So I've been looking for some out of print slipcovers for Hong Kong Blu-rays and my friend suggested to take a peek on Taobao. I've been reluctant to use them, but a couple of months ago, Australia Post opened up a store on Taobao's Tmall and started selling prepaid Alipay cards in their stores. I took the plunge and placed my first order just now. First up, I have a basic working level of Chinese so navigating wasn't too bad, but like a lot of Chinese sites in general, there's all this screen clutter that almost makes it overwhelming. Because of this, I would NOT recommend anybody without an understanding of Chinese to use Taobao. It's also a much more complicated version of eBay (e.g. ratings are represented as a series of diamonds which turn into crowns or something) and there are a lot of really cool functions, as well as others that baffle and confuse me.
Anyway, you can use overseas addresses now. You can even sign up to Alipay, although you'll need a passport for ID verification. I noticed certain search results didn't show up when I was signed in, so I guess just like eBay, sellers can restrict whether or not they post overseas. Now postage is what I'm not too sure about. It ended up looking way too cheap for both standard and EMS options, and if you're from overseas, Taobao actually offers a choice of mail forwarding services on checkout. It also looks like all payments are processed through Alipay now, so you can be slightly less apprehensive about using your credit card in China. I used a disposable prepaid card so worse that'll happen is I'll lose my money and won't actually get anything. I've lost money from reputable sellers like KimchiDVD and buyoyo before so I'm used to every online purchase being a gamble really. I'll report back once/if my order arrives.
tl;dr You can shop on Taobao if your not from China/HK/Macau/Taiwan now, but everything's still in Chinese only and I'm sure there's still some kinks to be worked out.
