What didn't happen -- the editor-in-chief of a prominent tech news site getting special treatment -- is almost more interesting to me than what did. Maybe ArsTechnica just isn't known over across the Atlantic at eBay UK? But I'm surprised that nobody noticed and offered to straighten things out in the two weeks since his original article.
For there to be defamation, there has to be published statements that cause a "reasonable person" to think worse of the defamed person. eBay did not publish any statements where any third party could read them; these statements were a private exchange. Only by recounting the story do we even know that supposed exchange of words took place.
