Recently, a lot of strange advertisements, such as: "My soul, my life and my ghost for sale" have appeared on the Internet. Take for example a 24-years-old inhabitant of New Zealand, Walter Scott, who took out for an auction on a certain website, called TradeMe, his own… soul, with the intention of selling it to anyone, even to the devil in case it exists.
"I cannot see it, touch it or feel it", says Walter, "but I can certainly sell it and get a good sum of money for that." Scott is sure that the ware he is selling is in a very good condition, just a little bit worn off because of "6 years of alcohol usage." There were 32,000 volunteers willing to purchase Walter's "precious treasure".
The auction has started with the price of 456 dollars and the price had been doubling every hour. Still, a little time before the closing of the auction, the managers of TradeMe had suddenly stopped the sales. They explained it by the numerous grievances of the religious visitors of the website, who considered the selling of the soul a stupid and outrageous joke. And still, Walter's soul had found its master – it was the manager of "Hell Pizza" Rachel Ellison, who proposed 3800 dollars for it.
"His soul already belongs to Hell, that's why there isn't any place better for it than our pizzeria," she said.
Last December, an American has tried to sell his soul at an auction to get money for Christmas. He declared that the one to buy it will get his "precious property" in a glass vessel with the respective contract. He explained this by the fact that he had no money for Christmas presents for his relatives and all that he had more valuable in the world was his soul.
In April 2006, the vendor of the "untouched material" has become a native of Shanghai. The auction had to take place on the biggest Chinese online auction Taobao. There were 58 requests. Back then there was a problem with Taobao's representatives: they said that selling such an "unusual ware" was out of the company's rules, thus its selling was prohibited. The main reason, though, was the lack of a guarantee for the delivery of the ware to its buyer. Besides, the management of Taobao has explained that they will allow the selling of the soul only with a written document of permission from… the "upper offices." Who that would be they did not say.