Although eBay is by far the biggest and best known of the selling sites, there are other sites offering similar services. One of these is ebid, which has over 4 million auctions going on. It's clearly laid out and easy to use, and it doesn't have a seller's fee - something eBay introduced that has not been too popular. On the other hand, eBid doesn't have the 'buy now' feature - it's auction only at present.

Another fast growing site is Bonanza. This is the new name of a previous auction site, Bonanzle, joined with another which has had a lot of publicity as an alternative to eBay. At first it looks like an ordinary online shop, but in fact you can sell there as well, and there is no seller's fee.

As the internet itself is still growing, you can expect more and more marketplace sites to emerge. It will be interesting to see if eBay manages to stay ahead of the competition in future.