But interested parties have to both agree on someone.
You make good points. Seems weird to introduce additional costs and points of failure as a way to improve trade, but I can see why this might be preferred in a scenario with an absence of trust.
It has to be a very trusted 3rd party because they get sent the item and the BTC to pay for it. Which makes no sense to me. Personally I think the same person should not hold the BTC and the item when they are escrow
But it seems that is what people prefer here
I think what you are missing is the fact that I trust minerjones (or ognasty for that matter, but he does not do that type of escrow) to hold both the btc and the item. It is the very definition of trusted escrow that I think you do not properly understand.