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This article is a great example of why we need legislation around ownership of digital items. I generally hate getting the government involved in things, but if

This article is a great example of why we need legislation around ownership of digital items. I generally hate getting the government involved in things, but if you're paying money for goods, there needs to be a way to be credited or receive your digital goods in a way that still works without your "account". Personally I always get kind of nervous around buying things on PSN, Xbox, Stadia, Steam, Oculus, etc. If they ban me, do I lose my thousands of dollars of games? That doesn't seem right (and no, I don't really care too much about what the Terms and Services say).

squarefoot 5y ago
> I generally hate getting the government involved in things It is sad when it occurs, but that's the exact reason why governments are there: they're (theoretically) reliable powerful people that should protect us from other unreliable powerful people, in exchange of being kept in power. Any other alternative would involve violence.
pdonis 5y ago
If you can't be confident of your ownership of and access to what you buy, why do you buy it?
- endisneigh 5y ago
  I apologize but I find this to be a silly question. I buy because I want to play. I do not have an expectation of indefinite ownership (even though I should have indefinite ownership), hence my comment.
  - pdonis 5y ago
    > I do not have an expectation of indefinite ownership But you said you were nervous about buying these things. What are you nervous about? And why do you pay money anyway if you're nervous about what you're getting? > even though I should have indefinite ownership On what grounds? These are companies operating in a free market. They're offering a product whose terms are right out there in the open. If you don't like the terms, don't buy.
    - alasdair_ 5y ago
      The terms are not a negotiated contract - they are dictated by one side and even if they are read by the purchaser, the implications of the terms may not be obvious. Many/most people will not understand that after paying hundreds of dollars for games, their games could suddenly be taken away from them without recourse. For a ridiculous example, imagine there was a clause buried in the fineprint that allowed the store owner to charge you $5000 to unlock the game whenever they chose to. Even if it were in the T&C, it would be ruled invalid because it was so unexpected. Similarly, removing the right to play a game you have bought with money because you haven’t played it “enough” (according to the vendor) may also be considered unreasonavlble.
      - pdonis 5y ago
        > The terms are not a negotiated contract That doesn't mean they aren't a contract. They're simply a contract where your only options as the buyer are to buy or not to buy. That said, a unilateral contract like this can be treated somewhat differently by courts. See below. > removing the right to play a game you have bought with money because you haven’t played it “enough” (according to the vendor) may also be considered unreasonable. As I posted in response to someone else upthread, it would be an interesting case if someone actually did try to take a game store to court on these grounds. Contract law does include general rules about reasonableness, and courts are more likely to apply them for unilateral contracts like these where one party does not have the opportunity to bargain.
        ipaddr 5y ago
        Terms are not a contract or a type of contract. Were you instructed to consult your legal team before signing the contract? What you never signed with a witness and a notary? So if they put in a term that said you agree to give them your house or 500 you would have to? Terms of service are the rules outlined by the service provider. Breaking these could get your service cut and you would have a hard time finding a legal recourse.
        5y ago
- josephcsible 5y ago
  Because people want to play the games, and there's not an alternative way to buy them that does give you that confidence.
  - pdonis 5y ago
    > there's not an alternative way to buy them that does give you that confidence That doesn't sound to me like a reason for legislation. It sounds to me like a reason for competition. But for there to be competition, customers have to be willing to put their money where their mouth is. If there were a competitor that charged, say, 20% more for a product that included the confidence you want, would you pay it?
    - josephcsible 5y ago
      Don't copyrights preclude meaningful competition here? If a game is sold through Publisher X, Publisher Y can't just unilaterally decide that they want to sell it too.
      - pdonis 5y ago
        > Don't copyrights preclude meaningful competition here? No. The game developer, who owns the copyright, decides what channels it gets sold through. If game developers knew that people wouldn't buy their games through channels that didn't give good guarantees of ownership and access, they wouldn't sell through those channels.
        jbay808 5y ago
        This sounds great on paper but I really don't think that feedback channel is effective in practice. First of all, when a game or a platform does poorly, the reason for that can be very hard to discern (unless there's some kind of coordinated vocal protest). "The customers are disagreeing with the fine print of our end-user license agreement" usually isn't high up on the list of reasons. Secondly, there are many degrees of incentive separation between the game developer and the customer. If the distributor offers the game developer a good lump-sum payment for a platform exclusive, they might not care about the EULA. The distributor might also own the developer. IP isn't fungible, so competition in the space is subject to much more inefficiency than a market for, say, wheat.
- chii 5y ago
  to participate in the cultural works of today's digital world.
  - pdonis 5y ago
    These are games we're talking about. They're recreation. For people to be demanding legislation because a recreational activity isn't set up just the way they like it, when they knew the terms perfectly well before they paid their money, is not "participating in cultural works".
    - boondaburrah 5y ago
      how is recreation not part of culture?
    - endisneigh 5y ago
      You're entirely missing the point of the comment if you think it's about games. It's about digital goods.
      - pdonis 5y ago
        I can't think of any "digital good" where there is a risk of losing access in this way that isn't recreational in a similar way to games. So my comments would apply equally well to any such goods.
        josephcsible 5y ago
        Two that immediately come to mind are online textbooks and Adobe Creative Cloud.
        pdonis 5y ago
        Hm. I agree online textbooks are different because you're not just paying for the textbook, you're also paying a school tuition, and the school isn't going to refund your tuition just because the textbook provider made a mistake. I asked another poster just upthread about the software (such as Creative Cloud) case.
- 5e92cb50239222b 5y ago
  I consider it a fair game to torrent those games that the publisher screws me over. Like San Andreas, the Steam version of which was FUBAR a few years ago and then removed altogether (for new buyers). I've paid for maybe five copies in my entire life, sorry, I'm not paying for the sixth.
- michaelmrose 5y ago
  You are of course correct but at the same time I often buy games for $5 - $10 on sale that are a few years old and after completion they have little to no replay value. Although many may not be as frugal they might well have the same attitude towards reuse/replay/resale. Play and forget.
- matheusmoreira 5y ago
  It must have been around 2006 when I registered my Steam account. I was just a kid back then. Didn't understand the fact the buy button was lying to me.
sefrost 5y ago
I wouldn’t feel any guilt about pirating the content I bought on any of those services if my account was taken from me for inactivity. I’d be interested to hear the argument about why that would be wrong though.
- josephcsible 5y ago
  It's definitely fine morally, but unfortunately it's illegal anyway.
  - platz 5y ago
    - tombert 5y ago
      Why is that? If you buy the game off Steam or something, this implies that the creators/publishers/platforms have gotten their due compensation. The cracks and files on ThePirateBay are done on a volunteer basis, meaning that it’s not costing the game developers any money.
      - iamthirsty 5y ago
        It is costing a developer money — someone who downloads the pirated game would’ve otherwise bought it. Game devs make money on sales. However if you have already bought the game, and then download a pirated version, it isn’t.
        deleted 5y ago
        [deleted]
        tombert 5y ago
        I was reasonably certain that this thread was specifically speaking in regard to the latter case.
        tehbeard 5y ago
vmception 5y ago
or just let Web3 and onchain NFT's happen, accepting one of the reasons why the incremental improvement is being seen as valuable. Even if a company offered a convenience service, the ideal implementation allows people to restore their account from the current function state onchain, which is what most web3 services do in an increasingly standardized and predictable way right now. regarding the NFT's and where they store the images, many NFT classes have getter methods that tell enough about what the implementation of the digital item should look like, usually when I'm talking to people I get the impression that they haven't looked. there are so many ways to do this right, even if they aren't passing muster right now.
- endisneigh 5y ago
  I don't understand how NFTs would solve the problem I described. Even if all of my Oculus games are NFTs - if I'm banned and can't access my account to download the games then I'm out of luck.
  - vmception 5y ago
    the games wouldn't be released on exclusively on a closed system because they have other paths to monetize the games you possess and the digital items you possess would have an independent record of your possession and continued access if you did use a company's platform because of its convenient UI, even if you lost access to that company's platform you should still be able to access all of your games and items in the Web3 paradigm and idea, the closed systems build themselves around open systems just to make them convenient, and aren't strictly necessary. the open system allows the records of assets to be tapped into and re-rendered in other games, or marketplaces. Think about it like Web 1.0 with updated technology and requisite pieces that were missing back then.
    - anamexis 5y ago
      In the NFT scenario , what would prevent people from sharing licenses?
Hokusai 5y ago
> I don't really care too much about what the Terms and Services say It does not matter even if you care. You do not have negotiating power to change them. It is a 'my way or highway' situation. And the government should be involved, you alone cannot change the Terms of Service, but your country can create laws to protect you from thieves, whenever they steal physical or digital goods. If you don't like your government fight to improve it but do not renounce to the power that it gives you as a citizen.
- _3u10 5y ago
  Yes you do. I had a ToS with an anti competitive clause in it, no reselling, was told they needed to transfer all our customers, etc, or they and us could get fined for illegal reselling. Phoned their regulator, was told to register as a reseller, and call back if we still had issues. After the registration had been finalized we contacted our new wholesaler, all that came of it was being unable to add new accounts for a few months. The next company we had the issue with you could basically hear the face palming on the phone why they had allowed a registered reseller to open an account that didn’t allow reselling, and whether they would allow us to continue reselling or whether we should do a conference call with <name of person> at <four letter agency>. It was basically one of those pray I do not alter our agreement further moments.
  - dtech 5y ago
    Of course you can alter the ToS, I'm sure Steam and the likes are open to contract negations before you buy a $70 game.
    - _3u10 5y ago
      It’s better to negotiate after, that way there’s a whole bunch of precedent around sales.
  - Broken_Hippo 5y ago
    Did you change the TOS or just get switched to a proper account type? These aren't the same. Few to no companies are going to even consider changing the TOS for a small purchase like a game, a book, music, and the like. You, as a consumer, do not have this power. I'd bet that any customer service rep you talk to (if that is an option) does not have the power nor access to the right documents to allow you to change it either. You can choose to buy or choose not to. That's it.
alasdair_ 5y ago
> If they ban me, do I lose my thousands of dollars of games? Generally yes, and this is obviously bullshit.
vital_beach 5y ago
whoops! you didn't drive your car for a year during the pandemic, we own it now. /s This type of anticonsumerism would get so much attention if it were in another field. I can only hope it happens here.
jonathankoren 5y ago
That’s because you never actually bought the item. You got a license to run it on someone else’s server. Let’s say you bought a bunch of things for The Matrix Online, do you expect that server to run forever? It won’t. It didn’t. Why should someone else maintain it forever? Are you getting a refund? Why? You already extracted the useful life of it. If there’s government regulation it’s around the deceptive use of the word “purchase” it’s just a long term rental
- josephcsible 5y ago
  It's one thing if it's an MMO or something else that inherently needs a central server. It's another if it's a game that could work 100% offline if not for the DRM.
- techsupporter 5y ago
  > That’s because you never actually bought the item. You got a license to run it on someone else’s server. Don't mean to sound too cranky but this "you just bought a license" crap has been a thing since software began being software. It was no more fair back then than it is now. No one is arguing, at least I don't think they are, that a company has an obligation to keep servers running in perpetuity. But to tell me I have no portable way to retain the bits I bought--excuse me, "licensed"--from a company is just crap. If a game can run in single-player mode without a server, or if a movie file can be played, or a song file listened to, then the act of "buying" it should mean I can do that for as long as I can keep my computers running and the onus on keeping backups of those files is on me. We call them app "stores," we use the moniker of "purchased," and the ads call them "ours." If companies don't want to let us keep the ability to independently use the software or content files we "purchased," then they should be prohibited from using the lexicon of buying things and be very explicit that this is a one-time fee for a rental that can be taken away at any time. Being explicit does not mean burying it in a multi-thousand word document that no person with a regular command of English can understand and that none of us have the power to negotiate for ourselves.
  - throwawaylinux 5y ago
    There is nothing unfair about licensing. I contribute to FOSS software, I expect that an individual or company abide by the terms of the license I grant them and that license is terminated if they fail to meet various conditions. That seems fair to me, it wouldn't become unfair if a payment was required either. But I think you have got it right with the rest of your comments. There has to be a meeting of the minds in these dealings, and I don't believe these companies are acting in good faith when they explicitly or implicitly suggest that you are "buying a game" or "buying a song" even if you can find out what that really means in fine print somewhere. Hopefully we get more legislation and precedent that forces them to be more explicit about what these purchases mean exactly.
wildpeaks 5y ago
That's exactly why it's safer to buy DRM-free from GOG because you can keep a backup of your purchases without having to worry the service might lock you out or remove a product.
emodendroket 5y ago
> If they ban me, do I lose my thousands of dollars of games? You absolutely do. Anyway, I agree with you. Digital marketplaces are becoming more and more important and certainly I'm sure I have a lot of money in Steam, Kindle, and various other services. It'd be nice to move away from the Wild West phase given how much money's sloshing around at this point.
- raz32dust 5y ago
  You can still play the games without steam (I often play without internet connection). But of course you'll miss out on a lot of things (multiplayer, achievements etc.) which might be important to you.
  - VRay 5y ago
    a lot of games have actual Steam DRM You can definitely remove it, but it's not like GOG where the launcher really is 100% optional and you can install and play the games without an internet connection or an account of any sort
  - whoknew1122 5y ago
    For some games this is true. But there's plenty of games which have an 'offline mode' that require you to connect to an auth server before the game will launch.
systemvoltage 5y ago
Sounds nice, but I don't think we need legislation. It would bring the entire digital content ecomony to a grinding halt. The line between what can be owned and what cannot be is not clear. The line between what's a digital good and what's not is also not clear. Is your online bank balance a digital good? Is it an immutable binary that's considered a digital good? An in-game item in a MMORPG that requires servers to operate? Is Adobe Creative Cloud a good or a service? The details are messy. And the lawmakers would guarantee the passing the most fucked up version of it with some other draconian measures bundled in there. Startup ecosystem would be in sheer panic to comply and some won't even contemplate starting a company selling digital goods/services. The scope is so insane, I am having a hard time thinking about it.
moistly 5y ago
Wouldn’t mind the music I’ve purchased remaining mine, too.
- moogly 5y ago
  That's why I only buy from Bandcamp and HDTracks.
westoque 5y ago
This makes a good case for decentralization no? Imagine all those items in the blockchain, you can leave for years knowing you can retrieve them anytime. The only con at the point is if you lose your keys. Reminds me of some friends who had Bitcoin and “forgot” about it and only to come back with massive profits.
- legulere 5y ago
  Trustless trust doesn’t solve any problems here. Having your ownership of games notarized without someone central, does not mean you can access them. You need someone to enforce that.
- endisneigh 5y ago
  I don't understand how blockchain would solve this problem. How much would it cost in gas fees to download a 100GB game? That aside how would you handle licensing, revocation, etc?
  - okwubodu 5y ago
    Tokenized game licenses could presumably be transferred to a different wallet without depending on whatever game company to do the right thing.
    - endisneigh 5y ago
      OK, but where do you download the game? Even with licensing, you couldn't play offline? If so, what's stopping someone from just keeping the state of the blockchain such that the offline client thinks you own the games but you actually don't. Doesn't seem like it'd work to me without a central authority.
      - okwubodu 5y ago
        You set up a server and allow any wallet with the license in it to sign a valid request to download and launch the game. > Even with licensing, you couldn't play offline? That’s a good point. The GOG DRM-free model wouldn’t work here. Someone smarter than me could likely give you an answer.
3np 5y ago
> Personally I always get kind of nervous around buying things on PSN, Xbox, Stadia, Steam, Oculus, etc. If they ban me, do I lose my thousands of dollars of games? You didn’t buy any games. You paid for access, but as you note you don’t actually own any of these games. Please stop giving in to the doublespeak BS of these companies. Other than the false marketing (using words like “buy”) and that DRM is toxic, I don’t see what’s really not right - it’s a terrible deal but you’re free to not partake. As long as people keep giving companies money for this kind of thing it will continue. It’s not like being able to play the very latest AAA game is something that is hard to give up, unlike a lot of other essential software. Just say no. (BTW, is this really the case with Steam? Last time I checked you could always make a local offline backup of a downloaded game and bring it with you; any connectivity/license check would have to be made in the game itself)
- jimmydorry 5y ago
  You can only be offline for a set amount of time with Steam (last I used it), and the check is made before you go offline.
  - j_4 5y ago
    That's a different thing from what OP is saying, they're right that Steam doesn't automatically enforce any DRM. It does provide the mechanisms but it's up to the devs whether they use them or not. In lots of cases you can just directly run the executable, especially for indie games. Source: am indie game dev
    - jimmydorry 5y ago
      Steam can work as a dumb CDN for executables, but a substantial number of games do use the out-of-the-box Steam DRM, especially the AAA games GP referenced. Source: Have used Steam pretty much since it was released and also worked with SteamKit for a project or two.
akavel 5y ago
https://gog.com https://gog.com has (nearly?) all games DRM-free, so you can backup (and also actually torrent I believe) any of the games, that's why I choose to buy from them.
- ivegotnoaccount 5y ago
  The question may be silly, but how does GOG handle multiplayer ? - Are players that bought the game on GOG able to play with those that bought it on steam/Uplay/other when lobbies are involved - Are there DRMs for online play that have lobbies ? If so, how are they handled ? Also, their list is sadly quite limited it seems, for the games many play. No GTA V, no God of War, no Red Dead Redemption, no Call of Duty, no battlefield V, which seem to be some of most selling games of past years. I know it's not their fault but because of it, it won't fit a huge chunk of the users' needs.
  - Duckapple 5y ago
    It really depends on implementation in-game. I think GOG has worked on API for crossplay with Steam for any game developers who are interested. In general, if the developer wants DRM, the developer gets DRM, so the options on GOG will probably always be years behind other platforms and usually not include multiplayer experiences, in terms of AAA games, that is.
  - CopperWing 5y ago
    > The question may be silly, but how does GOG handle multiplayer ? It depends: some games implement multiplayer through their publisher's private servers (e.g. Paradox games) so users can play together regardless of the shop they bought the game from. Some others (e.g. Dying Light) reimplement multiplayer replacing Steam facilities with GOG Galaxy. In that case interoperability is not possible maily because GOG Galaxy doesn't implement the same anticheat system. Finally some other games whose multiplayer is based on Steam, had the multiplayer removed in the version sold on GOG (e.g. modern XCOM games). > Also, their list is sadly quite limited it seems, for the games many play. Nowadays the game market offers more than just AAA games and for people like me who stopped buying DRM-protected games and are not interested in multiplayer there are still many good games to enjoy. Some AA and AAA games are also published on GOG after a while, so it's just matter to wait and support GOG's business model if you don't like DRM.
tdrdt 5y ago
I think one simple legislation could help a lot: forbid to use the word 'buy' in this context. Instead it should be 'hire' or 'lease' or something. Once I 'bought' an e-book that was copy protected by Adobe (my fault I didn't read the specs before buying). But because you can only read it when Adobe's servers are online no ownership is transferred to you as buyer. You buy rights to read the book on their terms. 'Hire this book' would be fair to use in this context. (Afterwards I successfully converted to book to an e-book format that I owned with some Calibre plugins).
- IshKebab 5y ago
  That sounds like a good idea. It would probably make sense to require that they specify how long you get to lease it for, rather than the current situation which is pretty much "until we decide not to run the service anymore".
  - GoblinSlayer 5y ago
    Something like "buy a 1 month subscription".
- fivre 5y ago
  Nobody gives a flying fuck whether the terms are legally accurate. This distinction is entirely already covered in the existing terms of service. People are annoyed that they can pay for something (sometimes an essential identity service), be arbitrarily denied it, and have no recourse other than maybe getting lucky by writing a complaint post that gets traction and read by some human who can tell the abuse department they've fricked it. Companies shouldn't be able to shift the burden of the negative aspects of running an online service (dealing with abuse) entirely onto society by offering no meaningful appeal process. Regulation isn't an appealing option, but companies have full well demonstrated that they aren't going to handle these cases unless forced to.
  - squeaky-clean 5y ago
    > People are annoyed that they can pay for something (sometimes an essential identity service), be arbitrarily denied it, and have no recourse other than maybe getting lucky by writing a complaint post that gets traction and read by some human who can tell the abuse department they've fricked it. I think the reasoning for changing the verbiage from "buy" to something more truthful is because most people don't even know this is a thing. Outside of hacker news and gaming subreddits, how many people are actually aware that digital video games they've "bought" can easily be revoked? I don't believe the average person is aware.
matheusmoreira 5y ago
We should go in the complete opposite direction and abolish data ownership straight up. Copyright needs to end. The second it's gone it will no longer be a crime to copy and these problems will no longer exist.
- nurettin 5y ago
  How to profit from written material without some sort of government enforcing my rights to ownership? Do I have to go begging on social media?
  - matheusmoreira 5y ago
    Don't really know. Patronage seems to be working well these days. Lots of creators seem to be finding success on services like Patreon. Also, crowdfunding. There needs to be a way to get paid before you create it for the labor of creating it. The creators and their labor are what's valuable, not the end result. Data is infinitely abundant and trying to limit access to data is just insane. It's the 21st century and we have world wide networked computers capable of copying data at massive scales at minimal cost. Paying for data just doesn't make any sense. Once it's out there it's pretty much done.
    - nurettin 5y ago
      Okay I pour hours into content and go begging. What is my compensation if it doesn't succeed?
      - inkblotuniverse 5y ago
        You write a book and nobody buys it or reads it. What's your compensation then?
        nurettin 5y ago
        The guarantee that if anyone buys or reads it in the future, I can claim my compensation. Otherwise I have to create a perpetual begging campaign and be at everyone's mercy.
simion314 5y ago
>Personally I always get kind of nervous around buying things on PSN My PlayStation account was blocked for online games/chat for 2 months with no clear reason, this also wasted 2 months of PS Plus subscription sice I could not really benefit from it. They did not offer any way to dispute this or clarify what exactly was wrong to avoid it. My son was using the console to play Fortnite, he told me that some guy blackmailed him to give him gifts or he will submit fake reports, I have no idea who checks this reports and if they have competent people that understand our native language or is all just some shit AI and some dude somewhere just confirming that the AI was wight. This incident completely changed my sentiments on Sony consoles and on top their greedy pricing and for sure I will avoid them in future.
- jorvi 5y ago
  Sony is extremely trigger happy with suspending based on messages. I’ve gotten a few weeks suspension for ‘harassment’ because I told someone that kept messaging me I was hacking that that was ‘honestly kind of dumb’.
  - robinduckett 5y ago
    Is it more likely that the other person reported you a bunch of times and that Sony does not employ people to check that reports are legitimate?
  - jokoon 5y ago
    If I ever make a game, I would make sure there is no public chat, and that you could only chat with people you add as friends. Imagine how easier it is to moderate, and how polite people become if you do that.
    - take-five 5y ago
      Hearthstone has exactly this system (only friends can chat with each other). What happens quite often after some matches: 1. You receive a friend request from your opponent 2. If you accept it, they probably are going to send you a bunch of insults and then unfriend you.
dend 5y ago
I recently wrote about this very topic: https://den.dev/blog/software-rentals/ https://den.dev/blog/software-rentals/
ErikVandeWater 5y ago
> This article is a great example of why we need legislation around ownership of digital items. If you show me well-written legislation that doesn't have generous handouts for cronies, I'm all for it.
brnt 5y ago
> I generally hate getting the government involved in things, but Why do you hate your elected representatives safeguarding fairness against large corporations like this?
- lobocinza 5y ago
  Because it's flawed. It's an easy bet to say that regulation will end up being ineffective and/or worsening things. Asking for regulation is kind of "gnome underpants" plan where regulate -> X -> profit. X is extremely complicated.
Aeolun 5y ago
> If they ban me, do I lose my thousands of dollars of games? I can kind of understand if you were legitimately in the wrong (e.g. sending death threats to other users, getting a warning, and then doing it again), but in the situation where you are simply inactive for some period of time I think it’s unreasonable.
- ivegotnoaccount 5y ago
  Even with such extreme things, the course of action should be: - Disable online features on the account - Fill a complain to authorities if illegal in the user's country (in France, sending death threats online is totally illegal) But not "Delete the account with its paid content". IMHO, the community part and game library part should not be strong-linked in such a way. If only for false positives.
saargrin 5y ago
we let it happen with music before, where apple and spotify and others can just delete stuff you purchased from your library... this actually sounds like the only beneficial use for NFTs i can think of
- Thiez 5y ago
  How would an NFT help here? Nobody is disputing that you bought the music (or, more precisely, bought a license for the music, that they may revoke at their discretion). The NFT proves nothing that a receipt wouldn't also prove. What you want is a law that forbids the current practice of revoking ownership.
malka 5y ago
The only way to own is to pirate nowadays. And people want you to believe that "it is not ethical".
- birdyrooster 5y ago
  And sadly this basically locks you out of many multiplayer as DRM titles
londons_explore 5y ago
If you try to take this to court, you will typically be offered a "goodwill payment" of a complete refund of all your games. That's because, even though the TOS is quite clear that you can lose all your stuff due to inactivity, Ubisoft doesn't want the risk of the court deciding the TOS is unfair and striking out those clauses.
bgro 5y ago
Everybody I've talks to jumps on the victim blaming high horse every time this comes up. "Well just don't get banned. What did you get banned for? What were you wearing when you got banned?" I have friends that got banned because somebody hacked into their account and fraudulently bought things. This is apparently account sharing, ban. Or filing a dispute about the charges = ban. Mass report by trolls = ban. There's a bunch of technical reasons outside your control where your account can be banned. Most of the legal protections you otherwise would have apparently do essentially nothing when you're banned from the service / platform you are required to use instead of just the thing you bought. This is annoying when your Steam account is hacked. This is a life altering problem when your YouTube comment gets flagged for a combined technicality of a combo-rule like "hate speech or terrorism" by calling somebody a "dummy," causing your YouTube account and all videos to be shut down, gmail account and all archived email deleted, all google docs deleted, all linked google cloud services to be suspended, and all 3rd party login oauths to be revoked. You won't be able to log into even non-google things, and further can't reset your password / login credentials or prove who you are because your email was deleted. This entire nightmare can happen to anybody at any time for any reason. Even further, because YouTube in particular is fully automated customer support, your rebuttable is likely to be automatically denied and flagged for trolling putting you in an even worse state. The only chance you have is if you happen to personally know a higher-up human before hand that you're able to talk to.
DocTomoe 5y ago
> I generally hate getting the government involved in things The general idea behind a protection racket is that once you paid the goons, they protect you against aggression, from themselves, and others.
danaris 5y ago
Unfortunately, there's a pretty straightforward way around legislation that requires that people have access to games they've bought, and companies are already moving in that direction: Just make every game have an online component, and make it not run if it can't properly authenticate with the server. Banning this type of practice gets into much thornier ground, because plenty of games legitimately do run only online (MMOs of all types, for instance), and for plenty of others, there's a legitimate reason for them to at least have an online component...and just how deeply embedded in the game that online component has to be is rarely going to be a simple matter to determine. I don't really see a good solution to this at the moment, sadly.
- dragonwriter 5y ago
  > I don't really see a good solution to this at the moment, sadly. Preferring games that don't do the bad thing and being willing to pay a premium for (or accept lower production values from) them is the market solution. I think you’ve outline why there isn't a legislative solution that doesn't adversely impact lots of genres of games where online is fundamental to the game and not an abusive control methods with no other purpose.
  - danaris 5y ago
    Well, yes, but on the whole, that one doesn't seem to be working: there are still plenty of people more than willing to plop down their $60+ for the latest and greatest AAA games...with loot boxes, microtransactions, always-online requirements for single-player modes, and extremely dodgy privacy policies.
    - dragonwriter 5y ago
      > extremely dodgy privacy policies. You might not be able to ban always-online requirements without unacceptable collateral damage, but you can legislatively address “extremely dodgy privacy policies” by simply having decent privacy laws and not leaving the issue up to corporate policy.

squarefoot 5y ago

> I generally hate getting the government involved in things It is sad when it occurs, but that's the exact reason why governments are there: they're (theoretically) reliable powerful people that should protect us from other unreliable powerful people, in exchange of being kept in power. Any other alternative would involve violence.

pdonis 5y ago

If you can't be confident of your ownership of and access to what you buy, why do you buy it?

endisneigh 5y ago
I apologize but I find this to be a silly question. I buy because I want to play. I do not have an expectation of indefinite ownership (even though I should have indefinite ownership), hence my comment.
- pdonis 5y ago
  > I do not have an expectation of indefinite ownership But you said you were nervous about buying these things. What are you nervous about? And why do you pay money anyway if you're nervous about what you're getting? > even though I should have indefinite ownership On what grounds? These are companies operating in a free market. They're offering a product whose terms are right out there in the open. If you don't like the terms, don't buy.
  - alasdair_ 5y ago
    The terms are not a negotiated contract - they are dictated by one side and even if they are read by the purchaser, the implications of the terms may not be obvious. Many/most people will not understand that after paying hundreds of dollars for games, their games could suddenly be taken away from them without recourse. For a ridiculous example, imagine there was a clause buried in the fineprint that allowed the store owner to charge you $5000 to unlock the game whenever they chose to. Even if it were in the T&C, it would be ruled invalid because it was so unexpected. Similarly, removing the right to play a game you have bought with money because you haven’t played it “enough” (according to the vendor) may also be considered unreasonavlble.
    - pdonis 5y ago
      > The terms are not a negotiated contract That doesn't mean they aren't a contract. They're simply a contract where your only options as the buyer are to buy or not to buy. That said, a unilateral contract like this can be treated somewhat differently by courts. See below. > removing the right to play a game you have bought with money because you haven’t played it “enough” (according to the vendor) may also be considered unreasonable. As I posted in response to someone else upthread, it would be an interesting case if someone actually did try to take a game store to court on these grounds. Contract law does include general rules about reasonableness, and courts are more likely to apply them for unilateral contracts like these where one party does not have the opportunity to bargain.
      - ipaddr 5y ago
        Terms are not a contract or a type of contract. Were you instructed to consult your legal team before signing the contract? What you never signed with a witness and a notary? So if they put in a term that said you agree to give them your house or 500 you would have to? Terms of service are the rules outlined by the service provider. Breaking these could get your service cut and you would have a hard time finding a legal recourse.
        5y ago
josephcsible 5y ago
Because people want to play the games, and there's not an alternative way to buy them that does give you that confidence.
- pdonis 5y ago
  > there's not an alternative way to buy them that does give you that confidence That doesn't sound to me like a reason for legislation. It sounds to me like a reason for competition. But for there to be competition, customers have to be willing to put their money where their mouth is. If there were a competitor that charged, say, 20% more for a product that included the confidence you want, would you pay it?
  - josephcsible 5y ago
    Don't copyrights preclude meaningful competition here? If a game is sold through Publisher X, Publisher Y can't just unilaterally decide that they want to sell it too.
    - pdonis 5y ago
      > Don't copyrights preclude meaningful competition here? No. The game developer, who owns the copyright, decides what channels it gets sold through. If game developers knew that people wouldn't buy their games through channels that didn't give good guarantees of ownership and access, they wouldn't sell through those channels.
      - jbay808 5y ago
        This sounds great on paper but I really don't think that feedback channel is effective in practice. First of all, when a game or a platform does poorly, the reason for that can be very hard to discern (unless there's some kind of coordinated vocal protest). "The customers are disagreeing with the fine print of our end-user license agreement" usually isn't high up on the list of reasons. Secondly, there are many degrees of incentive separation between the game developer and the customer. If the distributor offers the game developer a good lump-sum payment for a platform exclusive, they might not care about the EULA. The distributor might also own the developer. IP isn't fungible, so competition in the space is subject to much more inefficiency than a market for, say, wheat.
chii 5y ago
to participate in the cultural works of today's digital world.
- pdonis 5y ago
  These are games we're talking about. They're recreation. For people to be demanding legislation because a recreational activity isn't set up just the way they like it, when they knew the terms perfectly well before they paid their money, is not "participating in cultural works".
  - boondaburrah 5y ago
    how is recreation not part of culture?
  - endisneigh 5y ago
    You're entirely missing the point of the comment if you think it's about games. It's about digital goods.
    - pdonis 5y ago
      I can't think of any "digital good" where there is a risk of losing access in this way that isn't recreational in a similar way to games. So my comments would apply equally well to any such goods.
      - josephcsible 5y ago
        Two that immediately come to mind are online textbooks and Adobe Creative Cloud.
        pdonis 5y ago
        Hm. I agree online textbooks are different because you're not just paying for the textbook, you're also paying a school tuition, and the school isn't going to refund your tuition just because the textbook provider made a mistake. I asked another poster just upthread about the software (such as Creative Cloud) case.
5e92cb50239222b 5y ago
I consider it a fair game to torrent those games that the publisher screws me over. Like San Andreas, the Steam version of which was FUBAR a few years ago and then removed altogether (for new buyers). I've paid for maybe five copies in my entire life, sorry, I'm not paying for the sixth.
michaelmrose 5y ago
You are of course correct but at the same time I often buy games for $5 - $10 on sale that are a few years old and after completion they have little to no replay value. Although many may not be as frugal they might well have the same attitude towards reuse/replay/resale. Play and forget.
matheusmoreira 5y ago
It must have been around 2006 when I registered my Steam account. I was just a kid back then. Didn't understand the fact the buy button was lying to me.

sefrost 5y ago

I wouldn’t feel any guilt about pirating the content I bought on any of those services if my account was taken from me for inactivity. I’d be interested to hear the argument about why that would be wrong though.

josephcsible 5y ago
It's definitely fine morally, but unfortunately it's illegal anyway.
- platz 5y ago
  - tombert 5y ago
    Why is that? If you buy the game off Steam or something, this implies that the creators/publishers/platforms have gotten their due compensation. The cracks and files on ThePirateBay are done on a volunteer basis, meaning that it’s not costing the game developers any money.
    - iamthirsty 5y ago
      It is costing a developer money — someone who downloads the pirated game would’ve otherwise bought it. Game devs make money on sales. However if you have already bought the game, and then download a pirated version, it isn’t.
      - deleted 5y ago
        [deleted]
      - tombert 5y ago
        I was reasonably certain that this thread was specifically speaking in regard to the latter case.
      - tehbeard 5y ago

vmception 5y ago

or just let Web3 and onchain NFT's happen, accepting one of the reasons why the incremental improvement is being seen as valuable. Even if a company offered a convenience service, the ideal implementation allows people to restore their account from the current function state onchain, which is what most web3 services do in an increasingly standardized and predictable way right now. regarding the NFT's and where they store the images, many NFT classes have getter methods that tell enough about what the implementation of the digital item should look like, usually when I'm talking to people I get the impression that they haven't looked. there are so many ways to do this right, even if they aren't passing muster right now.

endisneigh 5y ago
I don't understand how NFTs would solve the problem I described. Even if all of my Oculus games are NFTs - if I'm banned and can't access my account to download the games then I'm out of luck.
- vmception 5y ago
  the games wouldn't be released on exclusively on a closed system because they have other paths to monetize the games you possess and the digital items you possess would have an independent record of your possession and continued access if you did use a company's platform because of its convenient UI, even if you lost access to that company's platform you should still be able to access all of your games and items in the Web3 paradigm and idea, the closed systems build themselves around open systems just to make them convenient, and aren't strictly necessary. the open system allows the records of assets to be tapped into and re-rendered in other games, or marketplaces. Think about it like Web 1.0 with updated technology and requisite pieces that were missing back then.
  - anamexis 5y ago
    In the NFT scenario , what would prevent people from sharing licenses?

Hokusai 5y ago

> I don't really care too much about what the Terms and Services say It does not matter even if you care. You do not have negotiating power to change them. It is a 'my way or highway' situation. And the government should be involved, you alone cannot change the Terms of Service, but your country can create laws to protect you from thieves, whenever they steal physical or digital goods. If you don't like your government fight to improve it but do not renounce to the power that it gives you as a citizen.

_3u10 5y ago
Yes you do. I had a ToS with an anti competitive clause in it, no reselling, was told they needed to transfer all our customers, etc, or they and us could get fined for illegal reselling. Phoned their regulator, was told to register as a reseller, and call back if we still had issues. After the registration had been finalized we contacted our new wholesaler, all that came of it was being unable to add new accounts for a few months. The next company we had the issue with you could basically hear the face palming on the phone why they had allowed a registered reseller to open an account that didn’t allow reselling, and whether they would allow us to continue reselling or whether we should do a conference call with <name of person> at <four letter agency>. It was basically one of those pray I do not alter our agreement further moments.
- dtech 5y ago
  Of course you can alter the ToS, I'm sure Steam and the likes are open to contract negations before you buy a $70 game.
  - _3u10 5y ago
    It’s better to negotiate after, that way there’s a whole bunch of precedent around sales.
- Broken_Hippo 5y ago
  Did you change the TOS or just get switched to a proper account type? These aren't the same. Few to no companies are going to even consider changing the TOS for a small purchase like a game, a book, music, and the like. You, as a consumer, do not have this power. I'd bet that any customer service rep you talk to (if that is an option) does not have the power nor access to the right documents to allow you to change it either. You can choose to buy or choose not to. That's it.

alasdair_ 5y ago

> If they ban me, do I lose my thousands of dollars of games? Generally yes, and this is obviously bullshit.

vital_beach 5y ago

whoops! you didn't drive your car for a year during the pandemic, we own it now. /s This type of anticonsumerism would get so much attention if it were in another field. I can only hope it happens here.

jonathankoren 5y ago

That’s because you never actually bought the item. You got a license to run it on someone else’s server. Let’s say you bought a bunch of things for The Matrix Online, do you expect that server to run forever? It won’t. It didn’t. Why should someone else maintain it forever? Are you getting a refund? Why? You already extracted the useful life of it. If there’s government regulation it’s around the deceptive use of the word “purchase” it’s just a long term rental

josephcsible 5y ago
It's one thing if it's an MMO or something else that inherently needs a central server. It's another if it's a game that could work 100% offline if not for the DRM.
techsupporter 5y ago
> That’s because you never actually bought the item. You got a license to run it on someone else’s server. Don't mean to sound too cranky but this "you just bought a license" crap has been a thing since software began being software. It was no more fair back then than it is now. No one is arguing, at least I don't think they are, that a company has an obligation to keep servers running in perpetuity. But to tell me I have no portable way to retain the bits I bought--excuse me, "licensed"--from a company is just crap. If a game can run in single-player mode without a server, or if a movie file can be played, or a song file listened to, then the act of "buying" it should mean I can do that for as long as I can keep my computers running and the onus on keeping backups of those files is on me. We call them app "stores," we use the moniker of "purchased," and the ads call them "ours." If companies don't want to let us keep the ability to independently use the software or content files we "purchased," then they should be prohibited from using the lexicon of buying things and be very explicit that this is a one-time fee for a rental that can be taken away at any time. Being explicit does not mean burying it in a multi-thousand word document that no person with a regular command of English can understand and that none of us have the power to negotiate for ourselves.
- throwawaylinux 5y ago
  There is nothing unfair about licensing. I contribute to FOSS software, I expect that an individual or company abide by the terms of the license I grant them and that license is terminated if they fail to meet various conditions. That seems fair to me, it wouldn't become unfair if a payment was required either. But I think you have got it right with the rest of your comments. There has to be a meeting of the minds in these dealings, and I don't believe these companies are acting in good faith when they explicitly or implicitly suggest that you are "buying a game" or "buying a song" even if you can find out what that really means in fine print somewhere. Hopefully we get more legislation and precedent that forces them to be more explicit about what these purchases mean exactly.

wildpeaks 5y ago

That's exactly why it's safer to buy DRM-free from GOG because you can keep a backup of your purchases without having to worry the service might lock you out or remove a product.

emodendroket 5y ago

> If they ban me, do I lose my thousands of dollars of games? You absolutely do. Anyway, I agree with you. Digital marketplaces are becoming more and more important and certainly I'm sure I have a lot of money in Steam, Kindle, and various other services. It'd be nice to move away from the Wild West phase given how much money's sloshing around at this point.

raz32dust 5y ago
You can still play the games without steam (I often play without internet connection). But of course you'll miss out on a lot of things (multiplayer, achievements etc.) which might be important to you.
- VRay 5y ago
  a lot of games have actual Steam DRM You can definitely remove it, but it's not like GOG where the launcher really is 100% optional and you can install and play the games without an internet connection or an account of any sort
- whoknew1122 5y ago
  For some games this is true. But there's plenty of games which have an 'offline mode' that require you to connect to an auth server before the game will launch.

systemvoltage 5y ago

Sounds nice, but I don't think we need legislation. It would bring the entire digital content ecomony to a grinding halt. The line between what can be owned and what cannot be is not clear. The line between what's a digital good and what's not is also not clear. Is your online bank balance a digital good? Is it an immutable binary that's considered a digital good? An in-game item in a MMORPG that requires servers to operate? Is Adobe Creative Cloud a good or a service? The details are messy. And the lawmakers would guarantee the passing the most fucked up version of it with some other draconian measures bundled in there. Startup ecosystem would be in sheer panic to comply and some won't even contemplate starting a company selling digital goods/services. The scope is so insane, I am having a hard time thinking about it.

moistly 5y ago

Wouldn’t mind the music I’ve purchased remaining mine, too.

moogly 5y ago
That's why I only buy from Bandcamp and HDTracks.

westoque 5y ago

This makes a good case for decentralization no? Imagine all those items in the blockchain, you can leave for years knowing you can retrieve them anytime. The only con at the point is if you lose your keys. Reminds me of some friends who had Bitcoin and “forgot” about it and only to come back with massive profits.

legulere 5y ago
Trustless trust doesn’t solve any problems here. Having your ownership of games notarized without someone central, does not mean you can access them. You need someone to enforce that.
endisneigh 5y ago
I don't understand how blockchain would solve this problem. How much would it cost in gas fees to download a 100GB game? That aside how would you handle licensing, revocation, etc?
- okwubodu 5y ago
  Tokenized game licenses could presumably be transferred to a different wallet without depending on whatever game company to do the right thing.
  - endisneigh 5y ago
    OK, but where do you download the game? Even with licensing, you couldn't play offline? If so, what's stopping someone from just keeping the state of the blockchain such that the offline client thinks you own the games but you actually don't. Doesn't seem like it'd work to me without a central authority.
    - okwubodu 5y ago
      You set up a server and allow any wallet with the license in it to sign a valid request to download and launch the game. > Even with licensing, you couldn't play offline? That’s a good point. The GOG DRM-free model wouldn’t work here. Someone smarter than me could likely give you an answer.

3np 5y ago

> Personally I always get kind of nervous around buying things on PSN, Xbox, Stadia, Steam, Oculus, etc. If they ban me, do I lose my thousands of dollars of games? You didn’t buy any games. You paid for access, but as you note you don’t actually own any of these games. Please stop giving in to the doublespeak BS of these companies. Other than the false marketing (using words like “buy”) and that DRM is toxic, I don’t see what’s really not right - it’s a terrible deal but you’re free to not partake. As long as people keep giving companies money for this kind of thing it will continue. It’s not like being able to play the very latest AAA game is something that is hard to give up, unlike a lot of other essential software. Just say no. (BTW, is this really the case with Steam? Last time I checked you could always make a local offline backup of a downloaded game and bring it with you; any connectivity/license check would have to be made in the game itself)

jimmydorry 5y ago
You can only be offline for a set amount of time with Steam (last I used it), and the check is made before you go offline.
- j_4 5y ago
  That's a different thing from what OP is saying, they're right that Steam doesn't automatically enforce any DRM. It does provide the mechanisms but it's up to the devs whether they use them or not. In lots of cases you can just directly run the executable, especially for indie games. Source: am indie game dev
  - jimmydorry 5y ago
    Steam can work as a dumb CDN for executables, but a substantial number of games do use the out-of-the-box Steam DRM, especially the AAA games GP referenced. Source: Have used Steam pretty much since it was released and also worked with SteamKit for a project or two.

akavel 5y ago

https://gog.com https://gog.com has (nearly?) all games DRM-free, so you can backup (and also actually torrent I believe) any of the games, that's why I choose to buy from them.

ivegotnoaccount 5y ago
The question may be silly, but how does GOG handle multiplayer ? - Are players that bought the game on GOG able to play with those that bought it on steam/Uplay/other when lobbies are involved - Are there DRMs for online play that have lobbies ? If so, how are they handled ? Also, their list is sadly quite limited it seems, for the games many play. No GTA V, no God of War, no Red Dead Redemption, no Call of Duty, no battlefield V, which seem to be some of most selling games of past years. I know it's not their fault but because of it, it won't fit a huge chunk of the users' needs.
- Duckapple 5y ago
  It really depends on implementation in-game. I think GOG has worked on API for crossplay with Steam for any game developers who are interested. In general, if the developer wants DRM, the developer gets DRM, so the options on GOG will probably always be years behind other platforms and usually not include multiplayer experiences, in terms of AAA games, that is.
- CopperWing 5y ago
  > The question may be silly, but how does GOG handle multiplayer ? It depends: some games implement multiplayer through their publisher's private servers (e.g. Paradox games) so users can play together regardless of the shop they bought the game from. Some others (e.g. Dying Light) reimplement multiplayer replacing Steam facilities with GOG Galaxy. In that case interoperability is not possible maily because GOG Galaxy doesn't implement the same anticheat system. Finally some other games whose multiplayer is based on Steam, had the multiplayer removed in the version sold on GOG (e.g. modern XCOM games). > Also, their list is sadly quite limited it seems, for the games many play. Nowadays the game market offers more than just AAA games and for people like me who stopped buying DRM-protected games and are not interested in multiplayer there are still many good games to enjoy. Some AA and AAA games are also published on GOG after a while, so it's just matter to wait and support GOG's business model if you don't like DRM.

tdrdt 5y ago

I think one simple legislation could help a lot: forbid to use the word 'buy' in this context. Instead it should be 'hire' or 'lease' or something. Once I 'bought' an e-book that was copy protected by Adobe (my fault I didn't read the specs before buying). But because you can only read it when Adobe's servers are online no ownership is transferred to you as buyer. You buy rights to read the book on their terms. 'Hire this book' would be fair to use in this context. (Afterwards I successfully converted to book to an e-book format that I owned with some Calibre plugins).

IshKebab 5y ago
That sounds like a good idea. It would probably make sense to require that they specify how long you get to lease it for, rather than the current situation which is pretty much "until we decide not to run the service anymore".
- GoblinSlayer 5y ago
  Something like "buy a 1 month subscription".
fivre 5y ago
Nobody gives a flying fuck whether the terms are legally accurate. This distinction is entirely already covered in the existing terms of service. People are annoyed that they can pay for something (sometimes an essential identity service), be arbitrarily denied it, and have no recourse other than maybe getting lucky by writing a complaint post that gets traction and read by some human who can tell the abuse department they've fricked it. Companies shouldn't be able to shift the burden of the negative aspects of running an online service (dealing with abuse) entirely onto society by offering no meaningful appeal process. Regulation isn't an appealing option, but companies have full well demonstrated that they aren't going to handle these cases unless forced to.
- squeaky-clean 5y ago
  > People are annoyed that they can pay for something (sometimes an essential identity service), be arbitrarily denied it, and have no recourse other than maybe getting lucky by writing a complaint post that gets traction and read by some human who can tell the abuse department they've fricked it. I think the reasoning for changing the verbiage from "buy" to something more truthful is because most people don't even know this is a thing. Outside of hacker news and gaming subreddits, how many people are actually aware that digital video games they've "bought" can easily be revoked? I don't believe the average person is aware.

matheusmoreira 5y ago

We should go in the complete opposite direction and abolish data ownership straight up. Copyright needs to end. The second it's gone it will no longer be a crime to copy and these problems will no longer exist.

nurettin 5y ago
How to profit from written material without some sort of government enforcing my rights to ownership? Do I have to go begging on social media?
- matheusmoreira 5y ago
  Don't really know. Patronage seems to be working well these days. Lots of creators seem to be finding success on services like Patreon. Also, crowdfunding. There needs to be a way to get paid before you create it for the labor of creating it. The creators and their labor are what's valuable, not the end result. Data is infinitely abundant and trying to limit access to data is just insane. It's the 21st century and we have world wide networked computers capable of copying data at massive scales at minimal cost. Paying for data just doesn't make any sense. Once it's out there it's pretty much done.
  - nurettin 5y ago
    Okay I pour hours into content and go begging. What is my compensation if it doesn't succeed?
    - inkblotuniverse 5y ago
      You write a book and nobody buys it or reads it. What's your compensation then?
      - nurettin 5y ago
        The guarantee that if anyone buys or reads it in the future, I can claim my compensation. Otherwise I have to create a perpetual begging campaign and be at everyone's mercy.

simion314 5y ago

>Personally I always get kind of nervous around buying things on PSN My PlayStation account was blocked for online games/chat for 2 months with no clear reason, this also wasted 2 months of PS Plus subscription sice I could not really benefit from it. They did not offer any way to dispute this or clarify what exactly was wrong to avoid it. My son was using the console to play Fortnite, he told me that some guy blackmailed him to give him gifts or he will submit fake reports, I have no idea who checks this reports and if they have competent people that understand our native language or is all just some shit AI and some dude somewhere just confirming that the AI was wight. This incident completely changed my sentiments on Sony consoles and on top their greedy pricing and for sure I will avoid them in future.

jorvi 5y ago
Sony is extremely trigger happy with suspending based on messages. I’ve gotten a few weeks suspension for ‘harassment’ because I told someone that kept messaging me I was hacking that that was ‘honestly kind of dumb’.
- robinduckett 5y ago
  Is it more likely that the other person reported you a bunch of times and that Sony does not employ people to check that reports are legitimate?
- jokoon 5y ago
  If I ever make a game, I would make sure there is no public chat, and that you could only chat with people you add as friends. Imagine how easier it is to moderate, and how polite people become if you do that.
  - take-five 5y ago
    Hearthstone has exactly this system (only friends can chat with each other). What happens quite often after some matches: 1. You receive a friend request from your opponent 2. If you accept it, they probably are going to send you a bunch of insults and then unfriend you.

dend 5y ago

I recently wrote about this very topic: https://den.dev/blog/software-rentals/ https://den.dev/blog/software-rentals/

ErikVandeWater 5y ago

> This article is a great example of why we need legislation around ownership of digital items. If you show me well-written legislation that doesn't have generous handouts for cronies, I'm all for it.

brnt 5y ago

> I generally hate getting the government involved in things, but Why do you hate your elected representatives safeguarding fairness against large corporations like this?

lobocinza 5y ago
Because it's flawed. It's an easy bet to say that regulation will end up being ineffective and/or worsening things. Asking for regulation is kind of "gnome underpants" plan where regulate -> X -> profit. X is extremely complicated.

Aeolun 5y ago

> If they ban me, do I lose my thousands of dollars of games? I can kind of understand if you were legitimately in the wrong (e.g. sending death threats to other users, getting a warning, and then doing it again), but in the situation where you are simply inactive for some period of time I think it’s unreasonable.

ivegotnoaccount 5y ago
Even with such extreme things, the course of action should be: - Disable online features on the account - Fill a complain to authorities if illegal in the user's country (in France, sending death threats online is totally illegal) But not "Delete the account with its paid content". IMHO, the community part and game library part should not be strong-linked in such a way. If only for false positives.

saargrin 5y ago

we let it happen with music before, where apple and spotify and others can just delete stuff you purchased from your library... this actually sounds like the only beneficial use for NFTs i can think of

Thiez 5y ago
How would an NFT help here? Nobody is disputing that you bought the music (or, more precisely, bought a license for the music, that they may revoke at their discretion). The NFT proves nothing that a receipt wouldn't also prove. What you want is a law that forbids the current practice of revoking ownership.

malka 5y ago

The only way to own is to pirate nowadays. And people want you to believe that "it is not ethical".

birdyrooster 5y ago
And sadly this basically locks you out of many multiplayer as DRM titles

londons_explore 5y ago

If you try to take this to court, you will typically be offered a "goodwill payment" of a complete refund of all your games. That's because, even though the TOS is quite clear that you can lose all your stuff due to inactivity, Ubisoft doesn't want the risk of the court deciding the TOS is unfair and striking out those clauses.

bgro 5y ago

Everybody I've talks to jumps on the victim blaming high horse every time this comes up. "Well just don't get banned. What did you get banned for? What were you wearing when you got banned?" I have friends that got banned because somebody hacked into their account and fraudulently bought things. This is apparently account sharing, ban. Or filing a dispute about the charges = ban. Mass report by trolls = ban. There's a bunch of technical reasons outside your control where your account can be banned. Most of the legal protections you otherwise would have apparently do essentially nothing when you're banned from the service / platform you are required to use instead of just the thing you bought. This is annoying when your Steam account is hacked. This is a life altering problem when your YouTube comment gets flagged for a combined technicality of a combo-rule like "hate speech or terrorism" by calling somebody a "dummy," causing your YouTube account and all videos to be shut down, gmail account and all archived email deleted, all google docs deleted, all linked google cloud services to be suspended, and all 3rd party login oauths to be revoked. You won't be able to log into even non-google things, and further can't reset your password / login credentials or prove who you are because your email was deleted. This entire nightmare can happen to anybody at any time for any reason. Even further, because YouTube in particular is fully automated customer support, your rebuttable is likely to be automatically denied and flagged for trolling putting you in an even worse state. The only chance you have is if you happen to personally know a higher-up human before hand that you're able to talk to.

DocTomoe 5y ago

> I generally hate getting the government involved in things The general idea behind a protection racket is that once you paid the goons, they protect you against aggression, from themselves, and others.

danaris 5y ago

Unfortunately, there's a pretty straightforward way around legislation that requires that people have access to games they've bought, and companies are already moving in that direction: Just make every game have an online component, and make it not run if it can't properly authenticate with the server. Banning this type of practice gets into much thornier ground, because plenty of games legitimately do run only online (MMOs of all types, for instance), and for plenty of others, there's a legitimate reason for them to at least have an online component...and just how deeply embedded in the game that online component has to be is rarely going to be a simple matter to determine. I don't really see a good solution to this at the moment, sadly.

dragonwriter 5y ago
> I don't really see a good solution to this at the moment, sadly. Preferring games that don't do the bad thing and being willing to pay a premium for (or accept lower production values from) them is the market solution. I think you’ve outline why there isn't a legislative solution that doesn't adversely impact lots of genres of games where online is fundamental to the game and not an abusive control methods with no other purpose.
- danaris 5y ago
  Well, yes, but on the whole, that one doesn't seem to be working: there are still plenty of people more than willing to plop down their $60+ for the latest and greatest AAA games...with loot boxes, microtransactions, always-online requirements for single-player modes, and extremely dodgy privacy policies.
  - dragonwriter 5y ago
    > extremely dodgy privacy policies. You might not be able to ban always-online requirements without unacceptable collateral damage, but you can legislatively address “extremely dodgy privacy policies” by simply having decent privacy laws and not leaving the issue up to corporate policy.