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eBay Delisting All Auctions for Virtual Property
The growing popularity of Massively Multiplayer games has brought the issue of ownership rights in virtual worlds, and the appropriateness of what is called 'real money transfer' (RMT) into an increasingly public light. The success of the company IGE, as well as the launch of Sony Online Entertainment's 'Station Exchange' service would seem to indicate that RMT is now an acceptable part of Massive gaming. The well-known auction site eBay has recently made a policy decision that may throw these assumptions into a different light. Following up on a rumour that's been going around I spoke today with a media representative for the company, who confirmed that eBay is now delisting all auctions for 'virtual artifacts' from the site. This includes currency, items, and accounts/characters; not even the 'neopoints' used in the popular Neopets service is exempt from this decision. Read on below for the company's rationale for this decision, and a few words on the impact this could have on future RMT sales.
Mr. Hani Durzy, speaking for eBay, explained that the decision to pull these items was due to the 'legal complexities' surrounding virtual property. "For the overall health of the marketplace" the company felt that the proper course of action, after considerable contemplation, was to ban the sale of these items outright. While he couldn't give me a specific date when the delistings began, he estimated that they've been coming down for about a month or so. Mr. Durzy pointed out that in reality, the company is just now following through with a pre-existing policy, as opposed to creating a new one. The policy on digitally delivered goods states: "The seller must be the owner of the underlying intellectual property, or authorized to distribute it by the intellectual property owner." Given the nebulous nature of ownership in online games, eBay has decided the prudent decision is to remove the possibility for players to sell what might be the IP of other parties via their service. Mr. Durzy made it a point to say that initial listings of virtual property would not have punitive actions. Their assumption, he said, is that most users break with policies because they're unaware of them, rather than maliciously. Initial infractions will result in a delisting of items, and an attempt to educate the user on the policy. Persistent disregard for the policies, of course, will result in a removal of the seller's account.
We've spoken before on the possibility of taxation of virtual goods in the U.S. and abroad, as well as the economic impact these sales can have. With the removal of a very popular, very public source of virtual currency and goods from the market, what does this mean for the future of RMT? Will small businessmen who previously worked via eBay now turn to larger independent sites like IGE? Given that eBay is ipso facto declaring virtual goods to be the property of the game makers and not the players who 'earn' them, what does this mean for the future of virtual rights in general?
We've spoken before on the possibility of taxation of virtual goods in the U.S. and abroad, as well as the economic impact these sales can have. With the removal of a very popular, very public source of virtual currency and goods from the market, what does this mean for the future of RMT? Will small businessmen who previously worked via eBay now turn to larger independent sites like IGE? Given that eBay is ipso facto declaring virtual goods to be the property of the game makers and not the players who 'earn' them, what does this mean for the future of virtual rights in general?
Examples:
- "level 60 epic gear warrior for sale" => "leveling services to get you a epic gear warrior"
- "5000 gold on Thunderlord" => "the five days of playing time it takes me to get you 5000 gold"
- "1337 item" => "time it took me to farm this item and give it to you"
I mean, are they safe guarding against this also? Because, in the end, what's wrong with selling people your time or services to them? Once they complete the service, you pay them. I don't know how they could find some way around this or tell which auctions for services need to be revoked.My work here is dung.
Good to see they are pulling virtual goods, how about the real junk coming from China (this has been a real problem, especially with things like musical instruments)
Please sign petition to restore sanity to our banking system!!!
http://financialpetition.org/
I doubt it will impact the various virtual economies much, considering that you can go directly to several of the larger farming groups and buy gold direct.
For example, IGE.
If people still want to buy/sell virtual goods, there really isn't any way to prevent them.
Still, I salute Ebay for trying.
Tepp
The well-known auction site eBay has recently made a policy decision that may throw these assumptions into a different light. Following up on a rumour that's been going around I spoke today with a media representative for the company, who confirmed that eBay is now delisting all auctions for 'virtual artifacts' from the site.
This is insane. There's clearly a market for this activity. And there's clearly a way to handle it legitimately (i.e. IGE). Instead of setting up a parallel site (like eBay motors), they just decide they're not going to handle it at all. Way to serve your investors, ebay.
The theory of relativity doesn't work right in Arkansas.
Could I still sell a pencil and include my WoW account with it?
The man who trades freedom for security does not deserve nor will he ever receive either. - Benjamin Franklin
Deleted
Does this mean they are also going to delist auctions for domain names, downloadable software, and other, not-so-game-oriented property that also happens to be virtual?
Not only can we buy crap we don't need, now we can buy crap that doesn't even exist. Whattacountry!
It's simple: I demand prosecution for torture.
What about games that do allow or will allow buying of virtual property? It seems to me that eBay would be shooting themselves in the foot by blindly delisting all virtual items.
On a different topic, now where will I shop for a level 70 blood elf paladin?
Abaddon: An Xbox 360 Indie game
People who will pay for this crap: 1) Those with MMORPG's as their biggest hobby. I know people that spend thousands on other hobbies that are more...socially mainstream. 2) People with loads of money and/or little time who don't want to bother with the "unfun parts" of the game. 3) Competitive types, who derive insane pleasure from being the only one to have a "Bastard Sword of +10 Virginity", etc.
Jesus H. Christ, have you never heard of First Sale Doctrine? I assure you that ebay's lawyers have, and will not be advising that they cut out a truly absurd percentage of their revenue over something that is legal. Anyway the two situations are not remotely similar. In the case of a book, cd, artwork, or game, you are selling physical media which contains some data.
In the case of a digital asset, you are selling a promise to make an alteration to a game world. There is no physical good and furthermore there is no intellectual property to transfer! It's not even like you exported an item out of the game world and are transferring the file representing the object. You are trying to sell something that clearly does not belong to you. You are not your character in world of warcraft. That's not even a representation of you. It's more like you've paid a monthly fee to play with someone else's action figures, in their sandbox.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
PlayerAuctions.com has no rules about who gets to list items and who's items get taken down. I used to ebay for about $2,000/month but ebay got mad at me. Apparently only certain people are allowed to list 500 auctions of gold selling, while my modest 5 listings a week got banned. I'm glad no one will be using Ebay anymore. PlayerAuctions.com seem cool and aren't capricious on the ban hammer.
God spoke to me.
I'd rather eBay start delisting all those "informational CDs" instead.
Got it.
You must be the owner of the intellectual property *if you are selling intellectual property*.
If you're selling a physical item, you must be the owner of the physical item.
You don't own your WoW character. You own your CDs. You can sell your CDs but not your WoW character.
Done.
The reply brings up the doctrine of first sale because it controls in your specious "slippery slope" example but not the original scenario. The reason first sale does not apply to the sale of virtual goods or characteres is because control of those virtual goods or characters is granted only under a license and not by a bill of sale. That is to say, when you buy World of Warcraft, you buy the physical artifact in the box, but you do not buy what you are logging on to. The characters, world, and all items are still Blizzard's, so you never owned them in the first place, and thus can't re-sell them. You can do that with a CD, or anything else on Half.com, because what you're selling is the physical artifact, and not the rights to reproduce the music on that CD. I'm stumped that you can tell the respondent to RTFA without understanding that your initial "precedent" is irrelevant.
Last time I posted about this, some Virtual Fan Boy, with some Level 38 Condescention Skill took me to task but, here goes:
Why would someone spend good hard cash to get virtual stuff simply for the game play? This follows a question of course, after that Korean chap killed himself with exhaustion after DAYS of nonstop gaming, WHY?
Politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it everywhere, diagnosing it incorrectly and applying the wrong fix.
You DON'T need to spend hundreds or thousands of dollars on nothing!
Here's a link to website with a huge listing of charitable organizations. I promise you that giving 2 grand to help the needy or cure a disease will make you feel better than spending 2 grand on a shiny new level 70 rogue.
http://www.charitynavigator.org/
Comprende?
You guys seem very naive. Corporations do not have morals - they only care about $$$$$$money and lawsuits. The people that run them are even less likely to have morals than politicians (aka lawyers). In fact the legal system demands ("due diligence") that they do everything legally (moral or immoral) possible to maximize profit and crush any opposition.
eBay has tried several times to shut down Half.com even though they do not have any other venue for selling rare/low turnover items profitably. They only bought it to close down what they viewed as undue competition. They don't care what impact that has on the rest of the world. Look at how they are slowly removing features (like pre-orders) and trickling catalog updates. The goal has not changed.
I hope that they can classify "informational PDF files" as "virtual items" and delist them. Ebay is just plagued with people selling "information" on how to get actual products, hoping someone will basically make a mistake and buy it thinking they are getting the product itself. This has got to stop. It's basically Ebay SPAM.
Virtual Economies is an MMO resource site that includes a directory of online marketplaces dealing in real-money trading of virtual assets. It also has links to services that try to track pricing trends.
EBay tried to de-list my auction back in October for the character I played. I put up my fully epic hunter for $375 buyout, and it sold in under 12 hours.
The kicker is that about 6 hours after I got the paypal payment for it, eBay sends me an email saying they have taken my auction down because it violated Blizzard's IP. The auction was already done! Hilarious work, eBay... not only did I get the money for my character, but I didn't have to pay eBay for the auction cost.
The other guy got my account;
I got money for the time I put into the character;
Blizzard got the money for the game CDs and my monthly subscription;
Paypal got their bite out of our transaction;
eBay lost money for the bandwidth, site design and hosting.
IANAL, but I play one on
At first I thought it was a good idea on ebay's part. On further review, it seems to me that if someone wants to pay real money for items existing only in an imaginary world(sorry, ritualist Neo, but is IS fantasy), as long as they are getting the products they paid for, let them! I mean, it can't be as bad as people paying for 'Pet Rocks' in the early '80s. As long as WOW, Guild Wars and others don't object, it shouldn't be ebay's problem. If WOW and Guild Wars DO object, then the point is moot. Your character is LEASED to you, and these companies do have copyright to all the goddies that go along with the game. If you think you do own them, I know a nice bridge off South Manhattan I'd love to sell you.
eBay is a big, profit-focused company. They don't walk away from money unless there is a reason. Either they've decided it will become a problem in the future, or more likely, it's a problem for them now. That could be the cost and ill-will of complaints for selling virtual items is now making it cost more than they're making out of it. What do you think?
Definitely not the end user. Your leasing access to the character & the service. Stop paying for the account and see what happens. You get it taken away from you. Heck, try selling a leased car & see how far you get. It's the same thing pretty much. Only people really bitching about this are the lazy & those farming. Both of which I could a flying crap about. Lazyasses shouldn't bother & farmers need to find a day job.
The item clearly doesn't "belong" to Blizzard or Blizzard artists in any sense that's relevant to the kind of virtual loot transactions in question. When you sell virtual loot, you (in reality) in addition to your own personal in-game character are losing something, and somebody else is gaining it, in fair exchange. As noted by other commentators here, the buying player "gains" the time and effort that somebody else invested in that item, and gains the benefits that the time and effort produced. The game designers gain and lose nothing.
The designers INVESTED nothing in that item IN THE VIRTUAL WORLD-- only the player did. Specifically, the player invested time and effort. The designers invested all sorts of things in the "items" in the real world. They created the artwork, creating the networking code, and much of the medium of the virtual world itself. But none of that is what the ebay buyer is paying for. The item for sale (or service, or time/effort, or whatever you want to call it) shouldn't be confounded with the physical game materials themselves including images and sounds.
When you work in-game to gain an item, you gain the privilege of possessing that item. That privilege is what other people will PAY YOU FOR.
If on the other hand you taking a screenshot of some typical in-game item, then sell that picture as merchandise itself, then it might be more appropriate to say that you're selling somebody else's property. Or if you steal a CD package from the manufacturer and sell it, for example.
But you don't own the music on your CD's.
Why wouldn't I just sell a CD that has my account info on it? After all I own the CD with my account info on it even though I don't own the account, and I would be selling a physical object. If you rip the music to your PC would it still be ok (on a legal standpoint) to sell the CD?
Anytime lawyers are involved things get stupid. I think 90% of legal problems could be solved with common sense alone. EULA's and other frivolous agreements should have the sole purpose of giving the company no liability.