3 ms·

There should be a law: if you sell an entertainment experience with significant online elements, and you shut down such elements, you should be forced to openso

by toyg 4y ago

There should be a law: if you sell an entertainment experience with significant online elements, and you shut down such elements, you should be forced to opensource the server. Just like that, dump the code wholesale on the internet somewhere.

Victerius 4y ago
Source code is often reused in other products. Corporate studios would balk.
- toyg 4y ago
  And? They'd figure it out. Millions of businesses have to deal with changes in law every day. In fact, there is a good chance this would result in standardising the most basic aspects of online activity (license checks etc) into free opensource libraries, saving such corporations a decent amount of money in the long run.
josephcsible 4y ago
We'd need a way to handle all of the companies who'd say "oops we lost the source".
- pseudalopex 4y ago
  Escrow.
- Yoofie 4y ago
  Their incompetence should not be an excuse to avoid or skirt the law. If they lose it, they should be fined or penalized. Once they start bleeding money, I guarantee that this problem will go away.
the_biot 4y ago
No, there should not be a law that forces anyone to give away their property. That's just complete nonsense. You should draw your own conclusion as to what you spend your money on, and possibly you might conclude that "buying" online games that can be taken away from you at any time is a waste of money. But you can't go from there to "we must take away intellectual property from these capitalist swine!".
- toyg 4y ago
  Is patent expiration "taking away IP from capitalist swines"...? Obviously not. IP itself is not a natural right - it's a legal construct with clear limits. The nonsense is thinking that requiring certain interests to follow rules that benefit society, is "taking away intellectual property". Any such law would obviously not be retroactive, so any publisher could decide whether they want to produce any such online element going forward. If they do, they will know their work will have to be disclosed on a free license at the end - effectively working in the same way as patents.
  - the_biot 4y ago
    I think the solution to this terrible behavior by Ubisoft, EA etc is what I said -- people need to stop putting up with it by not buying these games in the first place. You can't throw a law at every shenanigan these companies throw at their customers.
    - toyg 4y ago
      Oh yes, you absolutely can. Commercial law is so vast precisely because people have always misbehaved in pursuit of profit. > people need to stop putting up with it What I'm going to say might sound paternalistic to you, but it's the truth: most people don't really think that hard, generally speaking, and certainly not when it comes to satisfying their entertainment needs. That's why we have laws to protect the general public from predatory behavior in finance, hospitality, etc etc. This is predatory behavior, and it's now enacted at a scale that makes it parasitical - fleecing more and more money from the general consumer. A public response would be absolutely justified, in the same way it's absolutely justified what we're currently seeing going down with Apple's and Google's appstores. Otherwise we will continue to sleepwalk in the cyberpunk dystopia where corporations own our lives in practice, while being 'free to choose' purely in theory.
      - the_biot 4y ago
        What you're saying makes sense, though I'd only add that it's not "now", it's been going on for ages. EA's endless series of franchises tells you everything you need to know about both EA and their customers, for decades. But how can you possibly expect a law that takes away copyright of something they developed? That's insane, it'll never happen.

by toyg 4y ago

Victerius 4y ago

Source code is often reused in other products. Corporate studios would balk.

toyg 4y ago
And? They'd figure it out. Millions of businesses have to deal with changes in law every day. In fact, there is a good chance this would result in standardising the most basic aspects of online activity (license checks etc) into free opensource libraries, saving such corporations a decent amount of money in the long run.

josephcsible 4y ago

We'd need a way to handle all of the companies who'd say "oops we lost the source".

pseudalopex 4y ago
Escrow.
Yoofie 4y ago
Their incompetence should not be an excuse to avoid or skirt the law. If they lose it, they should be fined or penalized. Once they start bleeding money, I guarantee that this problem will go away.

the_biot 4y ago

No, there should not be a law that forces anyone to give away their property. That's just complete nonsense. You should draw your own conclusion as to what you spend your money on, and possibly you might conclude that "buying" online games that can be taken away from you at any time is a waste of money. But you can't go from there to "we must take away intellectual property from these capitalist swine!".

toyg 4y ago
Is patent expiration "taking away IP from capitalist swines"...? Obviously not. IP itself is not a natural right - it's a legal construct with clear limits. The nonsense is thinking that requiring certain interests to follow rules that benefit society, is "taking away intellectual property". Any such law would obviously not be retroactive, so any publisher could decide whether they want to produce any such online element going forward. If they do, they will know their work will have to be disclosed on a free license at the end - effectively working in the same way as patents.
- the_biot 4y ago
  I think the solution to this terrible behavior by Ubisoft, EA etc is what I said -- people need to stop putting up with it by not buying these games in the first place. You can't throw a law at every shenanigan these companies throw at their customers.
  - toyg 4y ago
    Oh yes, you absolutely can. Commercial law is so vast precisely because people have always misbehaved in pursuit of profit. > people need to stop putting up with it What I'm going to say might sound paternalistic to you, but it's the truth: most people don't really think that hard, generally speaking, and certainly not when it comes to satisfying their entertainment needs. That's why we have laws to protect the general public from predatory behavior in finance, hospitality, etc etc. This is predatory behavior, and it's now enacted at a scale that makes it parasitical - fleecing more and more money from the general consumer. A public response would be absolutely justified, in the same way it's absolutely justified what we're currently seeing going down with Apple's and Google's appstores. Otherwise we will continue to sleepwalk in the cyberpunk dystopia where corporations own our lives in practice, while being 'free to choose' purely in theory.
    - the_biot 4y ago
      What you're saying makes sense, though I'd only add that it's not "now", it's been going on for ages. EA's endless series of franchises tells you everything you need to know about both EA and their customers, for decades. But how can you possibly expect a law that takes away copyright of something they developed? That's insane, it'll never happen.