Why An eBay NDA?

Visitors to eBay Inc.'s headquarters in San Jose, Calif., are greeted in a sun-baked lobby by a cheery receptionist. But the room quickly darkens when she asks all visitors to sign a three-page nondisclosure agreement that covers every type of technology and information--except the writing on the bathroom walls. Why the caution? With eBay plagued repeatedly this summer by system outages, its IS architecture appears about as stable as a spinning plate atop a stick. One wag identified as "sourpuss" on the AuctionWatch.com bulletin board remarked during an eBay outage on Aug. 8 that eBay should notify its users "when they have an unscheduled up time." EBay's business model and market capitalization are widely envied. But with at least a half-dozen outages in recent weeks, does eBay really have to worry about undercover competitors stealing its secrets?