Whats the rule for selling oem software on ebay?

[chiwawa626]

Do i have to sell it with a full system or just some hardware, or no oem software at all?

 

[tcsenter]

If its Microsoft OEM, then the policy is it must be sold with a non-peripheral hardware component. A mouse isn't supposed to cut it, but I see people doing it. I would think a CPU fan would cut it before a mouse.

 

[chiwawa626]

Im sure i can dig up some old modems and stuff would that work?

 

[Luden]

yup.

 

[TheCorm]

So you can sell an OEM copy of Microsoft Word.....with a modem??? I thought it had to be with a complete PC.

Corm

 

[tcsenter]

So you can sell an OEM copy of Microsoft Word.....with a modem??? I thought it had to be with a complete PC.

Well, I think that Ebay liberally interprets the OEM hardware requirement to accomodate its sellers. They want to promote sales, not discourage them.

Microsoft pretty much looks the other way, they know damned well that DSP and OEM versions of its products have been leaking through the 2nd and 3rd tier reseller markets, but they do little to stop it, and it would be easy enough to crack down on it if they really had the will to. As long as people are buying authentic MS products and not bootlegged ones, Microsoft doesn't care.

 

[manly]

Unless things have really changed, MS and ebay had a special relationship where all kinds of MS software items were monitored and the auctions routinely shut down. This included many legitimate sales, including retail software but also OEM software bundled with hardware (admittedly in most cases, OEM software isn't very transferable at all). To say that MS doesn't care is stretching the truth when it comes to ebay auctions.

 

[tcsenter]

Unless things have really changed, MS and ebay had a special relationship where all kinds of MS software items were monitored and the auctions routinely shut down. This included many legitimate sales, including retail software but also OEM software bundled with hardware (admittedly in most cases, OEM software isn't very transferable at all). To say that MS doesn't care is stretching the truth when it comes to ebay auctions.

Ebay regularly monitors and evaluates the type of hardware being 'sold' with Microsoft OEM software. They continue to allow the sale of MS OEM with a wide range of questionable hardware, including peripherals such as a mouse, which is against the MS OEM policy, only because one may argue that a mouse is de facto "essential" component of a PC.

I would appreciate any evidence you can provide of Ebay shutting down "legitimate" sales of MS retail software. It doesn't happen.

 

[manly]

Originally posted by: tcsenter

Unless things have really changed, MS and ebay had a special relationship where all kinds of MS software items were monitored and the auctions routinely shut down. This included many legitimate sales, including retail software but also OEM software bundled with hardware (admittedly in most cases, OEM software isn't very transferable at all). To say that MS doesn't care is stretching the truth when it comes to ebay auctions.

Ebay regularly monitors and evaluates the type of hardware being 'sold' with Microsoft OEM software. They continue to allow the sale of MS OEM with a wide range of questionable hardware, including peripherals such as a mouse, which is against the MS OEM policy, only because one may argue that a mouse is de facto "essential" component of a PC.

I would appreciate any evidence you can provide of Ebay shutting down "legitimate" sales of MS retail software. It doesn't happen.

Well see your problem is you make a bold, blanket statement that is very difficult to prove.

I hardly go out on a limb by saying that Microsoft has special treatment with ebay over monitoring their items for sale, and sometimes ebay errs on the side of Microsoft (an IT/software business partner). Instead, you make the bold claim that ebay *never* shuts down a legitimate auction of an MS product.

Granted, you may say I overstated the problem (since we both tend to agree most OEM software resales are invalid), but here's the evidence you desire (and it's old):

83902481 - NEW MS WINDOWS 95 FULL VER. W/BOOTDISK SEALED

As you can see, the part of the relationship that is special is that ebay gladly shuts down any auctions that MS deems inappropriate. That just may be the way their system is designed, but the bottom line is that MS has sole authority to claim any auction of their products is invalid. Guilty of auctioning an MS product, period. They *might* give you back your listing fee. It's part of their VeRO program, of which MS is just one participating software vendor.

Now I don't sell many items on ebay, and never MS software, but I do believe there was a time when it was very difficult to resell MS software on ebay. Whether that has changed is unknown to me. We both agree that for legitimate OEM sales, the minimum bar is supposed to be a component like a hard drive or motherboard (not a mouse). However, as you noted, MS simply turns the other cheek because it's impossible even for them to regulate thousands of small business sellers (and the hundreds of thousands of private ones). However, ebay is one place where they can and do regulate sales as they please.

FWIW, technically the "OEM" software bundled with brand-name PCs cannot be broken off and legally licensed to another system. There's a reason it's called the MS tax.

 

[tcsenter]

Well see your problem is you make a bold, blanket statement that is very difficult to prove.

What, you mean like "MS and ebay had a special relationship where all kinds of MS software items were monitored and the auctions routinely shut down. This included many legitimate sales, including retail software..."? I certainly made no more bold or blanket statement than that, and I certainly wasn't the one who provided an example of suspected SOFTWARE PIRACY as purported evidence of MS shutting down "legitimate sales, including retail software..." I ask for A, you give me Z.

It would be VERY easy for Microsoft to shutdown the DSP and OEM products leaking into the 2nd and 3rd tier reseller channels. DSP and OEM versions are highly trackable, and Microsoft could as show of force terminate the OEM or DSP contracts of a dozen top violators from which a large number of product finds its way into the reseller markets, the rest would run scared with their tail between their legs.

It goes on overtly, it has for years, and Microsoft allows it to go on for precisely the reason I stated.

 

[manly]

So according to you, selling shrink-wrapped Windows software (as in the link) is now selling unlicensed software? Granted, the actual auction listing isn't there but it's most likely in reference to retail boxed Win95. I gave you A, but you don't know the alphabet?

Point taken that I also provided a blanket statement, but it's much easier to cite examples to support my statement. Whereas yours basically says ebay + MS never make a mistake ("It doesn't happen"). While we actually agree on most of these points, that last one is simply too forgiving.

According to you though, ebay is much more lax on MS software sales these days, so I'll leave this pointless debate at that.

 

[tcsenter]

According to you though, ebay is much more lax on MS software sales these days, so I'll leave this pointless debate at that.

If Microsoft truly cared, by your own admission, all it would require is one letter to Ebay and these auctions would never again exist on Ebay:

Windows 95 OEM w/Boot Disk, Never Opened

Windows 98 OEM with hardware

Windows 2000 Pro OEM

In fact, by definition, OEM software must not be sold at all, it must be "distributed" with an essential non-peripheral hardware component or a computer system.

Technically, all those Ebay auctions which list the item available for auction have it backwards: the software should be bundled with the hardware, not the other way around. This is not a term of art or difference of interpretation, it is very clear which is item actually being "sold" or made available for sale, and which item is being bundled.

The hardware is what should be "sold", and the software comes with the hardware. As it is, the opposite is happening. Microsoft could, if it had the will, shut this practice down on Ebay and a hundred other places with just a letter. It does not.

Maybe you're right. Maybe Microsoft really does care, and would prefer to stop this practice, but they cannot afford a #10 business envelope and stamp. The economy is in a slump, but I didn't realize things were THAT bad.

 

[VTrider]

Originally posted by: tcsenter
If its Microsoft OEM, then the policy is it must be sold with a non-peripheral hardware component. A mouse isn't supposed to cut it, but I see people doing it. I would think a CPU fan would cut it before a mouse.

Ebay canned some of my auctions in the past when I stated that the hardware was a 'mouse' (when selling some xtra OEM OS I had laying around). All I did was remove the picture of the mouse and stated it discreetly in the description - and EBAY didn't seem to mind that.

-VTrider