Paris: eBay to pay Louis Vuitton, Christian Dior and others 40 Million Euros!!!!!!

[jaydisc]

A French court just told eBay to pay the above and a few others 40 million for brand reputation damage by permitting the sale of counterfeit goods! This must have something to do with the cleaning up of eBay.

Source: The Age

How awesome it is to see eBay suffer for this! :D

[Burn]

Yeah I read that the other day. This could just be the beginning of bad times for E-Bay as there's nothing really stopping other companies (Hasbro for example) for taking the same action.

One other little tidbit that went un-noticed was E-Bay forced to compensate another company whose products cannot be sold through retailers unless that company has given them permission. As E-Bay was allowing every man and his dog to sell this companies products E-Bay was found to be violating the company's trading policy, or something along those lines.

[jaydisc]

Unfortunately, I disagree with the latter and as far as US law goes, that wouldn't fly. There is the doctrine of "First Sale" which says that you as a buyer are entitled to resell anything you have acquired without re-obtaining consent from the original seller. I'm not sure what the AU equivalent, if any, there is.

[Pulse]

HaHaHa! S#cked In Ebay! :p

I reckon it's time for the Ozformers to get into this online auction thing - We could make a killing :D.

All we need to do is repackage every TF into a plain-brown generic box, Re-name the figures (Optimus Prime would become Prime Optimus :p) & we'd be in business! :D

[griffin]

Yeah, I was worried about that second part relating to damages for selling legitimate items without consent of the official source.
But I don't understand why ebay can't just recoup its costs/damages by suing the sellers who broke ebay rules in the first place. Instead of just removing them or their *current* ebay ID, fine them or sue them for breach of contract (when they signed up). With the paypal requirement on all sales, ebay would have ready access to bank accounts of those who break ebay rules, and the law.

[Burn]

Yep, I misinterpreted a bit.

News.com.au story (http://www.news.com.au/technology/story/0,25642,23950456-5014108,00.html)

What I took wrong was this line.


The court ruling, which marked a first in France, found eBay directly responsible for the sale on its website of three Hermes bags including two fakes, for a total of €3000 ($4935).

I took the sale of the non-fake bag as being Hermes not giving them permission to sell their products. Which ... isn't so much of a Hermes thing, but a French thing.


A council representing the auction industry also accuses the Internet trader of breaking a French 2000 law that requires all auctioneers to be approved by the state.

[jaydisc]

News.com.au story[/URL]

Eeek! You might wanna avoid those Murdoch rags ;)

[STL]

Yeah, I was worried about that second part relating to damages for selling legitimate items without consent of the official source.
But I don't understand why ebay can't just recoup its costs/damages by suing the sellers who broke ebay rules in the first place. Instead of just removing them or their *current* ebay ID, fine them or sue them for breach of contract (when they signed up). With the paypal requirement on all sales, ebay would have ready access to bank accounts of those who break ebay rules, and the law.

Suing a lot of those sellers could be tough b/c often they'd have to cross international borders to do that. It's not so cut and dried in that case cos I imagine there's a whole civil court procedure that they'd have to adhere to. They might have the details but they have absolutely no right to play judge, jury and executioner. It'd also be incredibly costly retaining lawyers against each of the individual sellers. Perhaps a class action might be possible but there are strict rules on that and I'm not sure how they work in say China, HK, or other Asian countries. HK still operates under common law rules but then again bringing them together is tough.

Furthermore, the assets of the individuals who are selling these items might not necessarily be worth a suit against b/c recovery would likely be negligible. That's why eBay has been headhunted rather than the sellers who no doubt the companies suing eBay could've gotten the information of. No point suing someone who has nothing.

Not that we should be sympathetic to eBay. It makes plenty of money out of this and in doing so assumed the risk that it could be held accountable itself.

[autobreadticon]

most of those sellers are Asian, mainly Chinese sellers
taobao sets to benefit if ebay becomes bankrupt..

[Tober]

This does somewhat suprise me actually, I would have thought eBay would have tried to pass the buck back to the sellers. I thought eBay would be able to prove that controlling such sales was beyond their means as they are not able to inspect goods themselves and they do offer buyer protection through PayPay in the case of counterfiet goods. Then again I'm way to lazy to actually read the article :rolleyes:

eBay isn't about to go bust anytime soon. If this ruling has seriously hurt them then you just know that they will pass on the cost to buyers and sellers in the form of higher fees.

I personally don't love eBay but I use it alot because it, like PayPal, is very convenient. I lump them into my 'necessary evil' group which includes real estate agents, politicians, Telstra and sometimes lawyers etc who make a huge profit by providing people with basic essential needs.

[MV75]

Yep, I immediately thought of the Hasbro thing too. They must have been more generous though and just threatened legal action instead of just out and out suing Ebay.

For me, a company that does that is more highly regarded. Working with the community, and ultimatly your customers, is much preferable to me over just outright suing.
________
Gm Foods (http://gmfoods.info/)

[jaydisc]

I don't think legally this could have occurred in the USA or AU. Most sites have anonymity from what their user's post as long as they have a procedure in place for removing it when asked. Clearly, French law is different and has allowed this.

[Golden Phoenix]

I don't think legally this could have occurred in the USA or AU. Most sites have anonymity from what their user's post as long as they have a procedure in place for removing it when asked. Clearly, French law is different and has allowed this.

Surely the courts here could have this case used as precedent though. I don't know how much ground it would hold, but it would help the companies here

[dirge]

jay: you're right, but there could easily be a case for complicity on eBay's part. It depends on the political mood and the presiding judge, of course.

It's fairly apparent that eBay is happy enough to profit from the sale of counterfeit goods, even if it's processes do pay lip service to protecting copyright. I don't expect eBay to scour _every_ listing, but some categories are just awash with fake goods, and obviously fake goods at that.

[Tiby]

Tober, I prefer "grudge purchase" (winces) :)