When British artist Leo Norrington saw a perfectly shaped puff of white drifting above London, he decided it was too beautiful to let go — so he tried to own it.
Within minutes, he’d uploaded a listing to eBay: “One Cloud, Slightly Used, No Returns.” Starting bid: £10. The listing included a GPS coordinate, a poetic description, and a promise to “transfer ownership upon atmospheric availability.”
The joke went viral. Thousands of people followed the auction, and bids reached over £5,000 before eBay finally shut it down, citing “non-physical goods.” Norrington took it in stride, saying, “It was never about the money — I just wanted to see how high people’s heads could go in the clouds.”
Now, he sells “Cloud Ownership Certificates” — complete with photos and coordinates — as collectible art pieces. Turns out, you can’t buy a cloud, but you can sell the idea of one.
