Ebay Snatches Virtual Goods From Auctions
In an effort to bring eBay back to the business of real world goods and services, officials have been delisting virtual property from auctions. Reporters from Slashdot spoke to representatives from eBay to confirm the canceling of auctions for ‘virtual artifacts’. Slashdot reports the items that have been removed:
This includes currency, items, and accounts/characters; not even the ‘neopoints’ used in the popular Neopets service is exempt from this decision.
The media representative for eBay, Mr. Hani Durzy, explains that the decision to pull these items was due to the ‘legal complexities’ of listing virtual property. Essentially, who owns virtual property? The player or the company that created said game? Arguments can held in either favor. So, to avoid such a legal dilemma, eBay will patrol the listings and pull any virtual goods from the marketplace. They will uphold their policy on digitally delivered goods:
The seller must be the owner of the underlying intellectual property, or authorized to distribute it by the intellectual property owner.
Durzy points out that sellers who initially list virtual items, will not be punished for such actions. The seller will be instructed about eBay’s policy, and told that they will continue to uphold their policy on ‘virtual artifacts’. Now if the seller tries on multiple attempts to sell virtual goods, their eBay account will be removed.
It’s about time that eBay reclaims their right to only list real world items. EBay should be a marketplace that only deals with actual items for purchase. If publishers would like to allow the sale of items for their games, then they should set up a marketplace themselves.
eBay Delisting All Auctions for Virtual Property [Slashdot]
Toots
Posted to Video Games on 29 January 2007
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