Merketplaces can be held liable for third party sellers merchandise as it’s ultimately up to the marketplace to chose what is allowed and prohibited to be sold.
Imagine a marketplace allowed vendors to sell human slaves and the government tells that marketplace that is very much not okay stop it. If that marketplace continues allowing third party vendors to sell human slaves then that marketplace has now also broken the law along with the third party vendor and potentially even the purchaser depending on how the law was written.
Wait… Ebay is merely a marketplace where people or vendors use the platform to sell their goods.
Shouldn’t the individuals be sued?
Or maybe it’s because they could be in another country, so they go after the platform itself for allowing such devices to be sold?
Going after the marketplace is a more efficient strategy than playing whack a mole with individual sellers.
Also being a marketplace they do have a duty to make sure that people are not selling illegal items on their platform.
Because if platforms didn’t could you imagine how bad the Internet would be for buying things.
I don’t disagree. I am generally in favor of keeping markets on a short leash. As you said, it could be a lot worse.
Exactly, keeping markets on a shorter leash is also something I’m generally in favor of
Agreed, but I hope they go after the sellers, too.
The correct way would be to go after the buyers
The war on drugs would like a word.
As would the RIAA’s war on piracy. Despite the exhorbitant fines being handed down, I don’t believe they’ve made any profit from them.
That’s a political bomb though. This accomplishes the same end goal and is a strong enough warning to prevent similar markets popping up in the future
Merketplaces can be held liable for third party sellers merchandise as it’s ultimately up to the marketplace to chose what is allowed and prohibited to be sold.
Imagine a marketplace allowed vendors to sell human slaves and the government tells that marketplace that is very much not okay stop it. If that marketplace continues allowing third party vendors to sell human slaves then that marketplace has now also broken the law along with the third party vendor and potentially even the purchaser depending on how the law was written.
Good point
Why not go after both?
They should then request all purchases of the devices, and go after the buyers too.
As a bonus, a lot of the people buying these are probably wife beaters or toxic f**wits. So, screw protecting them…
It’s confusing because I kinda agree with some of your stereotyping and I’m not confident that is a good thing.
It’s anti-social behavior.
I dunno, the article is pretty weak on details. Curious what comes of it.