What has the greater value? A cheap deal or a free deal?
Yesterday, the mainland's two leading internet auction sites - Taobao.com and eBay - fired the first shots in a war of words over the value and worth of their strategies for conducting online auctions, with each side claiming that it has China's best interests at heart.
Taobao.com, the Alibaba auction site backed by Softbank Corp of Japan, said its service would remain free of charge over the next three years, throwing down the gauntlet to EachNet - the Chinese online portal run by eBay, which charges a fee for its transactions.
'We call on eBay to do what is right for this phase of China's e-commerce development and make your services free for buyers and sellers in China,' said Alibaba.com chief executive Jack Ma.
Later, eBay issued a press release responding to Taobao's pricing challenge.
'Free is not a business model. It speaks volumes about the strength of eBay's business in China that Taobao today announced that it is unable to charge for its products for the next three years,' eBay said. 'Some amount of pricing ensures a higher quality supply.'