Original URL: https://www.theregister.com/2005/01/21/ebayer_sells_nothing/

For Sale: Absolutely Nothing

Skint eBayer in once-in-a-lifetime offer

By Lester Haines

Posted in On-Prem, 21st January 2005 12:39 GMT

Updated A skint Londoner has decided to offer the eBayer who has everything - except space in which to store more online bargains - the chance to secure, well, absolutely nothing. Read on:

This is a fantastic, once in a lifetime opportunity to buy absolutely nothing! The successful bidder will receive absolutely nothing direct from me.
  • The perfect gift for the person who has everything.
  • Takes up no space. Easy to store.
  • Helps fight capitalism. Possibly.
  • No postage required.
  • Environmentally friendly, 100% organic and edible.

The current top bid stands at a modest £1. We have, er, nothing further to add except to note that this particular item is postage free. ®

Update

Unsurprisingly, eBay pulled this auction over the weekend when the top bid stood at an cool £12k. For shame. The vendor, Dom Ramsey, received the following email from eBay:

We appreciate that you chose eBay to list the following item(s):

5552296812 Absolutely Nothing

However, your listing(s) was in violation of eBay's listing policies. We would like to take this opportunity to let you know what part of your listing(s) is not allowed.

Your listing(s) contained the following information:

This is a fantastic, once in a lifetime opportunity to buy absolutely nothing!

We realize you may not be aware of this policy. However, auction listings that do not offer an actual item for sale are not allowed.

Our User Agreement states, in part:

"5.1 Listing Description...Your listings may only include text descriptions, graphics, pictures and other content relevant to the sale of that item..."

Your listing(s) did not offer an actual item for sale. Because it was in violation of eBay policy, your listing has been ended early. All associated fees have been credited to your account.

Don says:

As the auction was entirely genuine and the description completely accurate, I do not see that section 5.1 applies in any way.

If anything, I think it was one of the most honest and accurate ads on the whole site!

Once bidding had exceeded £100, I had decided that it would be better to donate the proceeds to the DEC Tsunami Relief fund, and had posted to that effect on the auction.

There are now scores of 'copy cat' auctions on eBay - some of which are using my exact text, and they have not been removed. So needless to say I'm a little annoyed.

I'm currently considering legal action, but being a skint londoner, I wondered if any of your readers might like to help. Of course, if I'm successful in selling nothing, all proceeds will still go to charity.

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