eBay has a policy against selling virtual items ("digitally delivered goods") on their site:
"The seller must be the owner of the underlying intellectual property, or authorized to distribute it by the intellectual property owner."
In other words, you cannot sell PDF "books" you don't own, haven't created or are not public domain. Of course this leads directly into virtual gold and other digital goods. If you post gold or other items from a virtual world eBay will tear it down - oh - except if it's Second-Life.
What?
"If someone participates in Second Life and wants to sell something they own, we are not at this point proactively pulling those listings off the site. We think there is an open question about whether Second Life should be regarded as a game."
So, you're probably asking yourself "what does a game have to do with virtual goods?" and you'd be correct. Their policy is for digital delivery of goods and the requirement that you own the intellectual property. Unless Second-Life allowed gamers to sell goods as their own intellectual property (another can of worms) it should be considered banned.
So, why does eBay seem to contradict themselves in this situation? One rumor states one of the eBay "high ups" was an early investor in Second-Life. Another take on the situation is pure profit, eBay makes a good chunk of change from Second-Life sales and by black listing the items they're cutting their own profits out of the equation.
There has to be some explanation as to why eBay would reason "its not a game" as the exception to the rule. Other than bad wording on the part of their PR folks.
source:
kotaku.com
news.com
