Arstechnica has an article on a report that the US Supreme court has overtuned a lower court ruling that an injunction should be issued against Ebay for the an infringement of online auction patents. The patents owned by MercExchange. One of which is a patent for the concept of an online auction site and the other for a direct-buy method which Ebay call “Buy it now”.

There were attempts by Ebay to license the patents in 2001, however they did not resolve and MercExchange have been in battle with the online auction giant ever since. Previously MercExchange was award $25 million dollars for the infringment on the “Buy it now” button and had won a ruling against ebay for the online auction concept but that has now been overturned.

This is a pretty massive judgment as Ebay is the difinitive online auction site. MercExchange didn’t even commercialise their models but still, Ebay could probably afford to pay whatever and continue on as long as an injunction ruling isn’t made.

It appears that Ebay may continue on as one of the worlds number one online agents for buying and selling of products with their release of Ebay express. Basically this is a non-auction arm of Ebay that allows sellers have their own online store without any expiration of time as an auction does. I will be endeavouring to become familiar with this feature and will report back to see how i go. Regardless of the fighting in court, ebay are on top and can leverage on customer base and an amazing business model to continue to rule the web in private and commerical buying and selling.