Ebay vs. Bidder\'s Edge What Bidder\'s Edge

EBay vs. Bidder's edge

What Bidder's edge did that was different from eBay's customers and the reasons why it mattered to eBay.

Trespass

In this paper, we analyze the lawsuit filed by eBay against Bidder's Edge. We also explore what Bidder's edge did that was different from eBay's customers and the reasons why it mattered to eBay. We also explore the definition of the otherwise traditional trespass to personal property and how trespass to personal property is different from the Californian definition of trespass to computer services as well as how it is different.

December, 1999 saw eBay file a lawsuit against Bidder's Edge in San Jose, California's Federal District law courts. This lawsuit saw Bidder's edge being charged with trespass on the eBay website through as process that involved the compilation of auction data without seeking prior and due permission from eBay (Masterson,2000).The lawsuit prompted Bidder's edge to file a counterclaim against the eBay establishment with attempted monopolization, monopolization, interference with relations (contractual) and unfair business practices. It is important to point out that Bidder's edge obtained permission to search for items on the eBay items list as well as post the results obtained, the bone of contention lied on the method of use of the search results. The disagreement led to eBay demanding that Bidder's edge cease searching its archives as well as issuing a very short period of compliance. Bidder's edge however continued 'crawling' the eBay site as a result of the fact that other action aggregation websites were still allowed to do so. This prompted eBay to attempt to block Bidder's edge aggregation activities through the blocking of its Internet Protocol (IP) addresses. Bidder's edge however came up with other technology (use of proxy servers) in order to evade their IP address block by the eBay computers (Pasulka,2000).

What Bidder's edge did that was different from eBay's customers and the reasons why it mattered to eBay.

The usual eBay customers accessed the website in order to place or acquire information about various types of products on purely personal reasons; either placing their items on the site for sale or purchasing items from the site. This therefore meant that the eBay computers were set up purely to serve the "human" customers but not the automated 'robots' and 'spiders' from sites like Bidder's Edge which does so for financial gains. It is worth noting that the original agreement between eBay and Bidder's Edge stated that the latter prohibited from employing any form of intelligent search agents such as "robots" and "spiders" while accessing its information some of which were not to be displayed on the public domain (Boonk et al., 2005). Bidder's Edge however contravened this agreement by searching the eBay computers and then displaying information publicly for financial gains. The main problem however, stemmed from the fact that Bidder's Edge was using the information it "crawled" from eBay in order to run their site that had the same purpose like eBay. By doing this, they used the data obtained from eBay for their own interest, a fact that was in contravention of the initial agreement. In a nutshell, the normal eBay customers performed searches on the website using tools, facilities and technology developed by eBay on their website. Bidder's Edge however performed automated searches on eBay servers (computers) which resulted in the consumption of their bandwidth and system resources a fact that in the worst case scenario involving multiple search aggregators, would affect the performance of the eBay website hence affecting their service delivery to their true customers. These moves by Bidder's Edge were observed by eBay as being unethical and illegal.

Trespass

The traditional definition of trespass entails the act of unlawfully causing injury to an individual, property, or the rights of an individual with the use of force or violence. The personal property in question could be an estate or other movable articles which are corporeal like furniture and jewelry or incorporeal ones like stocks and bonds. This concept is envisioned in the California definition of trespass to computer services since it finds anyone who commits or rather trespasses on another person's computer or its resources to be guilty of a public offense.