What game is eBay playing with Second Life?
Hoping to make a fortune by selling virtual goods you’ve acquired in an online game like World of Warcraft, EverQuest II, or City of Heroes? Forget about using eBay to sell your goodies.
Second Life is definitely not a game, according to eBay
eBay has announced that it is cracking down on the sale of virtual goods, such as currency, clothes and weapons from online games and virtual worlds.
eBay’s policy on the sale of digital goods states that “The seller must be the owner of the underlying intellectual property, or authorized to distribute it by the intellectual property owner”. There is some question about whether virtual goods are really owned by the game player, or whether they are the intellectual property of the company that owns the game or virtual world.
Interestingly the ban doesn’t extend to the much-hyped Second Life. eBay spokesperson, Hani Durzy, told CNET that the reason for this is: “We think there is an open question about whether Second Life should be regarded as a game.”
So if Second Life isn’t a game, what is it? And how does eBay decide what constitutes a game and what doesn’t? Why is Second Life different to other games? Is it simply because eBay believes the Linden Lab’s marketing guff (ie that Second Life is more than a game), or could there be some other reason for eBay’s philosophical questioning?
eBay founder and Chairman of the Board, Pierre Omidyar, is an investor in Second Life. According to an interview with Durzy at AuctionBytes, the decision to exempt Second Life was made at a “policy team level” and had nothing to do with Omidyar.
Anyone who has ever worked at a bureaucracy, or any large organization, knows that what the boss wants, the boss gets.
The boss doesn’t have to issue direct instructions to each individual employee; the boss’s interests and inclinations are usually common knowledge within the organization.
For this reason the whole “policy team level” line doesn’t wash with me. If you were in that particular “policy team”, you’re not going to create policy that pisses off the chairman of the board, are you?
Even though there are other sites, such as ige, where you can off load virtual goods, I am worried about the way that eBay has dealt with this issue by making what seems to be an arbitrary decision.
eBay is a global trading platform and has changed the way many markets operate – for example, it has had a profound impact on the antique market, where its global reach has changed the notion of what is considered scarce and what isn’t.
eBay therefore needs to operate at the highest standards of integrity and openness, and decisions like this one need to be completely transparent.
Related Posts:
January 31st, 2007
In your article you state that:
*****
eBay’s policy on the sale of digital goods states that “The seller must be the owner of the underlying intellectual property, or authorized to distribute it by the intellectual property owner”.
*****
This is the exact reason why the sale of digital items on ebay should be allowed. The creator of an item in Second Life retains the intellectual property rights of the item. Taken from the Second Life website:
*****
Linden Lab’s Terms of Service agreement recognizes Residents’ right to retain full intellectual property protection for the digital content they create in Second Life, including avatar characters, clothing, scripts, textures, objects and designs. This right is enforceable and applicable both in-world and offline, both for non-profit and commercial ventures. You create it, you own it – and it’s yours to do with as you please.
*****
They can also determine whether the item can be modified, resold or distributed by the next owner.
Since the money of Second Life (lindens or L$) can be converted into real US$, there should be no problem selling L$ on ebay either. The exchange rate is approximately L$275 per US$1. You can at any time convert your L$ into US$ and have it transferred to your bank account (or receive a check). Or you may purchase L$ with US$. Similar to Paypal, you are simply holding currency in another format.
Since it does not violate the currnet ebay policy, they would have no grounds to stop the selling of items or currency from Second Life.
January 31st, 2007
Camryn, if all of that was true, eBay would ban specific games/virtual worlds, rather than issue a blanket ban that excludes Second Life. Also, the PR guy defends the decision on grounds that Second Life is not a game – why didn’t he just say the reason you said. Me thinks you work for Second Life.
January 31st, 2007
Anyone who’s been a resident for a substantial amount of time know that Second Life is not game, but a platform. A game is defined as being a competitive activity that has a specific goal to accomplish by executing a variety of actions. Secondlife is far more than that…hence why various institutions, ranging for hi-tech to medical & education institutions participate in SL’s environment. You can however play any game you’d like IN Second Life, but the environment in itself is not a game. Just because you can play baseball in a park, doesn’t make the park itself a game.
The only people that regard SL as a game are those who know nothing about SL (aren’t members of the SL community), play only games in SL, or are new to the SL community & don’t make a conscientious difference between what a game and a platform is. The fact that Linden Lab gives it’s residents IP rights to their creations was big news back in 2003, since no other virtual environment offered such a benefit. To this day, I don’t know of any other major virtual environment that offers IP rights to their customers.
February 7th, 2007
Jason,
I am not an employee of SL but rather a member of the SL community. My knowledge of the “ebay ban” is limited to what was written in this article which only states that in order to sell digital wares, the seller must either own or be transferred the IP right to the item in question. SL provides this to its community member.
I cannot explain why ebay had to state it still has to determine whether or not SL is a game. The question as to whether or not it is a game, in my opinion, has no bearing on this issue. Ebay’s policy on digital items and the IP rights is not violated when selling Second life items.
But if forced into that argument, I cannot state it better than Ben.
November 15th, 2007
Linden Lab’s Terms of Service agreement recognizes Residents’ right to retain full intellectual property protection for the digital content they create in Second Life, including avatar characters, clothing, scripts, textures, objects and designs. This right is enforceable and applicable both in-world and offline, both for non-profit and commercial ventures. You create it, you own it – and it’s yours to do with as you please
November 23rd, 2007
sale ic
November 23rd, 2007
seo tech please visite http://www.seoszcn.com
November 23rd, 2007
seo tech please visite web site http://www.seoszcn.com
November 23rd, 2007
please visite web site http://www.seoszcn.com
seo
September 24th, 2008
sale ic
November 12th, 2009
<a href=adfa
[url=http://www.adasd.com]adf[/url]
sadf
January 6th, 2011
For any girls going through break ups, dive into quotes about moving on.
August 11th, 2011
Ebay’s policy on digital items and the IP rights is not violated when selling Second life items.They would have no grounds to stop the selling of items or currency from Second Life
November 8th, 2011
why ebay had to state it still has to determine whether or not SL is a game.
December 12th, 2011
Hello! It is for the firs time reaching this blog and i found some interesting posts. Reading them I was asking myself some questions. Why some bloggers are working so hard to put usefull information for the public and in the end they realized the compensation is too small? Is it worth it? The people who read this posts understand the volume of work necessary to mentain a blog alive? I really hope so.