By silicon.com, 21 September 2004 11:20
NEWS 21.09.1999:Internet auction house eBay has announced that it will stop selling CD-Rs, back-up software and 35mm and 70mm movie prints on its site.
The move is part of a crackdown on the traffic of pirated merchandise passing through its system and was decided upon following a review of copyright issues with US authorities.
The policy will take effect on 17 October.
An eBay spokesman added that the company also plans to prohibit the sale of alcohol and tobacco from next month.
21.09.2004: Five years on and, unsurprisingly, the pirates haven't shut up shop. eBay is still finding new ways to keep on the right side of the copyright laws and pirates are trying to beat them.
However, eBay's has now taken a more relaxed attitude to piracy prevention. The online auctioneer recently teamed up with Microsoft to try to stop dodgy software making it onto the site. Instead of a blanket ban on software sales, Redmond can now report when it thinks something is amiss and programs will scour the net for ropey-looking listings.
The auctioneer is now allowing music downloads for sale on the site but is convinced it's beaten the pirates on that score too - it will have its watchdogs sniffing out for any breach of copyright.
While vigilance may be flavour of the month some bans are still in place at eBay - software downloads, for example, aren't permitted for sale and neither are corpses and drugs.
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1. Roy Wyss
I tonight have just read your article on the rules governing the sale of softwear and I have to report that I have just purchased a CD and when I received the confermation of receipt of money by seller I find that I have to download it from an attachment to email not. This Is Not Within Your Rules.
'8128221357 cd bronze baby shoes'