Ebay stopped running text ads on Google two weeks ago, just as the annual eBay Live was about to kick off in Boston. The decision was widely seen as retaliation for the “Let Freedom Ring”-party Google had planned to stage in Boston to promote Google Checkout, a payment service eBay doesn’t allow sellers to use.

EBay argued that the move was unrelated to anything Google was doing and was simply a routine test of the “incrementality” in traffic that text ads on Google drive to eBay. Regardless of what prompted the eBay’s action, the move became the talk of eBay Live 2007.

I guess eBay has collected enough data to analyze the incrementality of ads on Google, because it is once again running text ads there, although seemingly fewer than it used to do.

The Boston Globe’s Donovan Slack reports today that the acoustic gunfire-detection system ShotSpotter won’t be in place in Boston “until October, months later than expected and too late to stave off the usual summer rise in gunfire and homicides.”

I’m neither surprised nor disappointed. I’m not surprised because Boston, like most cities in the Northeast, is a difficult place in which to get things done. I’m not disappointed because I think ShotSpotter is borderline useless. The $1.5 million the city is spending on it would have been used hiring a handful of more cops. Cops have this ability to deter and solve crime.

Mr. Slack writes that Boston’s ShotSpotter adventure started with councilor Rob Consalvo:

The city first began looking at the technology more than a year ago, when Councilor Rob Consalvo asked the mayor and police officials to look at ShotSpotter, which was credited with a 31 percent reduction in violent crime in North Charleston, S.C., and with helping police in Gary, Ind., to catch shooting suspects with guns still in their hands.

ShotSpotter Inc. apparently loves to disseminate fuzzy data, but from what I understand the company’s system was installed in 2002 in North Charleston. Below are crime statistics I lifted from North Charleston’s police web site:

Please note that the last column is for half of 2006, not the entire year. According to Charleston City Paper there were 29 homicides in North Charleston in 2006.

I really don’t see much of a reduction in violent crime, and certainly not a 31% drop.

A wordy but rather light-on-facts pamphlet from ShotSpotter, Inc. provides us with the following quote, uttered by “Sgt. Karen Cordray of the North Charleston Police Department’s Crime Analysis Unit”:

“ShotSpotter picks up incidents that people just don’t phone in. I think it’s your eyes and ears on the street – a good thing to have! In one area of the City a combination of ShotSpotter and proactive patrol work reduced violent crime by 35%. “

The old “in one area.” Impressive.

The pamphlet continues:

Reports show that in the first year, police made 18 arrests as a result of ShotSpotter, six during the initial response and 12 after follow-up investigations.

Sadly, the pamphlet doesn’t name any of those reports.

Here’s a more reasonable statistic than the 31% drop in violent crime:

Cities in which the system is deployed have seen a marked decrease in gunfire — anywhere from 32% (North Charleston, SC)

It’s from a press release put out by ShotSpotter Inc.

There’s a bit of a difference between “gunfire” and “violent crime.” In fact, Boston Police Department doesn’t even report gunfire statistics, but “shootings.” A shooting is when somebody is actually shot.

I can’t say I admire the due diligence exerted by Councilor Consalvo and his fellow city councilors on this matter.

My first shot at ShotSpotter: ShotSpotter may not be quite what Brian McGrory has been led to believe.

Boston Police Department put out a suspect-wanted notice early this afternoon for the man suspected of holding up Truly Jörg’s Pattiserie in Kenmore Square on May 9 this year. Three hours later, BPDnews.com announced the suspect has been apprehended. That is great news.

In other news, the BPD has opened a “community office” at Landmark Center (the old Sears building at the intersections of Brookline Avenue, Boylston Street, and Park Drive) a couple of blocks south of Kenmore Square. The “office will increase visibility in the Fenway area, as West Fenway is the farthest point in the district from the station house, located at 650 Harrison Avenue,” according to the department’s Media Relations.

06-23-2007 update:

The Boston Globe’s Suzanne Smalley covered the event. It seems as if the city’s Mayor Thomas Menino isn’t quite on the same page as police chief Ed Davis:

“Everyone will know that there’s an increased police presence here . . . a place you can come to us about any security need you have,” Davis said at a ceremony yesterday.

Mayor Thomas M. Menino said that he believes the substation will help police do a better job in the Fenway area.

“Bringing police closer to the people always advances community policing,” he said in an interview. Menino said he plans to study the impact of the new substation and will consider adding more of them in other large police districts.

He said that a substation that has operated in the Charlestown neighborhood for several years has been ineffective.

The city broke ground earlier this month on a new Charlestown police station, which will feature a holding cell and large staff. Menino said a substation in the South Bay Shopping Center will continue to be open during holidays.

Davis said he has no immediate plans for further substations and is focused instead on acquiring technology that will allow officers to file reports on the run.

Emphasis added.

At any rate, I warmly welcome the “neighborhood satellite station.”

At about 6:40-6:45 this morning there was a two-vehicle accident in the northern half of the intersection of Charlesgate East and Commonwealth Avenue. Neither driver seemed to be particularly hurt.

I don’t know what or who caused the accident.

E-comm consultant Randy Smythe finishes a post on eBay Live with an interesting bit of speculation:

Of course if Meg Whitman’s buddy Mitt Romney is elected President that might help delay [government] action [against eBay]– I’m just saying.

Here’s a thought OT (off topic) With Meg reaching 10 years at the helm of eBay and eBay facing their most daunting issues ever would Meg leave eBay late this year or early 2008 to join Mitt Romney’s presidential campaign. If Mitt is the front runner I think the possibility becomes remotely feesible.

How about that? I wonder what role Ms. Whitman would play in a Romney White House? I’d put her in charge of ICE because she’d make all the visa fees unaffordable. I’m so funny I hurt.

EBay Live 2008 will be held in Chicago, which I think will make it the first eBay Live convention in the Mid-West.

There are two things one can pretty much not just be expected, but taken for granted: EBay Live 2008 in Chicago will draw a lot more attendees than eBay Live 2007 in Boston did. Hopefully eBay will have learned from the overflow crowds in Las Vegas in 2006 and cut off the number of registrants at a comfortable level. There will also be a lot of jokes between now and then about whether the eBay Live in the Windy City will suck or blow. Hah hah hah. Well, now we have that whole set of jokes out of the way.

On the business side of things, eBay Live in 2008 will be a good time to evaluate a number of initiatives, issues and developments:

- How will the restructured PowerSeller program play out?

- Will store listings and profitability for eBay store listers get a bounce from the soon-to-be rejuvenated eBay store program?

- How much closer to Yahoo will eBay and PayPal be at that time?

- What will eBay’s relationship with Google be like?

- Will any of eBay’s acquisitions pay off? Specifically, how will Skype be coming along? Last year eBay mid-level eBay managers in Las Vegas that I spoke to wondered whether Skype would figure out a way to make money. Not much progress appears to have been made on that score over the past 12 months.

- What overall message will eBay push to drive buyers to its site?

- Finally, which washed-up has-been group that still knows how to get the masses moving will play at the Closing Gala?

Today was the last day of eBay Live 2007, and what a terrific day it was, just like the Live was in general.

Two authors on hand at Live were set to sign books, but both of them had had theirs books sell out in the eBay Live bookstore the first day, meaning there weren’t any books to sign for either John Gardner, author of “Chicken Soup For The Entrepreneur’s Soul,” or John Jantsch, author of “Duct Tape Marketing.”

As he had no books to sign Mr. Jantsch killed a few minutes by talking to me. We covered a handful of topics but the most important one was no doubt how much he liked going to Fenway Park on Friday night. Here are some of Mr. Jantsch’s observations from eBay Live 2007.

Just as I was talking to Mr. Jantsch an elderly lady slipped and fell just a few feet away from me. I’m not sure would caused her to slip, but slip she did. Convention staffers quickly gathered to assist her and a gurney was brought to the scene, but I don’t think she needed it.

What would anything in Massachusetts be without a state pol putting his name on the event? Vote Tim Cahill! I mean, reclaim abandoned property!

For some reason eBay gives a lot of exposure to eBay Canada at eBay Live conventions. This moose mascot was part of the effort.

EBay CEO Meg Whitman and eBay Market North America President Bill Cobb check out the big screen during the Closing Gala.

A rather nice tradition at eBay Live: EBay staffers cheering convention goers as the latter enter the Closing Gala. I don’t know how the eBay staffers keep on cheering cheerfully for as long as they do, but they do.

Some people do urban exploration, but I’m more timid than that and settle for convention-center exploration. Here’s a photograph from the eBay staffers lunch room.

Speaking of eBay staff, eBay employee Paola finds it “incredibly gratifying to hear members of our community tell us their stories.” She also calls eBayers “a colorful bunch,” which they most certainly are.

Catering staff setting up the food in the eBay staffers lunch room.

Kool and the Gang performed at the Closing Gala at eBay Live 2007 in Boston.

Next year’s eBay Live will take place in Chicago. I hope I’ll be able to go, partly because I’ve never been to Chicago.

EBay’s decision to cancel all advertising on Google remained a major talking point at eBay Live in Boston, in spite of eBay staffers gamely insisting that the decision is nothing out of the ordinary, merely a routine test of the “incrementality” of the effectiveness of so-called paid search on Google, and not at all retaliation for Google’s hastily abandoned plan to throw a party in Boston during eBay Live to win support among eBay sellers for Google’s checkout product. Could there have a less dramatic way to test said incrementality? “This is how we do it,” was the terse reply from an eBay manager.

My wife pointed out that last time eBay was this much up in arms was right before it acquired PayPal, which had basically slaughtered eBay’s own online payment service.

Maybe it’s just because I’m a big-time homer, but the Live in Boston is the best of the three eBay Live!s I have been to. It has been easy to get face-time with eBay staffers, easy to find places to sit and talk, or just sit, and one can move around without having to battle hordes of people, as one had to at the ridiculously overcrowded in Las Vegas last year. Somebody made the claim that last year’s event had “more energy,” and it did, only much of that energy was spent on sprinting from one session to another so one could get a seat.

It also doesn’t hurt that Boston’s convention center is a very good one. As a taxpayer, I can’t say I care too much for the convention center, but as I convention-goer I have almost nothing but praise. Bear in mind that I have been to a few shows at BCEC before this Live, so I’m not just taken by the novelty of it all. It is a good convention center.

There were quite a few interesting seminars today. An interesting difference between the seminars at eBay Live and the seminars at the eBay Developer Conference, which took place Monday through Wednesday this week, is that while devcon encouraged its attendants to photograph and blog seminars, Live expressly prohibits doing so.

Pictures from eBay Live today, mostly from the Solutions Center:

Scot Wingo, who I linked to in yesterday’s post. I really need to come up with a five-second pitch that sounds better than “I’m a freak with a camera. Do you mind if I take your picture?”

Popular financial planner Suze Orman was at hand to sign books. A lot of people waited patiently for her.

EBay Radio. That lady has a terrific radio voice, according to my wife.

Exhibitors do what they can to catch the attention of visitors, some times successfully. Here’s a photograph of a group of visitors checking out a product demonstration.

When you think of Boston, you think of Trust & Safety

Booth babes. What else is there to say? Notice how I didn’t crop the name of the exhibitor from the picture? It’s my way of saying “thank you.”

Here’s what the Solutions Center looks like after hours:

Tomorrow night eBay Live closes out with the Closing Gala.

Bidbits has more pictures from eBay Live.

As Bill at Switchback reported earlier today, there is “visible progress on the renovations” of the Kenmore Square bus station. Below are no less than five pictures of this stunning development.

From the south-east corner of the square:

From the west:

From the north:

From the north-east corner:

Finally, a view from the south-east corner of Kenmore Square that includes the Citgo sign:

(Link to Bill via Universal Hub)

Last week I wrote about an early-morning assault on a young woman in Kenmore Square. Such assaults are rare in our neighborhood, thank God. This morning I was roused from my not overly deep sleep by a much a more frequent occurrence: A loud and profane argument between two (presumably) drunk people in the street. The man and the woman went at it for more than 20 minutes, maybe for as long as 30 minutes. It was quite annoying, but it is the kind of thing one would be crazy to run outside to put an end to and cops couldn’t care less about stuff like that. So one has little choice but to hope that one can go back to sleep regardless of whether the drunks keep screaming or not.