eBay Copyright Thieves & Crooks Named and Shamed
It's dishonest to copy photographs, and misleading to buyers.

brighteyes-uk Selling Non-Existent Sovereign on eBay
eBay seller brighteyes-uk of Carrickfergus, United Kingdom, offered a 1905 Edward VII Gold Sovereign for sale on eBay using our photos of a mint condition coin.
Copyright abuse is dishonest.

A Picture is Worth a Thousand Words
Especially when it's one of our high quality photographs of mint condition coins. Two photo's must be worth 2,000 words.

Mint Condition?
About 99% of coins listed on eBay are in "mint condition" according to their sellers. Funnily enough only about 1% of coins we see are in mint condition. Is this self-delusion or dishonesty?
Failing to state clearly that the coins shown in the photographs are not the seller's own photographs or coins is likely to mislead all potential buyers into believing they are the same coin. As the listing states the coins are in mint condition, then buyers would be entitled to feel cheated if and when they received coins which were not in mint condition. It seem that most eBay vendors do not care or think about this.

Seller ID	Item Number	Date	Description	Price
brighteyes-uk	230469426525	2nd May 2010	Gold Sovereign 1905 EDWARD VII	�170
brighteyes-uk	230469426175	2nd May 2010	Gold Sovereign 1905 EDWARD VII	�170

High eBay Feedback is No Guarantee of Integrity or Honesty
When we wrote this page, this eBay member's feedback was 781; with 100% positive according to eBay.
We think this clearly shows that high eBay feedback is not a reliable indication of honesty or intelligence.

Sample Listing

Gold Sovereign 1905 EDWARD VII
Writing on coin: "EDWARD VS VII D G BRITT OMN REX F D IND IMP 1805
This sovereign had never been circulated or mounted and is in mint condition.

What's Wrong?
When we saw the Buy It Now pricing for this and other sovereigns from the same seller, we jumped to the conclusion that either the coins were stolen, or that the seller was stupid.
If the coins were genuine, even if they were not in mint condition, we would have paid more for them, and so would a number of other dealers. As she had visited one of our websites to get the photo, she could have see a link "We Buy Gold Sovereigns" on the same page. If she had made a quick telephone call to us, we would have given her an offer, subject to the coins being in reasonable condition, which would have been more than she was asking on eBay.
Although we would not have paid her postage, she would still have been much better off selling her coins to us. We would have bought the whole lot, about 10 or more coins in total, and she could have had a cheque of bank transfer by return. As she did not do so, and as the prices were Buy It Now, rather than auction, and pitched too low, it all sounded dodgy to us.

Price
The seller was originally asking a BIN (Buy It Now) price of �170.
She would have got more by selling to us even before eBay's 10% selling fees are taken into account. Even ignoring PayPal fees, she would have got about �150 for the coin for the coin.
A number of other listings offered sovereigns at �160 each, so the seller would have been lucky to get more than �140 each after eBay selling fees.

eBay Guilty of Negligence or Complicity
We did report both these examples of copyright abuse using our standard Statutory Declaration via the eBay VeRO programme, and they did remove one of them, 230469426175.
We look forward to taking legal action against eBay for their negligence and / or complicity if they fail to take down the offending material promptly.

Suspected Fraud
The other one of our listings, together with several others, were removed for suspected fraud, and breaches of eBay's listings policies, so we obviously were not the only ones with similar thoughts. Incidentally, eBay appear to rely on a number of unpaid, but public spirited, volunteers, to police their listings for them.

Apology Received
We were slightly surprised to receive an apology by e-mail:

Subject: Ebay Auctions - Violation
Date: Mon, 3 May 2010 11:24:42 +0100
Dear Sir/Madam
I am writing to you with regard to Ebay items 230469426175 and 230469426525 - Gold Sovereigns 1905 EDWARD VII
I have been informed by ebay that I should not have used the website image that I did and I can only apologise for this. I did not realise I was doing anything wrong by using the image but I know now not to do it again. Please accept my sincere apologies for this innocent mistake.
I await hearing further from you.
Regards
Frances McElhone

• The seller is an experienced eBay user (feedback 781).
• eBay do advise sellers, when they first register to sell, to either use their own photographs, or at least ensure they have permission to use them. They also advise that photographs should be of the actual item for sale.

Selling Gold Sovereigns & Other Coins on eBay
We point out that sellers may often get more money, for less effort, by selling to a specialised dealer, such as us, rather than via eBay.

Copyright Notice
Please see our "Copyright" page for further information.