> On the other hand, Trademe has never managed to penetrate markets outside New Zealand with any of its products, which limits its value.

I don't understand why that is necessarily a bad thing. If someone is looking to make a shit ton of money, have a chance to monopolize or dominate the international market, then yes, that makes sense. But if you're happy and content serving nationally, and so are your customers, I really don't see why someone would want to expand internationally.

If a product earns money, then hopefully it is providing value to users. If the number of users increase, more value is provided. If the number of users is arbitrarily limited, then people miss value they should get.

1) Why "should" them? Just because some people built a service doesn't mean they owe it to everyone.

2) The internet may scale worldwide, by that doesn't mean any service can do so while maintaining that value per user. Hell, it may not scale beyond a neighborhood, let alone a country.