Google and Amazon you search for products across the web/within a massive store (that has marketplace sellers)
Early sites are OK—but opportunity for well-designed
Built-in on-ramp into bitcoin for consumers
Alternative: fiat-to-bitcoin translation layer (never deal with bitcoin directly)
Additional merchant tools
Instant Exchange
Digital goods infrastructure (a la Gumroad; IPFS?)
Inventory management API (to sync with fiat store on Shopify, Amazon, Squarespace, etc.)
Mobile app
Messaging and simple bot-like commands to complete transactions
Shipping — Given a shop owner can, in theory, operate anonymously and shoppers can purchase anonymously, it seems odd that a real-world physical address is required in order to complete physical good transactions. cf. RPO and the concept of “re-shipping”
Payment processing — While bitcoin is best tool for a decentralized commerce network, bitcoin is not the most convenient option for most consumers. This is esp. relevant as more OpenBazaar stores will be less oriented toward grey market and simply leveraging the lower fee environment/distribution OpenBazaar provides. Related: And while OpenBazaar’s native support of bitcoin is great, many businesses will want the ability to instantly convert any transaction into fiat to minimize currency volatility risk. Currently there is no default liquidity provider for OpenBazaar.