Geldof forces eBay to block Live 8 ticket sales

Found on The Inquirer on Tuesday, 14 June 2005
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Saint Bob was fuming over the affair and has been encouraging folk to bid stupid amounts for the tickets and "mess up the whole system".

More than two million people sent text messages in a lottery to secure the 150,000 tickets for the gig in Hyde Park, London on July 2.

But soon after the tickets were released some inevitably turned up for sale on eBay.

This got Bob all hot under the collar and he began ranting to anyone with a TV camera. He told the BBC he thought eBay's UK management should resign or be sacked.

Ebay offered to make a donation to the cause - feeding poor people - saying that in a free market people should be allowed to do what they like with their tickets.

When this failed to dampen Bob's ire, the firm said it had decided to block the sales of Live 8 tickets on its auction site.

I doubt he would have complained if all the money from the sales went to the charity. Besides, it's the right of the winners to sell them. After all, they won the tickets legally and so they own them. This should make it pretty much legal to sell them. It's surprising to see eBay to give in; after all, they usually protect their sellers (after all, they pay the fees). Perhaps it will also teach those a lesson who followed Bob's advice: eBay suspended the accounts of those who bid "stupid amounts".