eBay to silence seller reviews

SAN JOSE, Calif., April 10 (UPI) -- The Internet auction house eBay is cutting out the squabbling by changing rules so sellers can no longer rate buyers, the company said.

Buyers will still be able to rate sellers, but the two-way feedback system, which has turned into a cycle of vengeful negative reviews, will be eliminated, The Washington Post reported.

In turn, eBay said it would police buyers.

Some of eBay's 82.3 million active users have come out against the new policy, which will make it harder to weed out bad customers.

Bill Frischling, chief operating officer for Dyscern, a high-volume eBay company, said providing comments about sellers allows the company to converse with their customers.

Another observer thought the system could withstand the change. "If you think about it, eBay is the only e-commerce site where buyers are even rated, much less can receive negatives," blogger Scot Wingo wrote.