Archive of UserLand's first discussion group, started October 5, 1998.

eBay vs. AuctionWatch

Author:Jeremy Bowers
Posted:10/12/1999; 9:51:32 AM
Topic:eBay vs. AuctionWatch
Msg #:11955
Prev/Next:11954 / 11956

Hey, is it just me, or is this one of the more significant things to come through Scripting News in a while?

This may be the first case pertaining to "What Can Someone Do To Your Website" that actually goes through the court system. Everything else always settled, but I think (hope?) this one will go through. AuctionWatch is basically fighting for its existance (who will want to use it if it doesn't carry eBay's stuff?), and eBay believes a lot is at stake as well. If neither back down, we could see an actual case, with an actual ruling, that could have some very wide ranging consequences.

I'm not even sure who I'm rooting for, to tell the truth. From the Wired Story

EBay says AuctionWatch's claim [that the item list is property of the poster] is only partly true. Although eBay doesn't own the text and photographs of items that users post on its site, the company says it does have copyright on the bidding prices, feedback, and other transaction-related information.

Copyrighted bidding prices? B-wuh? Ok... they can copyright the feedback, although, judging from the page at http://pages.ebay.com/help/community/png-user.html , they don't. Section 6 (quoted below) covers information submitted to eBay, and while they take a non-revocable liscense, they also explicitly take a non-exclusive liscense. So, while eBay may refuse to liscense the copyright rights to the auctions to AuctionWatch, it would appear under the current user agreement that eBay could take no action if a user grants AuctionWatch a liscense as well. So, the item listing is the property of eBay and the user, either of which can grant copyright permissions.

(For what it's worth, the AuctionWatch claim that the auctions belong to the user doesn't seem to me to help them much; in that case, they need permission from each poster instead of just eBay. I don't know what THAT gains them. Better to fight eBay about it.

I imagine that AuctionWatch will attack eBay's/the original user's right to copyright the basic information about the auction, which would be what is being sold, at what current price, when it closes, and the rules the auction is being performed under. Those items are short and may not meet creativity requirements. An amusing scenario would be if AuctionWatch was ruled able to take those things, but was forbidden from taking the description text, as that would meet minimal creativity "qbullet.smiley". eBay might defend their right to copyright everything, or, probably more interestingly, attempt to assert that they can block AuctionWatch from accessing their systems.

Keep an eye on this section of the eBay user agreement:

6.2 Solely to enable eBay to use the information you supply us with, so that we are not violating any rights you might have in that information, you agree to grant us a non-exclusive, worldwide, perpetual, irrevocable, royalty-free, sublicenseable (through multiple tiers) right to exercise the copyright and publicity rights (but no other rights) you have in Your Information, in any media now known or not currently known, with respect to Your Information. eBay will only use Your Information in accordance with our Privacy Policy.

How much you want to bet that within a few more days/week the word "non-exclusive" changes to "exclusive"?

At any rate, this looks importent to me. If eBay can prevent AuctionWatch from doing what they are doing, that quite likely could have direct consequences to the "scraping" discussion a while back, and indirectly affects most everything else related to that topic. Also interesting: If eBay can prevent AuctionWatch, eBay could still sell the rights to do it, but eBay would pretty much be able to set their own price...

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