[council] Legal Decision wrt Auctions

["Michael D. Palage" <michael@xxxxxxxxxx>]

Hello All:

I came across the following article today in one of my legal periodicals
that I thought might be worth sharing. I believe it may potentially be
relevant if ICANN should ever go down the path of auctioning off TLDs.
Although the summary of the article from BNA is free, one needs to have
a subscription for the translation of the decision into English,
however, the German version if FREE.

GERMAN CT. RULES NET AUCTION POSTING AN IRREVOCABLE OFFER
BNA's Electronic Commerce & Law Report reports that a German court has
ruled that placing an article for sale on eBay constitutes a binding and
irrevocable offer to sell. Even if a seller terminates the auction
before the specified time period ends, the binding offer stands. It does
not matter if the seller complied with eBay's termination procedures.
Article at <http://pubs.bna.com/ip/BNA/eip.nsf/is/a0b1e8v3y6>
For a free trial to the source of this story, visit
http://www.bna.com/prodcuts/ip/eplr.htm
German language decision at
<http://cogworms.notlong.com/>

Thomas perhaps you might be able to translate and share any relevant
portions of the text with the council.

Best regards,

Michael D. Palage