The $50 is for the process of them setting up your shop on the site.
You left just about the time that there was a big push to get new shops up and running. There was something like 1800, the last I heard. They also changed a lot of things re: "free click rates", and "featured shop status" (unless you are both "exclusive" and a top lister, you have to pay to be featured), and that list of shops having new items is no longer on the home page-- you have to click on a link (sure, it's not much, but some people don't see it, or want to bother waiting for yet another page to load). They still submit everybody to "Google", but only exclusive shops get submitted to "Froogle"; status on the internal listings also depends on whether you are "exclusive". They don't want you to submit to google/froogle on your own, and some "link exchanges" can't be done due to the "frames" on RL. They also fail to monitor the artisans' section as closely as they do antiques and collectables-- The Higher Power forbid that somebody mistakenly describes a Hummel figurine as being made in 1980, when it was made in 1981, but import jewelry is OK, as long as you "name" the "artists" making each piece (and say how they are all such good friends of yours). Their main ad thrust is to antiquing newsletters-- at $50 per shop each time, IF you can get your application/info in on time to be amongst the limited # of open slots available in their ad. They just started ads in "In Style"(?)-- it supposedly was to be for artisan shops FIRST, then if space remained, it would be opened to non-artisan shops. The last time, over half the spaces were taken up by "collectibles" and there were artisan shops that had wanted space, but no more was available. Kaytee "Simplexities" on