How lame is this?

Nope.

I guess for me it simply goes against everything that the Instructables community is about- the free sharing of ideas.

Here's the response I received from eBay today: Thank you for contacting us. We are pleased to inform you that the following listing(s) you reported have been removed from eBay in response to the Notice of Claimed Infringement you recently sent: tango_antiques 370203244189 370212868857 350211260636 370203243643 350212305697 370212674344 370203244744 370203244189 370212868857 350211260636 370203243643 350212305697 370212674344 370203244744 We have notified the seller and all participating bidders that the listing(s) has been removed due to your request. If the Notice of Claimed Infringement contained items that are not listed above you will receive a separate email communication about those items. These notices may arrive at different times (over a period of up to several hours) as items for different sellers are processed separately. If you should have any questions or concerns regarding this matter, please do not hesitate to contact us again. VeRO Program eBay Trust & Safety

It's pretty amazing what some people will do to make a buck. Hopefully it's all taken care of. The funny thing is that the seller probably barely even made any money for the risk they're taking. For me the bigger issue is that they didn't contribute anything or add any value to the project- they simply downloaded the pdf file and my photo and sold it as their own without any credit given to myself or Adafruit. Since the original MintyBoost was released under a Non-Commercial Share-Alike license, that would mean that all derivatives of that work (meaning my instructable) would fall under the same license and anyone trying to profit from that work that did not significantly alter the original work (or circuit design) would be in violation without permission from the original creator- in this case Adafruit Industries. So even I could not sell my own instructable without permission from Adafruit Industries. The instructable I wrote and my images are protected under copyright law from others trying to sell it for profit. The email I sent the seller could be considered a C&D (cease and desist) letter so if they were caught doing it again they would be making a very big mistake.

My thoughts exactly. I went ahead and contacted the eBay buyers of the seller's previous auctions and redirected them to my instructable here. The seller began selling my tutorial almost immediately after it was posted in May. Here's what I wrote:

Hi there,
I just found out this seller is copying my free online tutorial I posted at instructables.com and selling it here- they are even using my own photo in the listing! There is a press release about the free tutorial here:
http://www.earthjustice.org/energyefficiency/instructables-winner.html

This was something that was meant to help people and this seller is claiming as their own work for profit without my permission. Just thought you might want to know.

Jerome aka Honus@instructables.com

-please feel free to contact me there if you have any questions- Thanks!

My letter to the seller:
Hello,

You are attempting to sell copyrighted material (solar iPhone charger tutorial) that is protected under the Creative Commons Non-Commercial Share-Alike license. Are you aware of the penalties for this act? According to copyright law, in a civil suit, an infringer may be liable for a copyright owner's actual damages plus any profits made from the infringement. Alternatively, the copyright owner may avoid proving actual damage by electing a statutory damage recovery of up to $30,000 or, where the court determines that the infringement occurred willfully, up to $150,000. The actual amount will be based upon what the court in its discretion considers just. (17 U.S.C. 504)Violation of copyright law is also considered a federal crime when done willfully with an intent to profit. Criminal penalties include up to ten years imprisonment depending on the nature of the violation. (No Electronic Theft Act, 18 U.S.C. 2319)
The material you are selling is copyrighted by me as is the photo you are depicting. It is posted by me on Instructables.com for everyone to use free of charge, provided they do not try to profit from it- this is supported by the Creative Commons license.

This email is also being sent to eBay's Verified Rights Owner Program (VeRO) and I have processed a Notice of Claimed Infringement (NOCIs). If you would like to keep selling on eBay and would prefer not to go to court I would recommend removing this and any other similar auction.
This is a very serious matter that I do not take lightly and as such I have documented this act accordingly. If the offending auctions are not removed immediately I will be forced to take legal action. I will expect a response from you within 24hrs.

Sincerely,
Jerome Kelty

I have noticed that the offending auctions were ended early by the seller. So there you go.

I sent them a nice little letter so we'll see how far they want to go with this. Thanks for taking the time to report them Kiteman- it's much appreciated.