sekosoldier84 in eBay Copyright Theft
sekosoldier84, of "Menlo Park, CA, United States", stole our 1959 Mexican Gold 20 Pesos Photographs to use on eBay, and used it to try sell a his own coin. Totally dishonest.
High eBay Feedback is No Guarantee of Integrity or Honesty
When we wrote this page, this eBay member's feedback was 0; with 100% positive according to eBay.
Sample Listing
20 Peso Mexican Coin. Solid Gold!!!!
This is a 1959 gold 20 Pesos coin from Mexico. It is in excellent condition with no dings.Mexican 20 Pesos
Cuauhxicalli Eagle Bowl Aztec Calendar or Sun Stone
The Mexican 20 gold pesos features one of Mexico's best known monuments and symbols. The Aztec name is the almost unpronounceable Cuauhxicalli, which we believe translates as Eagle Bowl, but it is universally known as the Aztec Calendar or Sun Stone. It is thought to have been carved during the reign of the 6th Aztec monarch in 1479 and dedicated to the principal Aztec deity the sun. The stone has both mythological and astronomical significance. It weighs almost 25 tons, has a diameter of just under 12 feet, and a thickness of 3 feet.
On December 17th, 1760 the stone was discovered, buried in the "Zocalo" (the main square) of Mexico City. The viceroy of New Spain at the time was don Joaquin de Monserrat, Marquis of Cruillas. Afterwards it was embedded in the wall of the Western tower of the metropolitan Cathedral, where it remained until 1885. At that time it was transferred to the national Museum of Archaeology and History by order of the then President of the Republic, General Porfirio Diaz.
Many similar stones exist or have existed throughout Mexico, but we have described the best known one.
What's Wrong?
We invest a great deal of time, effort, and cost into creating some of the best Photographic coin images on the internet. We strongly object when lazy and dishonest people decide to use them without a by your leave or thanks, doing so in competition with us.
Copyright theft is dishonest. We recommend you avoid doing business with dishonest dealers.
This particular eBay seller not only stole our images of the obverse and reverse of a 1959 Mexican Gold 20 Pesos, he used them to sell his own coins on eBay.
He did not tell buyers it was not the same coin as he was hawking, but what if he doesn't even own any gold coins?
It's possible he is ignorant of such fine points, or just plain ignorant.
It is always possible, even likely, that sellers who steal Photographs do not own a similar coin, and have the intention to totally defraud potential buyers.
The vendor is not only cheating us by stealing our copyright images, he is fraudulently or ignorantly misleading and deceiving all potential buyers. Gaining pecuniary advantage by deception is the definition of fraud.
Price
The seller was asking a starting price of £620 for his coin.
He or she would probably have got more by selling to us when eBay's new 10% selling fees are taken into account, even ignoring PayPal fees, or spending it, although many eBay buyers do overpay for gold bullion, compared with our own prices for similar or better gold bullion bars.
Similarly, buyers may be better off dealing direct with a proper, well-established, dealer, such as us, and we could offer a better selection!
A Rare Apology
We received an apology from this seller:
I am contacting you regarding an item removed from e-bay. i would like to appolgize (sic) for using unathaurized (sic) photos and information. i (sic) was in a rush to list the item and didnt (sic) even think about it. I will be much more careful in the future. I am intending to re-list the item with my own pictures and descriptions if this is allright with you.This helps to make up for the abusive and arrogant attitude we get from most eBay members. It also reinforces our opinion that eBay do not put enough effort into educating their sellers, particularly new members, about copyright. eBay could easily modify their system so that for the first time a seller uploads images, there is a pop-up window which reminds them about copyright, and ask them to confirm they understand, and that the images uploaded are their own, or are used with permission. This of course will not stop abuse, but it would be a helpful reminder to the innocent (ish) sellers, and would remove a possible excuse for the guilty ones.
We note that the perfect spelling in the auction listing is because it was all our text taken from our Mexican 20 Pesos page.
eBay Guilty of Negligence or Complicity We will be reporting this example of copyright abuse using our standard Statutory Declaration via the eBay VeRO programme, and wait to see if they chose to action or ignore our report. 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.
Copyright Notice Please see our "Copyright" page for further information.
Copyright Infringements Remedies Our suggested draft remedies for copyright abusers dependent on category - competitors, bloggers, pseudo-expert & advice sites acting as eBay & Google portals, eBay & other auction site sellers.
Buying Gold Coins & Bars on eBay
Selling Gold Coins & Bars on eBay
Copyright Thieves on eBay We already have a page naming and shaming dealers using our images without permission. It's time we did the same for eBay, although if we include them all, this could be a very long page.
Alphabetical Listing of Other Copyright Theft Sites
Other Web Sites All comments about copyright also cover content of all our other websites including, but not limited to:-
- Chards
www.chards.co.uk - Investment Gold Bars & Coins (This Site)
taxfreegold.co.uk - General Coins & Jewellery:
www.24carat.co.uk - 1959 Mexican Gold 20 Pesos:
goldsovereigns.co.uk - 18 Carat Gold Jewellery:
www.18carat.co.uk - 9 Carat Gold Jewellery:
www.9carat.co.uk
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sekosoldier84 eBay Listing Using our 1959 Mexican Gold 20 Pesos Photographs
32 - 36 Harrowside, Blackpool, Lancashire, FY4 1RJ, England. Telephone (44) - (0) 1253 - 343081; Fax 408058;
E-mail: Contact Us The URL for our main page is: taxfreegold.co.uk