The
library-sized record collection that went on sale via eBay earlier this week has found a buyer, although the collection, which includes more than three million pieces, didn't quite fetch the $50 million that owner Paul Mawhinney had been hoping to get. In fact, the final price didn't inch much further past the $3 million reserve that Mawhinney had set with eBay, although the collection's final price of $3,002,150 is one of the highest selling prices in eBay's history. Details on the person who's claiming to have $3 million on hand are sketchy: He lives in Ireland and goes by the name of
jopsoup, and he has 97.1% positive feedback. And it would seem that he's used eBay to buy music-related items before, although none of his purchases have been this big (not to mention expensive to ship across the Atlantic).
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Idolator
After putting his six-million-song music collection on eBay and getting burned by a fake bidder, Pittsburgh rare-music collector Paul Mawhinney is once again trying to unburden himself of the 45s, LPs, and other pieces of recorded music he's amassed over the years via auction. But this time, he's switched up two key details: First, Mawhinney is letting registered buyers browse through his online database of music, which outlines the market value of each item (only 45s are in it now, but he's currently adding his long players to the site as well); and second—and perhaps most crucially—he's given up on the idea of selling the collection to someone who will keep it intact as a museum piece, thus allowing anyone who wants to turn around and open a rare record store of their own into the fray. [Official site; HT Listening Post]
