There wasn't nearly as neat a remedy for the flare- up of cynicism and suspicion that surfaced among some users following the terrorist attacks. In the everyday debate on eBay's message boards, some active sellers grumbled that the Auction for America initiative might siphon away customers and hurt their business. Others carped that people participating in the charity auction might just be looking for ways to boost their feedback rating.

Such low-level grumbling may just be part of a democracy, suggests Jim Griffith, eBay's longtime customer-service ambassador. "It isn't realistic to expect everyone in a community to agree on everything," he says. "We have our disagreements, and then we move forward."

Yet for the most part, eBay officials believe that their global community will emerge from the September 11 tragedy bigger and stronger than before. One of the most striking surprises in this area came in late September, when CFO Rajiv Dutta began advising major shareholders about the Auction for America initiative. One of his first calls was to the Janus mutual-fund company in Denver, which owns millions of eBay shares. For about 10 minutes, Dutta briefed a cluster of Janus analysts and portfolio managers about the program as they listened on a speakerphone. He explained that eBay would be foregoing significant fee revenue to make the charity auction happen, but that he and other top executives believed that it was the right thing to do.

When Dutta was done, he "didn't hear anything for five or six seconds," he recalls. "I wondered, Did I say something wrong? Do they think that this is just a big mistake?" Then Blaine Rollins, head of the flagship Janus Fund, weighed in. "Rajiv," he said, "we are so proud of what you're doing. Let us know how we can help."

Senior editor George Anders (ganders@fastcompany.com) runs Fast Company's Silicon Valley bureau.

Sidebar: The Value of Good Works

On September 17, eBay's Auction for America made its debut at a New York news conference, where Mayor Rudolph Giuliani and Governor George Pataki joined eBay CEO Meg Whitman. Within days, members of the eBay community were selling thousands of items in the charity drive, ranging from Vietnam War medals to dinosaur teeth. "Many of us were trying to find ways to help," a Canadian seller explained. "I congratulate eBay for creating one."

Auction for America became a rallying point for other leaders who wanted to help repair America's wounds. The NFL said that it would sell memorabilia through the eBay program. So did Utah governor Mike Leavitt and Texas congresswoman Kay Granger. Jay Leno volunteered to sell one of his Harleys over the site.

Buyers in Auction for America found their spirits lifted too. More than 100 people bought drawings by Amber Moydell, an 8-year-old girl in Texas. She depicted people of all races holding hands around a simply drawn version of the globe. Among the buyers was a New York woman who wrote to the Moydell family immediately after seeing Amber's drawings.

"She said that she had lost several friends in the September 11 attack," Amber's mother, Michael Moydell, recalls. "Every time she felt that life was getting really hard, she said that she would look at Amber's drawing and take it as a reminder that there are warmhearted people out there."