eBay Bans the Sale of Virtual Goods on the Auction Site

eBay, the Internet's largest auction site has halted the auction and sale of virtual goods. Some believe that this could threaten a bustling Internet economy. The move was said by eBay to be in line with the company's policy that "the seller must be the owner of the underlying intellectual property, or authorized to distribute it by the intellectual property owner.”

It has been a vibrant and booming business. People selling virtual goods from the virtual world of a popular online massive multiplayer game such as World of Warcraft or Everquest II. Players would take real-world money and pay for virtual world items, or skills, and then those items would be delivered in-game. Some have valued this economy as somewhere between $250 million and $800 million per year.

eBay made this decision to delist virtual items because of concerns about the legal ramifications of the ownership of items created in an online world, but does not affect sales of items in the virtual world Second Life. The decision opens the market to other sites such as IGE that specialize in the trading of items and goods obtained through the games.