That might have been a tactical error. Yahoo began notifying participants in the group that their information was being subpoenaed, which led to something of a stir. Not only did the Missouri defendants' attorney file motions to quash all the subpoenas, the Electronic Frontier Foundation filed in support of quashing the Yahoo subpoena, posting documents in the process that provide us with the best window into this whole affair. But as fascinating as the defamation suit is, it's a tangent to what we're talking about here. And whether the Missouri women are guilty of infringing Great Notions copyrights will presumably be decided in court, so we don't have to worry about that either.
On the other hand, the eBay and PayPal subpoenas are very relevant. Although the Missouri court has put a hold on all those subpoenas, there is an apparent coincidence here. The two buyers whose experience we discussed yesterday purchased their allegedly infringing CDs from one of the Missouri women. And, you will recall, they didn't receive their first letters from ESPC until late July. So how did the ESPC get their name, postal address, and transaction information it needed to send those letters? Did eBay or PayPal give them up?
Well, like all the questions here, we're not going to be able answer that one definitively, but eBay acknowledges it's a distinct possibility. For one thing, PayPal somehow failed to get the message about the motion to quash the subpoenas, so it provided information to the ESPC pursuant to the July 10th subpoena. For another thing, responding to ESPC subpoenas for seller and buyer information has become something of a routine activity for eBay/PayPal.
"You will have to check with the Embroidery Software Protection Alliance to confirm what their sources of information on buyers have been," an eBay spokesperson told me. "I can tell you that through the course of our conversations with them, they have actually filed multiple subpoenas, so it is entirely possible the folks you're talking to were subjects of an earlier subpoena." The eBay spokesperson also said that, contrary to what eBay buyers have been told when they asked eBay how the ESPC had gotten their purchase information, buyer information was not provided to the ESPC through eBay's VERO (Verified Rights Owner) program.
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