by Adam Cohen
First published 2003
Adam Cohen chronicles how eBay transformed from a simple trading tool into the internet's most profitable commerce platform. The company began when Pierre Omidyar created a website to help his fiancee connect with fellow collectors. Operating from a spare bedroom, the venture earned money in its first month and grew into a digital empire serving over 20 million users. Cohen examines the human stories behind the success, from bidders who wake at 3am to chase household items to entrepreneurs who rent warehouses for their bubble-wrap businesses. The book explores how 75,000 people now depend on eBay for their livelihoods and why this particular dot-com thrived while others collapsed. Cohen reveals the mechanics of what became known as the perfect market and demonstrates how eBay fundamentally altered commercial relationships in the digital age.
Genres: history, business, economics, non-fiction, technology, 21st-century
Vibes: fast-paced, intimate, thought-provoking
Tropes: rags-to-riches, rise-of-a-company
Setting: United States
Period: 21st Century
332 pages · Paperback · Piatkus