Metadata service that supports user-to-user sales via third party web pages
An electronic marketplace system embodies various inventions for assisting users in listing products for sale, locating the listings for a product, and performing related actions. A user wishing to sell a product can browse to an existing description of the product in an electronic catalog and then select an option to create a corresponding listing. To create the listing for the selected product, the user preferably specifies the product's condition and a selling price. Others may view and make purchases from such listings while browsing the catalog. In one embodiment which is part of a web page metadata service, the World Wide Web serves as the electronic catalog such that users may create, view and make purchases from product listings during viewing of third party web pages that describe the associated products. The system may also provide an option for buyers to preorder products from unspecified sellers.
1. A system for supporting user-to-user sales of products, comprising:
a metadata client that runs in association with a browser on user computers; and
a metadata server that communicates with the metadata client over a computer network to provide users with metadata for viewed web pages;
wherein the metadata client and server are responsive to a first user accessing a first web page that displays a description of a first product by providing to the first user an option to create a listing for selling a unit of the first product;
and wherein the metadata client and server are further responsive to a second user accessing a second web page that displays a description of the first product by notifying the second user of the product listing created by the first user and providing an option for the second user to make an associated purchase from the first user.
2. The system as in claim 1 wherein the metadata client and server include functionality for analyzing web page content to determine whether a recognized product is represented therein.
3. The system as in claim 1 , wherein the first and second web pages are provided independently of the metadata client and server.
4. The system as in claim 1 , wherein the first and second web pages are from different web sites.
5. The system as in claim 1 , wherein the metadata client and metadata server collectively enable users to create listings for selling products represented on web pages, and to view listings created by other users for selling such products, across a plurality of web sites hosted by a plurality of independent entities.
6. The system as in claim 1 , wherein the metadata client and metadata server collectively enable users to create listings for selling the first product, and to view listings created by other users for selling the first product, via web pages of each of a plurality of web sites of each of a plurality of entities.
7. The system as in claim 1 , wherein the metadata client is a browser plug-in.
8. A system for facilitating user-to-user sales of products, comprising:
a metadata client component that runs on user computers in conjunction with a web browser to provide web page metadata to users during browsing of web pages;
a metadata server component that servers the metadata to the metadata client component;
wherein the metadata client and server components collectively implement a user-to-user sales service in which (a) when a first user accesses a first web page that describes a first product, the first user is provided an option to create a sales listing for selling the first product; and (b) following generation of the sales listing by the first user, when a second user accesses a second web page that describes the first product, the listing is exposed to the second user, and the second user is given an option to purchase the first product from the first user.
9. The system as in claim 8 , wherein the first and second web pages are provided independently of the metadata client and server components.
10. The system as in claim 8 , wherein the first and second web pages are from different web sites.
11. The system as in claim 8 , wherein the metadata server component includes functionality for analyzing web page content to determine whether a recognized product is represented therein.
12. The system as in claim 8 , wherein the metadata client component and metadata server component collectively implement the user-to-user sales service across a plurality of web sites of a plurality of entities.
13. The system as in claim 8 , wherein the metadata client component and metadata server component collectively implement the user-to-user sales service across substantially the entire World Wide Web.
14. The system as in claim 8 , wherein the metadata client component and metadata server component collectively enable users to create listings for selling products represented on web pages, and to view listings created by other users for selling such products, across a plurality of web sites hosted by a plurality of independent entities.
15. The system as in claim 8 , wherein the metadata client component is a browser plug-in.
16. The system as in claim 8 , wherein the metadata server component comprises a memory which stores a table that maps URLs to products.