[MUD-Dev] Ebay bans character selling

[Frank Crowell]

susie wrote:

> On Sun, 28 Jan 2001 the_logos at www.achaea.com wrote:

>> Ebay and Yahoo have banned the sale of virtual characters based on
>> the fact that doing so violates the intellectual property rights
>> of, say, Verant.

>> While I certainly applaud this enforcement of Verant's rights, I wonder
>> how long it will be until someone sets up an auction service specifically
>> to cater to the buying and selling of virtual items and hosts it somewhere
>> handily out of the reach of the US government.

> There are cottage game auction sites cropping up now in response to
> Ebay's actions.  These sites claim that they will not allow
> themselves to be influenced by Verant, etc, but I am not sure if
> that is due to their foolhardiness or their existence outside of a
> particular legal jurisdiction.  

Someone once told me that a law is not a law until it is challenged in
a court.  The issue is really the EULA now, not the IP issue.  The IP
issue was a red herring so that Ebay could rationalize their actions.

The auctions will not stop.  But the consumers will not be successful
with their law suit either.  this is not Sony vs Bleem, this affects
the whole software industry since almost every producer depends on the
EULA -- including the web sites and muds.

But no state or federal law has been broken.  The EULA is not a law.
It is a document that lawyers for software companies draft with the
knowledge that 99% of the people will act as if it is a law.  I admit
that I have not read the Uniform Trade whatever law, but I believe
they enacted some code to help give the EULA a better position.  But
all that still needs to be challenged.  The EULA is a one-way
agreement and therefore not a valid contract (according to the
opponents of the EULA). But the whole issue really relates to contract
law and commerce and not IP law.

frank
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