eBay's "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" Download Policy

I wasn't able to make eBay's Digital Download Workshop they had last week, but I logged in the next day and read everything posted. What I found was that I was very happy that I didn't login "during" the workshop and expect to get any questions answered. The folks running the workshop were not really "there" for about the first half of the hour. In other words, nothing really worthwhile was said by eBay or questions answered until shortly before the hour workshop was over. There were plenty of questions asked, and people aggravated by the lack of response from eBay reps during the workshop.

Actually, 5 mins into the workshop they said "Griff and Brian are here and we are ready to start the Workshop. We'll address questions as we go but first, we have some information to post." Now, get this... 41 minutes (that's FORTY ONE MINUTES) later they posted the information they mentioned just after the workshop started. That post was titled "Using Classified Ads for Selling Digital Content."

They KNEW what the workshop was going to be about. They KNEW the information they wanted to present. Why didn't they have it typed up so they could just paste it in when the workshop started?

Then, 52 minutes into the 60 minute long workshop they posted more in a post titled "A Digital Content Selling Strategy Example." Then came a few short posts... "Just In Time Printing", "Perceived Value Matters!", "The Content Itself" and "Pricing."

Most of the questions asked by users were answered after the hour was over and the opportunity to interact was over. They did manage to answer some questions, but I wasn't crazy about most of their answers. Some of them were a bit ambiguous to say the least.

The one question I wanted to see them answer was, can you offer a 'complimentary' download after the sale while the customer waits for their digital media to arrive in the mail? Now, mind you, if offered a download in lieu of something mailed and offered it in lieu of paying shipping, many bidders would probably just skip having the digital media mailed to them. So, my question was, if you do this are you breaking the rules?

This is what was said:

You can not use the word "download" in your auction ads or your About me pages.

However, and I quote, "...with regards to sending the content via email attachment POST SALE where you also never mentioned that would (should be "word" not would), as either an option, or courtesy, delivery the content in digital format, then it would be allowed." (spelling, grammar, punctuation errors theirs, not mine)

So, to me that means, "Don't ask, don't tell."


Here is some more of what I learned:

• You can sell multiple items from one classified ad, but you can't link to them individually. You can put a phone number or email address in your classified ad though.
• Online Memberships CAN be sold via auction if you send a Membership card (or other physical item). If there is no physical item mailed, then it has to be listed via classified ad.
• Online graphics can be sold via auction if there has to be discussion over the design. If it's predesigned and they are buying it as it is designed, then it has to be listed as a classified ad.
  

You might gleam some more information out of the discussion if you read it yourself.

I have pulled out the information that they prepared ahead of time to share in the workshop and copied it in this blog post:

http://auctionriches.blogspot.com/2008/04/using-classified-ads-for-selling.html

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