16 ms·

Sony makes bold claim about game ownership

179 points by speckx 1mo ago

TheCleric 1mo ago
Revocable software licenses are a scam.
nerdjon 1mo ago
What I don't understand is why Sony is the one being targeted for this when this has been the case with any digital purchase for 20 years? I don't know of a digital marketplace that works differently. But instead all of the hate, the boycots, etc are all targeting Sony instead of focusing on actually figuring out how to improve digital purchase rights which extend beyond games (and far beyond Sony). I know that some online hate it when you compare this situation to PC since there is choice there, but not when it comes to this. Sure you can choose which store you want to not really own things with but its the same result. Steam did this a year ago: https://www.reddit.com/r/Games/comments/1g19n60/steam_now_tells_gamers_up_front_that_theyre/ https://www.reddit.com/r/Games/comments/1g19n60/steam_now_te... Where were the boycots then.
- redwall_hp 1mo ago
  Valve killed the previously thriving boxed game industry two decades ago and people can't get over how much they love everything about Valve. Sony follows 20 years later (in a world where internet is faster than installing from BluRay and games are outgrowing three layer discs) and people lose their mind. There's more noise about this than Microsoft's mass layoffs at the game companies they bought up.
  - CamperBob2 1mo ago
    Sony has a very long corporate tradition of fucking over their customers. Valve does not. People still give money to Sony for some reason, but as far as I'm concerned that's on them. Call it victim-blaming at this point, I guess.
    - FoundTheShill 1mo ago
      [flagged]
  - wredcoll 1mo ago
    Valve was a plucky underdog against the established publishers and, while dominant today, still has reasonable competition, sony is a giant corp with a reputation and a monopoly on playstations.
    - alephnerd 1mo ago
      > sony is a giant corp with a reputation and a monopoly on playstations. That's like saying Volkswagen has a monopoly on Volkswagen cars. Sony clearly does not have a monopoly on the video game industry, and a plurality of video games are cross-platform across consoles, PCs (Windows/Linux), and even MacOS.
      - nalekberov 1mo ago
        If I want to move from point A to point B, I can choose from BMW, Audi or any cheaper Chinese brand. But I cannot play 'Astro Bot' on another platform.
        dcow 1mo ago
        You can't get the Volkswagen engine sound or drive experience in a BMW, though.
        nalekberov 1mo ago
        Remember? Moving from point A to point B.
        dcow 1mo ago
        Apples and oranges. If you goal is to simply play games, well then there's plenty of hardware out there for you to use. If you want to play Sony exclusives then you have to use their hardware. If I want to get from point A to point B then I can use any vehicle. If I want to get from point A to point B in a Volkswagen then I have to buy a one.
  - Grombobulous 1mo ago
    - Sony has a track record of removing purchased media en masse, while Valve does not. - While it could be argued that Valve runs an effective monopoly of the PC platform based on their marketshare, Valve operates on a platform with competitive options including DRM-free stores. - Game consoles have always been more attached to physical media than PCs. - Sony is the largest player in the market (disregarding mobile phone gaming) with more total marketshare than Valve and the PC platform. This makes them a much more visible target.
  - ReptileMan 1mo ago
    The PC has thriving piracy scene. So for any game worth playing there were lawful backups available on specialized sites. In a way it is different.
  - beart 1mo ago
    I disagree with the assertion that Valve is responsible for the death of physical game copies. First off, console games have gradually moved away from offering physical copies for years. This had the (probably deliberate) effect of killing the used game market. Earlier attempts to kill that market were driven by the proliferation of digital content that could not be resold. Second, physical copies on the PC have not been guaranteed for a very long time. I would suggest it was actually the wide-scale proliferation of indie games that did more to kill the physical copy market than any deliberate transition from AAA studios. There are thousands of indie games out there now. Without digital copies, it would be impossible for anyone to actually purchase any of them. And the momentum to move away from physical copies for PC gaming has been there for a very long time. No one was going to Best Buy to pick up a physical copy of minesweeper. There have been other factors as well, such as the popularization of MMORPGS which provided years of content from a single physical copy. Really though, the idea that without Valve, the PC gaming market would still be chugging along on physical game copies just isn't realistic. It goes completely against the momentum built over the last 25 years of PC gaming.
  - philipov 1mo ago
    Valve doesn't randomly remove stuff I've payed for from my library. Even when the ability to purchase something goes away, people who already bought it keep access to it.
    - redwall_hp 1mo ago
      They patched CS:GO away, a game I paid retail price for, with "Counter-Strike 2" and overnight dropped support for my platform (MacOS). Sony has never stolen a game from me, unlike Valve. The closest incident was that movie thing, which was more a failure on their part to negotiate perpetual licensing with the rightsholder.
      - Telaneo 1mo ago
        CS:GO is still accessible via the beta feature. Not sure if you can still play it on MacOS. I agree that that's the wrong way to do it, but at least you still have access to it in theory.
      - scheeseman486 1mo ago
        Valve pivoting away from MacOS is a consequence of choices Apple has made for their platform, many of which made it a more hostile place for Steam to exist. This is baked into the long standing Apple model of software distribution, where API and architectural changes inevitably obsolete software with Apple usually providing only a limited time window for cross compatibility. You can still play your purchases on an operating system that isn't actively fighting against you running them.
  - scheeseman486 1mo ago
    Physical PC games weren't great in the 2000s. Online activated serial keys, optical disc based DRM that caused problems during both the 9x>NT and XP>Vista transitions, the only thing that made PC gaming tolerable for me was gamecopyworld. Valve (eventually) offered something better than that. PC games can still be physical. Burn some discs or copy the files onto a USB stick and put it in a box. I think it's crazy that boutique companies like Limited Run Games completely avoid the platform when it's the only one left that isn't actively hostile to the core principles of the company. Admittedly PC does have the image of being a digital distribution only platform these days, but it's illusory and breaking that illusion is a marketing problem. People were pretty pissed about the xbox layoffs, it's just that things move fast and this was the next thing.
  - vel0city 1mo ago
    > Valve killed the previously thriving boxed game industry two decades ago Boxed PC games were practically dead by the time Valve started selling 3rd party games on their marketplace. Most game stores around me had stopped selling them or massively shrunk the shelf space for them. Xbox, Gamecube, Playstation 3, they had whole walls of the store dedicated to their stuff. PC games had a couple of shelves in the middle of the store, if even that. Sales for PC games had massively fallen between 1999 and 2005 while the rest of the game industry exploded. The industry had shrunk over a third in five years before Valve started selling online. You can't say it was "thriving".
- deleted 1mo ago
  [deleted]
- swiftcoder 1mo ago
  > when you compare this situation to PC since there is choice there, but not when it comes to this They may not be playing in the same league as Steam, but PC folks do have the choice of GoG and itch, which both sell DRM-free binaries.
  - nemomarx 1mo ago
    steam also sells drm free binaries. the steam drm is optional and the publisher or Dev can choose to go without it of course it's better that gog requires you go without it for the customer, but I'm not sure it helps in terms of legal rights. If gog shuts down you'll need to have your games backed up and downloaded to still own them and you won't have any license to a new download or etc
  - nerdjon 1mo ago
    I honestly keep forgetting GoG exists but fair, maybe saying there is no choice is a bit much but if you want to play a given game it may not be available there meaning your choice is to not play it or deal with this.
    - Telaneo 1mo ago
      > it may not be available there meaning your choice is to not play it or deal with this. On PC, there are always other options [pirate flag emoji]. Steam (in many, but not all cases) competes with free. Sony doesn't on the PS5.
- nemomarx 1mo ago
  Sony announced they're not going to print more physical discs for games. So far no one else in the big three has confirmed they're doing this, so obviously the controversy goes to them
- expedition32 1mo ago
  Sony is just handling this stupidly. What they should do is just stay silent and stay the course. Everyone fucking knows in 10 years time physical media will be dead and all of this is water under the bridge.
- jjice 1mo ago
  I think it's because they're a huge player in the space and the PS5 appears to be the dominant player in the console space this generation. This affects so many people in their faces right now, where as the switch to "buying" movies on an online platform was more gradual as it was a new platform offering and not one that had had ownership from day one (arguably since 1994 with the PS1). So in short, I think it's because they're the big guy making a very visible change to the broader public, instead of a new platform with a new way of doing things (how Steam was).
- chrisfosterelli 1mo ago
  > What I don't understand is why Sony is the one being targeted for this when this has been the case with any digital purchase for 20 years? Examples: literally two days ago Sony permanently removed access to over 500 movies for people who had "purchased" them, and only a couple months ago Sony announced their plan to permanently shutter physical media production for Playstation. I agree with you that it's a systemic issue but it also doesn't surprise me that Sony is seen as the lead boogeyman. I think if you asked the average gamer what their opinion of Valve's business practices was vs. Sony you'd get a very different answer even if the legalese in the TOS is similar.
  - nerdjon 1mo ago
    I maybe should have phrased that better since I do understand their announcement around disks and removing the movies is a reason why they are the current target. I just find it hypocritical, people keep saying they are going to move to xbox or pc next gen and its like. Their policy is exactly the same. You have the same risk and not really ownership. And I am not defending Sony, they have a long history of getting cocky with their consoles and pulling some shit. But in this particular case they are following the trend that we allowed by going all digital on PC and buying digital games on consoles. Sony isnt going to be the one that changes this, the only way to expect change would be targeting all of them including Valve. But everyone, like this article, just seems to gloss right over that and seem to imply its only Sony that is the problem here.
    - nemomarx 1mo ago
      Nintendo still has pretty good physical. Move to them if you can imo
      - greenowl 1mo ago
        and much better franchise
    - antiframe 1mo ago
      > You have the same risk and not really ownership. You don't, though. When I download a game on Steam or GOG, I have the files on my PC. I can back them up. I can modify them. Yes, live service games still have an online component I don't control, but I do still control the files on my computer. I don't on a console. Actually, I don't own any consoles for reasons of software freedom but I hear they are much more difficult to do things like back up your data, etc.
- spike021 1mo ago
  Even disc-based games in boxes have mostly required online connectivity to download most game files for a long time. It doesn't make it right but I feel like the writing has been on the wall for ages.
- zehaeva 1mo ago
  I think the difference here is that sony is in the middle of taking down their ps3 store, and while they say you'll be able to download the games for the "foreseeable future" I don't think many folks have a great deal of confidence in this being true for for that long. Valve has spent the better part of 20 years fostering a good relations with the gaming community and pretty much every gamer has a great deal of confidence that they'll protect your purchases.
- deleted 1mo ago
  [deleted]
- riffruff24 1mo ago
  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kWSIFh8ICaA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kWSIFh8ICaA Because they did a whole marketing stunt over it. Granted it was more than a decade ago, so probably just a remnants of old console war.
- kobalsky 1mo ago
  > Where were the boycots then. 1. steam does not have a monopoly on distribution rights for PC games. if steam were to go bankrupt publishers could honor your keys and even other marketplaces could do it. steam themselves let you bring your own key. 2. steam has been a benevolent marketplace leader, even though DRM itself plays against customers, the rest of the stuff they pushed while leading, like game sharing, play and refund, offline playing, are pro consumer. 3. why would your knee jerk reaction to this is pointing a finger to steam, what's your endgame?
  - nerdjon 1mo ago
    Why is your knee jerk reaction to defend steam? Sure they have said and claimed a lot of things, but their TOS says the same thing that Sony is arguing. Its suddenly this big shock now but no one cared before? Sure the way Sony is handling this is fumble after fumble but thats PR. My problem is that Valve for some reason gets a free pass because "they are the good guys" when their own policy means they could do the exact same thing. I own a lot of games on Steam, but I am not nieve to assume that there is not a chance that at some point I could loose all or some of those games. People are for some reason in a false sense of security about Steam and that is a problem. They have to be part of the conversation when it comes to digital ownership. Ignoring them means we can't actually solve the issue.
  - dcow 1mo ago
    Yeah, right XD
- rolph 1mo ago
  When You rootkit people, it tends to be unforgettable.. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sony_BMG_copy_protection_rootkit_scandal https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sony_BMG_copy_protection_rootk...
- frollogaston 1mo ago
  Nintendo is the only one still selling video games that you own practically speaking, ie you own the cartridge and it has the game on it or at least has the key. Unless I'm out of the loop on that.
cratermoon 1mo ago
If buying isn't owning, piracy isn't theft.
- ThinkItThru 1mo ago
  Don’t worry, DRM eliminates the possibility of piracy since the content is gated behind an account. Go ahead and copy/distribute the game client, even reverse-engineer the server and launch a private instance. You still don’t have the content.
  - nemomarx 1mo ago
    I mean does it? DRM is cracked within a week or two of launch now. companies are actively removing drm from their games a few months after it comes out because of the cost of licensing it. AI has accelerated this if anything, and especially the server side stuff. Look at the destiny 2 private servers right now recreating lost content.
- gustavus 1mo ago
  It's actually an interesting question there. Because I've been wondering if I buy something in taking ownership of it, whereas if I steal something I am still taking ownership of it without compensation. However if I'm not buying something but merely licensing it the wouldn't that mean that technically I'm not stealing it I'm only violating the terms of the license of it, which is now a civil not criminal matter.
  - amiga386 1mo ago
    That's not really how copyright law works. Firstly, you're not "stealing" (committing the crime of theft) by making digital copies of a work. You are infringing copyright. Even a single copy infringes copyright. To not infringe copyright, you need a license for your copying from the copyright holder. You can still manage to infringe that license even if you went through a normal storefront and paid the copyright holder the amount they asked for. You can do that by doing things with your licensed copy that the copyright holder wrote into your license that you mustn't do. If they sold physical items, they would not be able to apply such adverse terms to your copy. If you void your own license in that way, you no longer have that license, and so any copying/modification/distribution you're doing is back to being copyright infringement. Finally, there is such a thing as criminal copyright infringement. That's when you make a significant profit from copyright infringement (for example, getting people to pay you to watch a pay-per-view event that you're illegally redistributing, or even just having adverts that make you money on a website offering unlicensed Nintendo ROMs for emulators)
captainbland 1mo ago
If we're not owning it, you're not selling it, you're leasing it. Terminology on sales pages should reflect this. "Subscribe now" "purchase license" etc. should be mandated if this is the expectation. Terms like "buy" without qualification are misleading in this context, but they won't remove them from store pages because people are more likely to pay higher rates for something if they believe they are actually owning the good in perpetuity.
- ncr100 1mo ago
  Yes. "buy" and "purchase" are redefined in the EULA
  - epicureanideal 1mo ago
    They shouldn’t be able to redefine common terms when closer terms like lease or license are available. It’s misleading.
    - everyone 1mo ago
      It's also totally illegal in many countries.. you can write whatever nonsense you want on an eula, but it will be about as useful as toilet paper in court.
      - ncr100 1mo ago
        Additionally e.g. the UK has right-to-repair which may influence this subject: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49552588 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49552588 (from elsewhere in this discussion).
    - ncr100 1mo ago
      Agreed - and with AI being able to easily navigate arbitrarily complex and humanly-misleading systems, average humans (without a personal lawyer always on retainer) are at an increasing disadvantage in society.
  - 1mo ago
Keyframe 1mo ago
Remember your wallet is your vote in all of this, no matter the size of it!
- Telaneo 1mo ago
  The whales have votes orders of magnitude larger than mine.
- infinite_spin 1mo ago
  It's nothing like democracy though, and the concept of paying (or not paying) to vote is antithetical to a democratic process. We should not confuse the two.
- hightrix 1mo ago
  I think I'll vote with my VPN protected piracy. If I'm not buying a thing, but instead a limited license to a thing, then I don't care about buying that thing anymore and I'll just take it. I doubt I'll be alone and with Denuvo being regularly defeated on release day, I'm not too worried about availability.
aizk 1mo ago
On this topic I'd like to give a big kudos to the devs at https://decomp.dev/ https://decomp.dev/ who are tirelessly working to decompile old video games for fun, preserving it for future generations.
- megagpt1 1mo ago
  [flagged]
  - flutteringfool 1mo ago
    I don't see that, maybe it was temporary?
    - megagpt1 1mo ago
      [flagged]
      - aizk 1mo ago
        ???
  - RajT88 1mo ago
    Seems fine to me.
strictnein 1mo ago
The amusing thing about all of this is that the tech that Microsoft is using to be the "good guy" in this is the same thing they were savaged for when they announced it for the Xbox One. The ability to take a physical disc and use that as your key, with each disc having a unique code embedded in it. When you would install the game it would then lock that code to your account, proving your ownership of it, and you would no longer need the disc. To be fair to the critics, they hadn't thought out all the issues around resale and trading games with friends, but had stated they would address that, before just dropping the tech entirely. It seems like they never stopped having the discs support it, so now it's a relatively straightforward thing for them to enable.
VCFundedGenYer 1mo ago
Sony is wrong. If I buy it, I own it. I can do what I want with it, I can put it in a sandwich and eat it.
ginko 1mo ago
13 years ago when Microsoft wanted to introduce per-user locks for bought XBone games Sony released this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kWSIFh8ICaA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kWSIFh8ICaA Fans were eating it up and it won them the console market lead. Times sure have changed.
jdw64 1mo ago
These days, it feels like we can't truly own anything anymore. Sure, physical media used to break often, but these days I just don't get that satisfying feeling of actually owning something.
DrBazza 1mo ago
I despise Sony and avoid them at all costs. They started with AACS and then finally lost me when they embedded Cinavia in the Playstation.
red_admiral 1mo ago
Sony is correct here? If I buy a CD or a cassette or a record, I own the physical media but I only have a licence to the music it contains - not the ownership, and not the copyright. Whether I can play that music as a DJ at an event or on the radio, or remix it as a backing track for another song I'm creating and so on, depends on licencing laws and royalty payments. That was true well before the internet, and it's why Wham! get a huge boost in royalties every December whenever a radio station plays Last Christmas. A separate question is whether Sony can _revoke_ a licence and delete the game off your device again.
- barnabee 1mo ago
  If I buy a game - i.e. I am on a store page title "Game Name" not "Limited Revokable License for Game Name", and I click "buy", then I expect to own a copy of the game or the right to a copy of the game (in perpetuity), not a limited revokable license to play the game.
  - tiahura 1mo ago
    In the US adults are expected to read what they agree to. If they don’t, it’s generally their problem.
    - Kinrany 1mo ago
      In the rest of the civilized world adults are expected to have common sense and be truthful when it comes to formal transactions.
      - tiahura 1mo ago
        Good point. Reading before you sign should be common sense regardless of what country you're in. And, if you don't agree with the terms, you shouldn't click "I Agree."
        Kinrany 1mo ago
giancarlostoro 1mo ago
I wonder if anyone will ever have the guts to enter the gaming console market using open source as a base. Linux support for GPUs has never been better than what it is today. I've spent the last 4 or 5 years gaming exclusively on Linux just to highlight how good it has gotten, and no I don't have to run around doing command line incantations. Linux has improved a lot, heck, even AI you have a drastically better experience working with AI on Linux than on Windows (which hearing this 10 years ago would have confused me given how many issues I had with my GPUs on Linux for YEARS). All someone has to do is assemble a reasonable desktop that runs Linux, gives you access to GOG and Steam, and you've already got more games than most game consoles, the issue right now I suppose would be moreso hardware costs. You would also want to make sure your Desktop Environment is fine tuned with a controller in mind. If you can read games from discs, you'd be getting the attention of many people. The facts are that most people have always bought digital over discs but when you take that away, and it becomes clear that they could lose their games forever, everyone wants CDs back.
- cautiouscat 1mo ago
  Like the Steam Machine? Or do you mean open hardware too?
  - throwaway219450 1mo ago
    You can stream Big Picture with tools like Sunshine/Moonlight or their forks. Works amazingly well over a LAN if you have a server somewhere and stream to something connected to the TV. I have a headless server and an NVIDIA GPU so not sure what the sibling comment is referring to about compatibility.
- sicktriple 1mo ago
  You're literally describing the steam machine/steam deck. Also, bazzite is an immuable distro based on silverblue that does pretty much exactly what you described. I know there's some issues with big picture mode and Nvidia, but that's an Nvidia driver problem, not a limitation of the platform.
- awkwardpotato 1mo ago
hn_submit 1mo ago
This statement could do Sony in. Gamers will refuse to buy a PS6 if there's not an ironclad guarantee that they own the games they purchase, be it digital or disc form. And since gaming is the only profit center that's holding Sony above water I see the company disappearing in a couple of years. I foresee another "gaming winter" like we had in the 1980's. Maybe a decade from now another gaming platform will arise, most likely built around open-source software and hardware.
- Semaphor 1mo ago
  > Gamers will refuse to buy a PS6 if there's not an ironclad guarantee that they own the games they purchase, be it digital or disc form. I highly doubt that. I’d say 99%, probably more, won’t care either way. People barely care on PC, and people on consoles are generally used to more abuse.
  - hn_submit 1mo ago
    Let's wait for the PS6 release and we'll see who's right.
- 0cf8612b2e1e 1mo ago
  When have gamers held firm in a boycott situation? A lot of tough talk that crumbles when a new hat is released. There was that infamous picture of the Steam Group, something like, “Never Buy CoD XYZ”. Half of the group members were playing it.
- Danox 1mo ago
  Microsoft gaming division i.e. the Xbox will disappear before Sony goes anywhere. Same thing goes from Nintendo every year people/analysts insist that both those companies are in trouble and will die off because of the way they do business but here they are still successful and the main reason, they’re successful is that they concentrate on gameplay in comparison to their competition.
  - hn_submit 1mo ago
asdaqopqkq 1mo ago
After GTA6 comes out on PC, Sony should get ready for a crash that will make the PS3 launch issue look tiny. Kids these days just play Rolox or Fortnite on tablets, the gamer pipeline is gone and what ever is left of the gamers are migrating to SteamOS/PC. Older kids would much rather use Insta/Kick/etc as an IRL MMO. Teen boys are more concerned with looksmaxxing than video games. Maybe they know this and this is one last milking of the their installbase before the big fall.
tetrisgm 1mo ago
This is going to backfire spectacularly. Between this claim, ramping down disc production, and the possibility of a $999 home console,they are going to have a difficult time. There are still so few PS5 exclusives. Even fewer with PS5 Pro support. It’s going to take a lot to gain trust and justify a PS6. No clear path to victory here with a hardware update.
- jsbisviewtiful 1mo ago
  Yeah I've already decided there won't be any new Sony consoles in my household. Games are so big now I can't possibly download all my games at once so if the store goes down I lose all those games permanently and $70+ for AAA games that are really hit and miss in the "fun" category is no longer worth it to me. The PS5 was also pretty darn expensive when it came out and I can't say I've played too many PS5 exclusive games since I bought it. Most of the PS5 catalog has been indie games available on Steam or ported PS4 games... and with Sony reportedly releasing a new console next year they are clearly high on their own supply. Never thought I'd have this opinion, but the gaming industry as is needs to crash/burn and rebuild itself. So many downright wild anti-consumer things happening in the last 10 years and studios have completely lost sight of how to keep themselves out of bankruptcy.
- ActorNightly 1mo ago
  It will be fine. Gaming as a whole is a shadow of what it used to be, specifically because it has been tailored to the masses who have no real opinion on any of this other then they want to play what their friends play.
  - t-writescode 1mo ago
    My guy, there’s more weird and niche indie games than there’s ever been. Not too long ago, even AAA studios like EA were trying super weird stuff, like It Takes Two. Nostalgia glasses are real, and yeah we don’t have a Good and Evil game anymore, and we’re not in an RTS renaissance; but there are a LOT of VERY good games out there, even for your particular niche - and if there’s not, then Godot and Unity make it VERY easy for you to add to the pile, like hundreds of thousands of teams before you in the last decade.
thataccount 1mo ago
Easy solution: Stop buying whatever it is that Sony is trying to sell. Watch definitions radically shift.
aleksiy123 1mo ago
PlayStation store not allowing returns for games that have been downloaded is the most bs policy. In a world where steam allows instant returns with under 2 hours play time. I have a few games now on ps where I barely played or found out the controls were terrible and have no way to return.
shevy-java 1mo ago
Sony will lose this. Why? Because courts can point to the fact that in the 1990s, people bought a game, then could play it and re-sell it freely. So the claim about Sony how people only ever "licenced" something from them, and NOW face more restrictions than before, simply because Sony claims so, makes no sense. That's against established practices. Sony should be disbanded by the court for wasting our time here.
kmeisthax 1mo ago
> This feels like a strange reductio ad absurdum argument in reverse, where the argument isn’t disproven by reducing it: it is instead proven that merchandise and specifically software is sold as copies not as a singular entity. I’m not sure who Sony’s lawyers are trying to appeal to here, or if they just wanted to burn through a few dozen billable hours on an argument that makes no sense. Unfortunately I think this argument has a bit more merit than you think. There is already copyright precedent that you cannot enjoy first sale rights on digital property (e.g. "a marketplace for used MP3s", or "we'll scan this book and loan it to you and we promise not to touch it until the loan expires"). Physical goods have specific legal rights that the courts have so far refused to extend to digital files[0]. In that legal environment, every digital copy of a work is fundamentally some data combined with permission to make use of copies of that data under some conditions. There are no digital copies, only digital licenses. But that's merely an argument that third-parties don't get to copy things just because the way they're copying it emulates an act one might do with a physical copy. Where Sony goes off the rails is that they then argue that the only two options can be "a license under our chosen terms" and "complete and total copyright assignment," and then illustrate the absurdity of someone thinking they bought copyright ownership over Resident Evil (which genuinely can't be sold in parallel like this) to argue that the only way Sony can sell games digitally at all is under terms of their own choosing. A smart judge would see through this and argue that Sony could at least have chosen terms that materially resembled the rights of someone who owned a physical copy. That is, they could have provided a service to allow someone to transfer their license to another PlayStation Network user. But at the same time, the law has a nasty habit of bowing to its best customers[1], and I would not be surprised if the judge just goes along with what Sony says (especially if the plaintiffs don't do a good job rebutting it). [0] The reasoning for this is that there is no such thing as a digital move. On a computer, "move" is "copy and delete", and the act of making a copy is squarely in the realm of ordinary copyright protection. [1] See also: the European Commission and California's abject refusal to require games you bought and paid for to continue to work offline.
dspillett 1mo ago
> Sony would like you to know that any reasonable gamer would know that purchasing a game is just licensing a game, not owning it. In that case, any reasonable company would have no trouble being honest and not using the words “buy” and “purchase” with respect to game access.
didibus 1mo ago
I might go Steam Machine route in the PS6 era, I know it's technically same on Steam, but they have at least been much better at not rug pulling, and there are easier way to circumvent things on a Linux/PC machine. Unless Sony changes their stance so that either I have full lifetime use of the game or an explicitly stated period of time (which if shorter than lifetime I'd expect to be cheaper). I'm even willing to drop resale of individual game, if I can just sell off my account as a whole to someone else.
- tombert 1mo ago
  Valve is also pretty amenable to adding third-party games to the box as well. It's trivial to add games from GOG using Heroic and play them alongside regular Steam games. My main "game console" is a NixOS box running Jovian, and I have made oodles of Flakes that I use to make custom non-Steam games that launch deterministically, and as far as I'm aware, Valve is perfectly fine with this (not that I particularly care if they are).
josefritzishere 1mo ago
Sony is trying to redefine "buy" so that they can steal. This is awful. I'll never trust them again.
maxglute 1mo ago
At current prices, consoles cannot just die fast enough. Would be very funny if Trump sanctions Sony for Xbox to close US console gap, and then everyone simply moves to PC.
ethin 1mo ago
IMO the better thing is to force these companies to dump this mindset that digital information is a finite resource. Sony's logic doesn't even make sense to begin with. If person A buys a game, that game does not suddenly become unavailable for person B to also buy. I mean, even copyright recognizes that it is possible for a rightsholder to own all rights to the master copy of a good but other people can own separate copies of the work without infringing on the rights of the rightsholder. Sony is just taking the maximalist view here because they want to keep the power of being able to control who and what has access to whatever they sell, for any arbitrary reason whatsoever.
- stronglikedan 1mo ago
  > IMO the better thing is to force these companies to dump this mindset IMO this is a strictly idealistic view in a world where only a very small vocal minority actually seems to care. The vast majority of people will continue to reward these companies with their wallets, so they have no incentive to change course.
  - ethin 1mo ago
    How is this idealistic? This is how digital information and copyright (if it is to apply to digital information) needs to work. It is absolutely absurd that I can buy something from you, but you can then turn around and say "well actually you just leased a license from me" and you then can break into my digital home and steel (ahem, "repossess") the digital copy for yourself without my consent. My logic is quite simple: if something would be nonsensical if applied to physical goods, then it is even more nonsensical for digital ones. Obviously the general populous won't care about this, but it is something we should be striving for, as digital information is infinite once it has been transmitted over the internet.
    - dcow 1mo ago
      > Obviously the general populous won't care about this, but it is something we should be striving for Hence idealistic
kstrauser 1mo ago
LOL fuck off with that. The Amazon link[0] to a Final Fantasy game has a "Buy Now" button, not "License Now". I'm buying a copy of a game, exactly like I'm buying a copy of a book.[1] If they want to pretend in their little "licensing" fiction, it should be federally illegal to describe buying a copy as "purchasing" or "buying". When you lease a car, you know you're leasing a car. They have to be clear about that up front. [0] https://www.amazon.com/FINAL-FANTASY-VII-REMAKE-INTERGRADE-Nintendo/dp/B0FR6937TP/ https://www.amazon.com/FINAL-FANTASY-VII-REMAKE-INTERGRADE-N... [1] In before the idiotic strawman "so you think you own Final Fantasy?". No. I think I own my copy, not the copyright to distribute it.
- m463 1mo ago
  What's interesting is that the item you linked says "game key card" and "90 GB - Full game download via internet required" also interesting, in california vendors are required to say "you are buying a license" unless you can download the media you are purchasing. I don't know if that game qualifies. for kindle books, amazon says: "By placing your order, you're purchasing a license to the content and you agree to the Kindle Store Terms of Use." but some books actually could say "buy" like this one: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0DMZC4VPQ https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0DMZC4VPQ Because when you "purchase a license" you can actually download the book in epub/pdf format (this specific book, not all books) There doesn't seem to be a way to determine kindle books that you can download in epub/pdf before you "license" them.
kazinator 1mo ago
Yes, when you pay to use a copy of copyrighted work, you're not owning the work in the sense of obtaining the right to redistribute. That is completely separate from the question of whether you are buying your copy to permanently use, or just renting it temporary. Conflating the two concepts is either sophistry, or stupidity.
- tombert 1mo ago
  I have to admit that I'm pretty impressed that GOG has managed to convince a lot of the big brand-name players, (including Sony! [1]) that a DRM-free way of distributing games can be viable. If there's no DRM then there's nothing stopping you from keeping a backup on your own that they can't take away. [1] https://www.gog.com/en/game/god_of_war https://www.gog.com/en/game/god_of_war
- MayeulC 1mo ago
  You are buying a copy though, and would be expected to have the right to resell it. So digital stores go out of their way to "license" the copyrighted work instead of selling you a copy. I have been thinking about this lately, and figured that another difference with classic media was the "live service" model, where games receive updates. You can't take for granted that a copy comes with updates, so I guess that as a middle ground, publishers could license updates (and online multiplayer) & sell copies of the game. Sell your copy, fine, but if you want updates or multiplayer, you have to purchase a subscription again. This would make more sense to me, but may be difficult to communicate and implement.
otikik 1mo ago
If buying isn’t owning, then pirating isn’t stealing
tomkarho 1mo ago
Sony decided to go with "You will own nothing and be happy"
bluejay2387 1mo ago
I know I am in the overwhelming minority and that most people will just continue to buy Sony's stuff anyway, but I decided a few years ago when all the ownership crap came up that I am just not buying stuff that I don't own. Sony's PS4 went to my local electronics recycler and I haven't bought a Sony product since. I can't realistically do it with everything, there are some products I have to buy rather I get to own them or not. But I am not putting up with it where I can and gaming is optional -- plus GOG has served me really well since.
- satellites 1mo ago
  I'm keeping my ps4 as long as the hardware still runs because at least I can still buy discs for it. I have a nice collection of high-replay-value single player games. I know discs are just physical licenses at this point in time, not actual software on disc like the old school days. But even with all this nonsense from Sony I don't think they'll cross the rubicon of terminating licenses that come on physical discs for their older consoles. If they do, I hear you can jailbreak ps4s :)
  - overfeed 1mo ago
    > I know discs are just physical licenses at this point in time, not actual software on disc like the old school days. I don't understand why people keep repeating this meme when emulation exists, and discs remain the easiest legal format to grab data for emulators to play. You may need an exploit to get game data off a digital-only console.
- frollogaston 1mo ago
  GOG is better, but I still really don't like buying video games that I don't own (ie can't resell). Come to think of it, I've only ever digitally purchased one game above $5, Minecraft, and Microsoft ended up stealing that from me.
pfdietz 1mo ago
They've convinced me. They've convinced me to never buy any of their products.
- jonhohle 1mo ago
  Don’t worry. You can’t “buy” them anyway!
flowerthoughts 1mo ago
Proposed new rule: If there's no technical reason to fuck with the product I have already purchased access to, don't fuck with the product I have already received.
motbus3 1mo ago
I find it hard to believe that anyone would think that they put "BUY" and then expect that they redefine what buy means.
- iamleppert 1mo ago
  You can BUY a license to something, but it's still a license. You don't own the actual game unless you buy the rights to it from the publisher. The rights to a game can cost millions, and only then, do you truly, ever own it.
  - kstrauser 1mo ago
    No. I can buy a book. That gives me ownership over that copy of the book. No one is claiming it gives me the right to do things like make copies of it to distribute to others, so we can ignore that goofy argument. The fact is, I own the book. When I buy a game disc, I own that copy of the game on it. I can give it away. I can sell it. I own that copy, in the same way I own that book. No own claims to "license" a book anymore, or at least no one who doesn't get laughed out of court.
    - iamleppert 1mo ago
      You own that physical copy due to the physical nature of it. However, you still are limited in what you can do with it. You can't make a copy of it and sell that copy. You can't read that book aloud, and sell the recording. In certain cases, you can't even read that book for an audience. The fact that you own it has embrued certain rights to you due to the physical nature of the book. Take away the physical medium and there is nothing physical left that you own. Therefore, you have no physical rights to it anymore. The publisher, at their sole discretion, can remove the medium of access by which you consume the book. And then you'll be left without a book. This is exactly how the current system works, I am just explaining it to you. So don't shout at the wind.
      - kstrauser 1mo ago
        Let me stop you right there: no one is claiming that buying a book gives you copyrights to its content. That's a strawman. When you own a book, you own that copy of it. You can do whatever you like with that copy, short of distributing copies of it. You can sell it. You can lend it to friends. You can leave it laying around a doctor's office for a stream of people to read. Short of distributing copies of it, it's yours. Sony claims you do not own your copy of a game, merely the right to use it until they decide otherwise. That is fundamentally different than when buying a book, or CD, or DVD.
sdcfgy 1mo ago
Every time someone pulls this it makes stealing more interesting and exciting for me.
psadauskas 1mo ago
If buying isn't owning, then pirating isn't stealing.
- badpun 1mo ago
  Pirating is basically unlicensed use.
CMay 1mo ago
This is not a bold claim, this is just how it is. If you ask any average gamer, "if you buy a game on Steam or on a CD from Walmart, do you operate on the understanding that you are now legally allowed to make as many copies of it as you want and sell those copies?" The answer will unanimously be no. If they owned it, the answer would be yes. They might say they own it, but they will clearly and reasonably understand that they do not own it in legal terms, because they understand what they cannot do with it. Some of them will understand that they can legally make copies for backups, but why would you need the law to tell you that it's legal for you to make a backup of something you own? You wouldn't. You can buy a hard drive, but buying it does not give you the IP for all the technology that went into it. No reasonable person believes that would be the case, either. You can buy a car, but you can't then copy all the parts and start mass producing your own copies of that car. Do any of you go through the McDonalds drive thru and believe you now own the burgers, fries and all the packaging that goes with it to the extent that you can start up your own McDonalds with logo and all? Whether it's physical or digital, even if people have contradictions in their head since they aren't lawyers, they understand enough about how things work to conclude that what they understood when they pressed the purchase button equates to not obtaining total ownership of all aspects. It is simply true. This is so broadly understood that I don't even think you would need to use a jury. A judge could simply throw the case out at this point on that alone, if it hadn't already been settled in past legal precedent, which it has.
Ekaros 1mo ago
Unless it is subscription based online game I take that buying game is perpetual unrevocable licence. Sadly non-transferable but that is trade-off for digital.
revlolz 1mo ago
If purchasing isn't buying, how can it be stolen? Seems like a pretty self defeating stance regarding "piracy."

179 points by speckx 1mo ago

Revocable software licenses are a scam.

What I don't understand is why Sony is the one being targeted for this when this has been the case with any digital purchase for 20 years? I don't know of a digital marketplace that works differently. But instead all of the hate, the boycots, etc are all targeting Sony instead of focusing on actually figuring out how to improve digital purchase rights which extend beyond games (and far beyond Sony). I know that some online hate it when you compare this situation to PC since there is choice there, but not when it comes to this. Sure you can choose which store you want to not really own things with but its the same result. Steam did this a year ago: https://www.reddit.com/r/Games/comments/1g19n60/steam_now_tells_gamers_up_front_that_theyre/ https://www.reddit.com/r/Games/comments/1g19n60/steam_now_te... Where were the boycots then.

redwall_hp 1mo ago
Valve killed the previously thriving boxed game industry two decades ago and people can't get over how much they love everything about Valve. Sony follows 20 years later (in a world where internet is faster than installing from BluRay and games are outgrowing three layer discs) and people lose their mind. There's more noise about this than Microsoft's mass layoffs at the game companies they bought up.
- CamperBob2 1mo ago
  Sony has a very long corporate tradition of fucking over their customers. Valve does not. People still give money to Sony for some reason, but as far as I'm concerned that's on them. Call it victim-blaming at this point, I guess.
  - FoundTheShill 1mo ago
    [flagged]
- wredcoll 1mo ago
  Valve was a plucky underdog against the established publishers and, while dominant today, still has reasonable competition, sony is a giant corp with a reputation and a monopoly on playstations.
  - alephnerd 1mo ago
    > sony is a giant corp with a reputation and a monopoly on playstations. That's like saying Volkswagen has a monopoly on Volkswagen cars. Sony clearly does not have a monopoly on the video game industry, and a plurality of video games are cross-platform across consoles, PCs (Windows/Linux), and even MacOS.
    - nalekberov 1mo ago
      If I want to move from point A to point B, I can choose from BMW, Audi or any cheaper Chinese brand. But I cannot play 'Astro Bot' on another platform.
      - dcow 1mo ago
        You can't get the Volkswagen engine sound or drive experience in a BMW, though.
        nalekberov 1mo ago
        Remember? Moving from point A to point B.
        dcow 1mo ago
        Apples and oranges. If you goal is to simply play games, well then there's plenty of hardware out there for you to use. If you want to play Sony exclusives then you have to use their hardware. If I want to get from point A to point B then I can use any vehicle. If I want to get from point A to point B in a Volkswagen then I have to buy a one.
- Grombobulous 1mo ago
  - Sony has a track record of removing purchased media en masse, while Valve does not. - While it could be argued that Valve runs an effective monopoly of the PC platform based on their marketshare, Valve operates on a platform with competitive options including DRM-free stores. - Game consoles have always been more attached to physical media than PCs. - Sony is the largest player in the market (disregarding mobile phone gaming) with more total marketshare than Valve and the PC platform. This makes them a much more visible target.
- ReptileMan 1mo ago
  The PC has thriving piracy scene. So for any game worth playing there were lawful backups available on specialized sites. In a way it is different.
- beart 1mo ago
  I disagree with the assertion that Valve is responsible for the death of physical game copies. First off, console games have gradually moved away from offering physical copies for years. This had the (probably deliberate) effect of killing the used game market. Earlier attempts to kill that market were driven by the proliferation of digital content that could not be resold. Second, physical copies on the PC have not been guaranteed for a very long time. I would suggest it was actually the wide-scale proliferation of indie games that did more to kill the physical copy market than any deliberate transition from AAA studios. There are thousands of indie games out there now. Without digital copies, it would be impossible for anyone to actually purchase any of them. And the momentum to move away from physical copies for PC gaming has been there for a very long time. No one was going to Best Buy to pick up a physical copy of minesweeper. There have been other factors as well, such as the popularization of MMORPGS which provided years of content from a single physical copy. Really though, the idea that without Valve, the PC gaming market would still be chugging along on physical game copies just isn't realistic. It goes completely against the momentum built over the last 25 years of PC gaming.
- philipov 1mo ago
  Valve doesn't randomly remove stuff I've payed for from my library. Even when the ability to purchase something goes away, people who already bought it keep access to it.
  - redwall_hp 1mo ago
    They patched CS:GO away, a game I paid retail price for, with "Counter-Strike 2" and overnight dropped support for my platform (MacOS). Sony has never stolen a game from me, unlike Valve. The closest incident was that movie thing, which was more a failure on their part to negotiate perpetual licensing with the rightsholder.
    - Telaneo 1mo ago
      CS:GO is still accessible via the beta feature. Not sure if you can still play it on MacOS. I agree that that's the wrong way to do it, but at least you still have access to it in theory.
    - scheeseman486 1mo ago
      Valve pivoting away from MacOS is a consequence of choices Apple has made for their platform, many of which made it a more hostile place for Steam to exist. This is baked into the long standing Apple model of software distribution, where API and architectural changes inevitably obsolete software with Apple usually providing only a limited time window for cross compatibility. You can still play your purchases on an operating system that isn't actively fighting against you running them.
- scheeseman486 1mo ago
  Physical PC games weren't great in the 2000s. Online activated serial keys, optical disc based DRM that caused problems during both the 9x>NT and XP>Vista transitions, the only thing that made PC gaming tolerable for me was gamecopyworld. Valve (eventually) offered something better than that. PC games can still be physical. Burn some discs or copy the files onto a USB stick and put it in a box. I think it's crazy that boutique companies like Limited Run Games completely avoid the platform when it's the only one left that isn't actively hostile to the core principles of the company. Admittedly PC does have the image of being a digital distribution only platform these days, but it's illusory and breaking that illusion is a marketing problem. People were pretty pissed about the xbox layoffs, it's just that things move fast and this was the next thing.
- vel0city 1mo ago
  > Valve killed the previously thriving boxed game industry two decades ago Boxed PC games were practically dead by the time Valve started selling 3rd party games on their marketplace. Most game stores around me had stopped selling them or massively shrunk the shelf space for them. Xbox, Gamecube, Playstation 3, they had whole walls of the store dedicated to their stuff. PC games had a couple of shelves in the middle of the store, if even that. Sales for PC games had massively fallen between 1999 and 2005 while the rest of the game industry exploded. The industry had shrunk over a third in five years before Valve started selling online. You can't say it was "thriving".
deleted 1mo ago
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swiftcoder 1mo ago
> when you compare this situation to PC since there is choice there, but not when it comes to this They may not be playing in the same league as Steam, but PC folks do have the choice of GoG and itch, which both sell DRM-free binaries.
- nemomarx 1mo ago
  steam also sells drm free binaries. the steam drm is optional and the publisher or Dev can choose to go without it of course it's better that gog requires you go without it for the customer, but I'm not sure it helps in terms of legal rights. If gog shuts down you'll need to have your games backed up and downloaded to still own them and you won't have any license to a new download or etc
- nerdjon 1mo ago
  I honestly keep forgetting GoG exists but fair, maybe saying there is no choice is a bit much but if you want to play a given game it may not be available there meaning your choice is to not play it or deal with this.
  - Telaneo 1mo ago
    > it may not be available there meaning your choice is to not play it or deal with this. On PC, there are always other options [pirate flag emoji]. Steam (in many, but not all cases) competes with free. Sony doesn't on the PS5.
nemomarx 1mo ago
Sony announced they're not going to print more physical discs for games. So far no one else in the big three has confirmed they're doing this, so obviously the controversy goes to them
expedition32 1mo ago
Sony is just handling this stupidly. What they should do is just stay silent and stay the course. Everyone fucking knows in 10 years time physical media will be dead and all of this is water under the bridge.
jjice 1mo ago
I think it's because they're a huge player in the space and the PS5 appears to be the dominant player in the console space this generation. This affects so many people in their faces right now, where as the switch to "buying" movies on an online platform was more gradual as it was a new platform offering and not one that had had ownership from day one (arguably since 1994 with the PS1). So in short, I think it's because they're the big guy making a very visible change to the broader public, instead of a new platform with a new way of doing things (how Steam was).
chrisfosterelli 1mo ago
> What I don't understand is why Sony is the one being targeted for this when this has been the case with any digital purchase for 20 years? Examples: literally two days ago Sony permanently removed access to over 500 movies for people who had "purchased" them, and only a couple months ago Sony announced their plan to permanently shutter physical media production for Playstation. I agree with you that it's a systemic issue but it also doesn't surprise me that Sony is seen as the lead boogeyman. I think if you asked the average gamer what their opinion of Valve's business practices was vs. Sony you'd get a very different answer even if the legalese in the TOS is similar.
- nerdjon 1mo ago
  I maybe should have phrased that better since I do understand their announcement around disks and removing the movies is a reason why they are the current target. I just find it hypocritical, people keep saying they are going to move to xbox or pc next gen and its like. Their policy is exactly the same. You have the same risk and not really ownership. And I am not defending Sony, they have a long history of getting cocky with their consoles and pulling some shit. But in this particular case they are following the trend that we allowed by going all digital on PC and buying digital games on consoles. Sony isnt going to be the one that changes this, the only way to expect change would be targeting all of them including Valve. But everyone, like this article, just seems to gloss right over that and seem to imply its only Sony that is the problem here.
  - nemomarx 1mo ago
    Nintendo still has pretty good physical. Move to them if you can imo
    - greenowl 1mo ago
      and much better franchise
  - antiframe 1mo ago
    > You have the same risk and not really ownership. You don't, though. When I download a game on Steam or GOG, I have the files on my PC. I can back them up. I can modify them. Yes, live service games still have an online component I don't control, but I do still control the files on my computer. I don't on a console. Actually, I don't own any consoles for reasons of software freedom but I hear they are much more difficult to do things like back up your data, etc.
spike021 1mo ago
Even disc-based games in boxes have mostly required online connectivity to download most game files for a long time. It doesn't make it right but I feel like the writing has been on the wall for ages.
zehaeva 1mo ago
I think the difference here is that sony is in the middle of taking down their ps3 store, and while they say you'll be able to download the games for the "foreseeable future" I don't think many folks have a great deal of confidence in this being true for for that long. Valve has spent the better part of 20 years fostering a good relations with the gaming community and pretty much every gamer has a great deal of confidence that they'll protect your purchases.
deleted 1mo ago
[deleted]
riffruff24 1mo ago
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kWSIFh8ICaA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kWSIFh8ICaA Because they did a whole marketing stunt over it. Granted it was more than a decade ago, so probably just a remnants of old console war.
kobalsky 1mo ago
> Where were the boycots then. 1. steam does not have a monopoly on distribution rights for PC games. if steam were to go bankrupt publishers could honor your keys and even other marketplaces could do it. steam themselves let you bring your own key. 2. steam has been a benevolent marketplace leader, even though DRM itself plays against customers, the rest of the stuff they pushed while leading, like game sharing, play and refund, offline playing, are pro consumer. 3. why would your knee jerk reaction to this is pointing a finger to steam, what's your endgame?
- nerdjon 1mo ago
  Why is your knee jerk reaction to defend steam? Sure they have said and claimed a lot of things, but their TOS says the same thing that Sony is arguing. Its suddenly this big shock now but no one cared before? Sure the way Sony is handling this is fumble after fumble but thats PR. My problem is that Valve for some reason gets a free pass because "they are the good guys" when their own policy means they could do the exact same thing. I own a lot of games on Steam, but I am not nieve to assume that there is not a chance that at some point I could loose all or some of those games. People are for some reason in a false sense of security about Steam and that is a problem. They have to be part of the conversation when it comes to digital ownership. Ignoring them means we can't actually solve the issue.
- dcow 1mo ago
  Yeah, right XD
rolph 1mo ago
When You rootkit people, it tends to be unforgettable.. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sony_BMG_copy_protection_rootkit_scandal https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sony_BMG_copy_protection_rootk...
frollogaston 1mo ago
Nintendo is the only one still selling video games that you own practically speaking, ie you own the cartridge and it has the game on it or at least has the key. Unless I'm out of the loop on that.

cratermoon 1mo ago

If buying isn't owning, piracy isn't theft.

ThinkItThru 1mo ago
Don’t worry, DRM eliminates the possibility of piracy since the content is gated behind an account. Go ahead and copy/distribute the game client, even reverse-engineer the server and launch a private instance. You still don’t have the content.
- nemomarx 1mo ago
  I mean does it? DRM is cracked within a week or two of launch now. companies are actively removing drm from their games a few months after it comes out because of the cost of licensing it. AI has accelerated this if anything, and especially the server side stuff. Look at the destiny 2 private servers right now recreating lost content.
gustavus 1mo ago
It's actually an interesting question there. Because I've been wondering if I buy something in taking ownership of it, whereas if I steal something I am still taking ownership of it without compensation. However if I'm not buying something but merely licensing it the wouldn't that mean that technically I'm not stealing it I'm only violating the terms of the license of it, which is now a civil not criminal matter.
- amiga386 1mo ago
  That's not really how copyright law works. Firstly, you're not "stealing" (committing the crime of theft) by making digital copies of a work. You are infringing copyright. Even a single copy infringes copyright. To not infringe copyright, you need a license for your copying from the copyright holder. You can still manage to infringe that license even if you went through a normal storefront and paid the copyright holder the amount they asked for. You can do that by doing things with your licensed copy that the copyright holder wrote into your license that you mustn't do. If they sold physical items, they would not be able to apply such adverse terms to your copy. If you void your own license in that way, you no longer have that license, and so any copying/modification/distribution you're doing is back to being copyright infringement. Finally, there is such a thing as criminal copyright infringement. That's when you make a significant profit from copyright infringement (for example, getting people to pay you to watch a pay-per-view event that you're illegally redistributing, or even just having adverts that make you money on a website offering unlicensed Nintendo ROMs for emulators)

captainbland 1mo ago

If we're not owning it, you're not selling it, you're leasing it. Terminology on sales pages should reflect this. "Subscribe now" "purchase license" etc. should be mandated if this is the expectation. Terms like "buy" without qualification are misleading in this context, but they won't remove them from store pages because people are more likely to pay higher rates for something if they believe they are actually owning the good in perpetuity.

ncr100 1mo ago
Yes. "buy" and "purchase" are redefined in the EULA
- epicureanideal 1mo ago
  They shouldn’t be able to redefine common terms when closer terms like lease or license are available. It’s misleading.
  - everyone 1mo ago
    It's also totally illegal in many countries.. you can write whatever nonsense you want on an eula, but it will be about as useful as toilet paper in court.
    - ncr100 1mo ago
      Additionally e.g. the UK has right-to-repair which may influence this subject: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49552588 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49552588 (from elsewhere in this discussion).
  - ncr100 1mo ago
    Agreed - and with AI being able to easily navigate arbitrarily complex and humanly-misleading systems, average humans (without a personal lawyer always on retainer) are at an increasing disadvantage in society.
- 1mo ago

Keyframe 1mo ago

Remember your wallet is your vote in all of this, no matter the size of it!

Telaneo 1mo ago
The whales have votes orders of magnitude larger than mine.
infinite_spin 1mo ago
It's nothing like democracy though, and the concept of paying (or not paying) to vote is antithetical to a democratic process. We should not confuse the two.
hightrix 1mo ago
I think I'll vote with my VPN protected piracy. If I'm not buying a thing, but instead a limited license to a thing, then I don't care about buying that thing anymore and I'll just take it. I doubt I'll be alone and with Denuvo being regularly defeated on release day, I'm not too worried about availability.

aizk 1mo ago

On this topic I'd like to give a big kudos to the devs at https://decomp.dev/ https://decomp.dev/ who are tirelessly working to decompile old video games for fun, preserving it for future generations.

megagpt1 1mo ago
[flagged]
- flutteringfool 1mo ago
  I don't see that, maybe it was temporary?
  - megagpt1 1mo ago
    [flagged]
    - aizk 1mo ago
      ???
- RajT88 1mo ago
  Seems fine to me.

strictnein 1mo ago

The amusing thing about all of this is that the tech that Microsoft is using to be the "good guy" in this is the same thing they were savaged for when they announced it for the Xbox One. The ability to take a physical disc and use that as your key, with each disc having a unique code embedded in it. When you would install the game it would then lock that code to your account, proving your ownership of it, and you would no longer need the disc. To be fair to the critics, they hadn't thought out all the issues around resale and trading games with friends, but had stated they would address that, before just dropping the tech entirely. It seems like they never stopped having the discs support it, so now it's a relatively straightforward thing for them to enable.

VCFundedGenYer 1mo ago

Sony is wrong. If I buy it, I own it. I can do what I want with it, I can put it in a sandwich and eat it.

ginko 1mo ago

13 years ago when Microsoft wanted to introduce per-user locks for bought XBone games Sony released this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kWSIFh8ICaA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kWSIFh8ICaA Fans were eating it up and it won them the console market lead. Times sure have changed.

jdw64 1mo ago

These days, it feels like we can't truly own anything anymore. Sure, physical media used to break often, but these days I just don't get that satisfying feeling of actually owning something.

DrBazza 1mo ago

I despise Sony and avoid them at all costs. They started with AACS and then finally lost me when they embedded Cinavia in the Playstation.

red_admiral 1mo ago

Sony is correct here? If I buy a CD or a cassette or a record, I own the physical media but I only have a licence to the music it contains - not the ownership, and not the copyright. Whether I can play that music as a DJ at an event or on the radio, or remix it as a backing track for another song I'm creating and so on, depends on licencing laws and royalty payments. That was true well before the internet, and it's why Wham! get a huge boost in royalties every December whenever a radio station plays Last Christmas. A separate question is whether Sony can _revoke_ a licence and delete the game off your device again.

barnabee 1mo ago
If I buy a game - i.e. I am on a store page title "Game Name" not "Limited Revokable License for Game Name", and I click "buy", then I expect to own a copy of the game or the right to a copy of the game (in perpetuity), not a limited revokable license to play the game.
- tiahura 1mo ago
  In the US adults are expected to read what they agree to. If they don’t, it’s generally their problem.
  - Kinrany 1mo ago
    In the rest of the civilized world adults are expected to have common sense and be truthful when it comes to formal transactions.
    - tiahura 1mo ago
      Good point. Reading before you sign should be common sense regardless of what country you're in. And, if you don't agree with the terms, you shouldn't click "I Agree."
      - Kinrany 1mo ago

giancarlostoro 1mo ago

I wonder if anyone will ever have the guts to enter the gaming console market using open source as a base. Linux support for GPUs has never been better than what it is today. I've spent the last 4 or 5 years gaming exclusively on Linux just to highlight how good it has gotten, and no I don't have to run around doing command line incantations. Linux has improved a lot, heck, even AI you have a drastically better experience working with AI on Linux than on Windows (which hearing this 10 years ago would have confused me given how many issues I had with my GPUs on Linux for YEARS). All someone has to do is assemble a reasonable desktop that runs Linux, gives you access to GOG and Steam, and you've already got more games than most game consoles, the issue right now I suppose would be moreso hardware costs. You would also want to make sure your Desktop Environment is fine tuned with a controller in mind. If you can read games from discs, you'd be getting the attention of many people. The facts are that most people have always bought digital over discs but when you take that away, and it becomes clear that they could lose their games forever, everyone wants CDs back.

cautiouscat 1mo ago
Like the Steam Machine? Or do you mean open hardware too?
- throwaway219450 1mo ago
  You can stream Big Picture with tools like Sunshine/Moonlight or their forks. Works amazingly well over a LAN if you have a server somewhere and stream to something connected to the TV. I have a headless server and an NVIDIA GPU so not sure what the sibling comment is referring to about compatibility.
sicktriple 1mo ago
You're literally describing the steam machine/steam deck. Also, bazzite is an immuable distro based on silverblue that does pretty much exactly what you described. I know there's some issues with big picture mode and Nvidia, but that's an Nvidia driver problem, not a limitation of the platform.
awkwardpotato 1mo ago

hn_submit 1mo ago

This statement could do Sony in. Gamers will refuse to buy a PS6 if there's not an ironclad guarantee that they own the games they purchase, be it digital or disc form. And since gaming is the only profit center that's holding Sony above water I see the company disappearing in a couple of years. I foresee another "gaming winter" like we had in the 1980's. Maybe a decade from now another gaming platform will arise, most likely built around open-source software and hardware.

Semaphor 1mo ago
> Gamers will refuse to buy a PS6 if there's not an ironclad guarantee that they own the games they purchase, be it digital or disc form. I highly doubt that. I’d say 99%, probably more, won’t care either way. People barely care on PC, and people on consoles are generally used to more abuse.
- hn_submit 1mo ago
  Let's wait for the PS6 release and we'll see who's right.
0cf8612b2e1e 1mo ago
When have gamers held firm in a boycott situation? A lot of tough talk that crumbles when a new hat is released. There was that infamous picture of the Steam Group, something like, “Never Buy CoD XYZ”. Half of the group members were playing it.
Danox 1mo ago
Microsoft gaming division i.e. the Xbox will disappear before Sony goes anywhere. Same thing goes from Nintendo every year people/analysts insist that both those companies are in trouble and will die off because of the way they do business but here they are still successful and the main reason, they’re successful is that they concentrate on gameplay in comparison to their competition.
- hn_submit 1mo ago

asdaqopqkq 1mo ago

After GTA6 comes out on PC, Sony should get ready for a crash that will make the PS3 launch issue look tiny. Kids these days just play Rolox or Fortnite on tablets, the gamer pipeline is gone and what ever is left of the gamers are migrating to SteamOS/PC. Older kids would much rather use Insta/Kick/etc as an IRL MMO. Teen boys are more concerned with looksmaxxing than video games. Maybe they know this and this is one last milking of the their installbase before the big fall.

tetrisgm 1mo ago

This is going to backfire spectacularly. Between this claim, ramping down disc production, and the possibility of a $999 home console,they are going to have a difficult time. There are still so few PS5 exclusives. Even fewer with PS5 Pro support. It’s going to take a lot to gain trust and justify a PS6. No clear path to victory here with a hardware update.

jsbisviewtiful 1mo ago
Yeah I've already decided there won't be any new Sony consoles in my household. Games are so big now I can't possibly download all my games at once so if the store goes down I lose all those games permanently and $70+ for AAA games that are really hit and miss in the "fun" category is no longer worth it to me. The PS5 was also pretty darn expensive when it came out and I can't say I've played too many PS5 exclusive games since I bought it. Most of the PS5 catalog has been indie games available on Steam or ported PS4 games... and with Sony reportedly releasing a new console next year they are clearly high on their own supply. Never thought I'd have this opinion, but the gaming industry as is needs to crash/burn and rebuild itself. So many downright wild anti-consumer things happening in the last 10 years and studios have completely lost sight of how to keep themselves out of bankruptcy.
ActorNightly 1mo ago
It will be fine. Gaming as a whole is a shadow of what it used to be, specifically because it has been tailored to the masses who have no real opinion on any of this other then they want to play what their friends play.
- t-writescode 1mo ago
  My guy, there’s more weird and niche indie games than there’s ever been. Not too long ago, even AAA studios like EA were trying super weird stuff, like It Takes Two. Nostalgia glasses are real, and yeah we don’t have a Good and Evil game anymore, and we’re not in an RTS renaissance; but there are a LOT of VERY good games out there, even for your particular niche - and if there’s not, then Godot and Unity make it VERY easy for you to add to the pile, like hundreds of thousands of teams before you in the last decade.

thataccount 1mo ago

Easy solution: Stop buying whatever it is that Sony is trying to sell. Watch definitions radically shift.

aleksiy123 1mo ago

PlayStation store not allowing returns for games that have been downloaded is the most bs policy. In a world where steam allows instant returns with under 2 hours play time. I have a few games now on ps where I barely played or found out the controls were terrible and have no way to return.

shevy-java 1mo ago

Sony will lose this. Why? Because courts can point to the fact that in the 1990s, people bought a game, then could play it and re-sell it freely. So the claim about Sony how people only ever "licenced" something from them, and NOW face more restrictions than before, simply because Sony claims so, makes no sense. That's against established practices. Sony should be disbanded by the court for wasting our time here.

kmeisthax 1mo ago

> This feels like a strange reductio ad absurdum argument in reverse, where the argument isn’t disproven by reducing it: it is instead proven that merchandise and specifically software is sold as copies not as a singular entity. I’m not sure who Sony’s lawyers are trying to appeal to here, or if they just wanted to burn through a few dozen billable hours on an argument that makes no sense. Unfortunately I think this argument has a bit more merit than you think. There is already copyright precedent that you cannot enjoy first sale rights on digital property (e.g. "a marketplace for used MP3s", or "we'll scan this book and loan it to you and we promise not to touch it until the loan expires"). Physical goods have specific legal rights that the courts have so far refused to extend to digital files[0]. In that legal environment, every digital copy of a work is fundamentally some data combined with permission to make use of copies of that data under some conditions. There are no digital copies, only digital licenses. But that's merely an argument that third-parties don't get to copy things just because the way they're copying it emulates an act one might do with a physical copy. Where Sony goes off the rails is that they then argue that the only two options can be "a license under our chosen terms" and "complete and total copyright assignment," and then illustrate the absurdity of someone thinking they bought copyright ownership over Resident Evil (which genuinely can't be sold in parallel like this) to argue that the only way Sony can sell games digitally at all is under terms of their own choosing. A smart judge would see through this and argue that Sony could at least have chosen terms that materially resembled the rights of someone who owned a physical copy. That is, they could have provided a service to allow someone to transfer their license to another PlayStation Network user. But at the same time, the law has a nasty habit of bowing to its best customers[1], and I would not be surprised if the judge just goes along with what Sony says (especially if the plaintiffs don't do a good job rebutting it). [0] The reasoning for this is that there is no such thing as a digital move. On a computer, "move" is "copy and delete", and the act of making a copy is squarely in the realm of ordinary copyright protection. [1] See also: the European Commission and California's abject refusal to require games you bought and paid for to continue to work offline.

dspillett 1mo ago

> Sony would like you to know that any reasonable gamer would know that purchasing a game is just licensing a game, not owning it. In that case, any reasonable company would have no trouble being honest and not using the words “buy” and “purchase” with respect to game access.

didibus 1mo ago

I might go Steam Machine route in the PS6 era, I know it's technically same on Steam, but they have at least been much better at not rug pulling, and there are easier way to circumvent things on a Linux/PC machine. Unless Sony changes their stance so that either I have full lifetime use of the game or an explicitly stated period of time (which if shorter than lifetime I'd expect to be cheaper). I'm even willing to drop resale of individual game, if I can just sell off my account as a whole to someone else.

tombert 1mo ago
Valve is also pretty amenable to adding third-party games to the box as well. It's trivial to add games from GOG using Heroic and play them alongside regular Steam games. My main "game console" is a NixOS box running Jovian, and I have made oodles of Flakes that I use to make custom non-Steam games that launch deterministically, and as far as I'm aware, Valve is perfectly fine with this (not that I particularly care if they are).

josefritzishere 1mo ago

Sony is trying to redefine "buy" so that they can steal. This is awful. I'll never trust them again.

maxglute 1mo ago

At current prices, consoles cannot just die fast enough. Would be very funny if Trump sanctions Sony for Xbox to close US console gap, and then everyone simply moves to PC.

ethin 1mo ago

IMO the better thing is to force these companies to dump this mindset that digital information is a finite resource. Sony's logic doesn't even make sense to begin with. If person A buys a game, that game does not suddenly become unavailable for person B to also buy. I mean, even copyright recognizes that it is possible for a rightsholder to own all rights to the master copy of a good but other people can own separate copies of the work without infringing on the rights of the rightsholder. Sony is just taking the maximalist view here because they want to keep the power of being able to control who and what has access to whatever they sell, for any arbitrary reason whatsoever.

stronglikedan 1mo ago
> IMO the better thing is to force these companies to dump this mindset IMO this is a strictly idealistic view in a world where only a very small vocal minority actually seems to care. The vast majority of people will continue to reward these companies with their wallets, so they have no incentive to change course.
- ethin 1mo ago
  How is this idealistic? This is how digital information and copyright (if it is to apply to digital information) needs to work. It is absolutely absurd that I can buy something from you, but you can then turn around and say "well actually you just leased a license from me" and you then can break into my digital home and steel (ahem, "repossess") the digital copy for yourself without my consent. My logic is quite simple: if something would be nonsensical if applied to physical goods, then it is even more nonsensical for digital ones. Obviously the general populous won't care about this, but it is something we should be striving for, as digital information is infinite once it has been transmitted over the internet.
  - dcow 1mo ago
    > Obviously the general populous won't care about this, but it is something we should be striving for Hence idealistic

kstrauser 1mo ago

LOL fuck off with that. The Amazon link[0] to a Final Fantasy game has a "Buy Now" button, not "License Now". I'm buying a copy of a game, exactly like I'm buying a copy of a book.[1] If they want to pretend in their little "licensing" fiction, it should be federally illegal to describe buying a copy as "purchasing" or "buying". When you lease a car, you know you're leasing a car. They have to be clear about that up front. [0] https://www.amazon.com/FINAL-FANTASY-VII-REMAKE-INTERGRADE-Nintendo/dp/B0FR6937TP/ https://www.amazon.com/FINAL-FANTASY-VII-REMAKE-INTERGRADE-N... [1] In before the idiotic strawman "so you think you own Final Fantasy?". No. I think I own my copy, not the copyright to distribute it.

m463 1mo ago
What's interesting is that the item you linked says "game key card" and "90 GB - Full game download via internet required" also interesting, in california vendors are required to say "you are buying a license" unless you can download the media you are purchasing. I don't know if that game qualifies. for kindle books, amazon says: "By placing your order, you're purchasing a license to the content and you agree to the Kindle Store Terms of Use." but some books actually could say "buy" like this one: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0DMZC4VPQ https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0DMZC4VPQ Because when you "purchase a license" you can actually download the book in epub/pdf format (this specific book, not all books) There doesn't seem to be a way to determine kindle books that you can download in epub/pdf before you "license" them.

kazinator 1mo ago

Yes, when you pay to use a copy of copyrighted work, you're not owning the work in the sense of obtaining the right to redistribute. That is completely separate from the question of whether you are buying your copy to permanently use, or just renting it temporary. Conflating the two concepts is either sophistry, or stupidity.

tombert 1mo ago
I have to admit that I'm pretty impressed that GOG has managed to convince a lot of the big brand-name players, (including Sony! [1]) that a DRM-free way of distributing games can be viable. If there's no DRM then there's nothing stopping you from keeping a backup on your own that they can't take away. [1] https://www.gog.com/en/game/god_of_war https://www.gog.com/en/game/god_of_war
MayeulC 1mo ago
You are buying a copy though, and would be expected to have the right to resell it. So digital stores go out of their way to "license" the copyrighted work instead of selling you a copy. I have been thinking about this lately, and figured that another difference with classic media was the "live service" model, where games receive updates. You can't take for granted that a copy comes with updates, so I guess that as a middle ground, publishers could license updates (and online multiplayer) & sell copies of the game. Sell your copy, fine, but if you want updates or multiplayer, you have to purchase a subscription again. This would make more sense to me, but may be difficult to communicate and implement.

otikik 1mo ago

If buying isn’t owning, then pirating isn’t stealing

tomkarho 1mo ago

Sony decided to go with "You will own nothing and be happy"

bluejay2387 1mo ago

I know I am in the overwhelming minority and that most people will just continue to buy Sony's stuff anyway, but I decided a few years ago when all the ownership crap came up that I am just not buying stuff that I don't own. Sony's PS4 went to my local electronics recycler and I haven't bought a Sony product since. I can't realistically do it with everything, there are some products I have to buy rather I get to own them or not. But I am not putting up with it where I can and gaming is optional -- plus GOG has served me really well since.

satellites 1mo ago
I'm keeping my ps4 as long as the hardware still runs because at least I can still buy discs for it. I have a nice collection of high-replay-value single player games. I know discs are just physical licenses at this point in time, not actual software on disc like the old school days. But even with all this nonsense from Sony I don't think they'll cross the rubicon of terminating licenses that come on physical discs for their older consoles. If they do, I hear you can jailbreak ps4s :)
- overfeed 1mo ago
  > I know discs are just physical licenses at this point in time, not actual software on disc like the old school days. I don't understand why people keep repeating this meme when emulation exists, and discs remain the easiest legal format to grab data for emulators to play. You may need an exploit to get game data off a digital-only console.
frollogaston 1mo ago
GOG is better, but I still really don't like buying video games that I don't own (ie can't resell). Come to think of it, I've only ever digitally purchased one game above $5, Minecraft, and Microsoft ended up stealing that from me.

pfdietz 1mo ago

They've convinced me. They've convinced me to never buy any of their products.

jonhohle 1mo ago
Don’t worry. You can’t “buy” them anyway!

flowerthoughts 1mo ago

Proposed new rule: If there's no technical reason to fuck with the product I have already purchased access to, don't fuck with the product I have already received.

motbus3 1mo ago

I find it hard to believe that anyone would think that they put "BUY" and then expect that they redefine what buy means.

iamleppert 1mo ago
You can BUY a license to something, but it's still a license. You don't own the actual game unless you buy the rights to it from the publisher. The rights to a game can cost millions, and only then, do you truly, ever own it.
- kstrauser 1mo ago
  No. I can buy a book. That gives me ownership over that copy of the book. No one is claiming it gives me the right to do things like make copies of it to distribute to others, so we can ignore that goofy argument. The fact is, I own the book. When I buy a game disc, I own that copy of the game on it. I can give it away. I can sell it. I own that copy, in the same way I own that book. No own claims to "license" a book anymore, or at least no one who doesn't get laughed out of court.
  - iamleppert 1mo ago
    You own that physical copy due to the physical nature of it. However, you still are limited in what you can do with it. You can't make a copy of it and sell that copy. You can't read that book aloud, and sell the recording. In certain cases, you can't even read that book for an audience. The fact that you own it has embrued certain rights to you due to the physical nature of the book. Take away the physical medium and there is nothing physical left that you own. Therefore, you have no physical rights to it anymore. The publisher, at their sole discretion, can remove the medium of access by which you consume the book. And then you'll be left without a book. This is exactly how the current system works, I am just explaining it to you. So don't shout at the wind.
    - kstrauser 1mo ago
      Let me stop you right there: no one is claiming that buying a book gives you copyrights to its content. That's a strawman. When you own a book, you own that copy of it. You can do whatever you like with that copy, short of distributing copies of it. You can sell it. You can lend it to friends. You can leave it laying around a doctor's office for a stream of people to read. Short of distributing copies of it, it's yours. Sony claims you do not own your copy of a game, merely the right to use it until they decide otherwise. That is fundamentally different than when buying a book, or CD, or DVD.

sdcfgy 1mo ago

Every time someone pulls this it makes stealing more interesting and exciting for me.

psadauskas 1mo ago

If buying isn't owning, then pirating isn't stealing.

badpun 1mo ago
Pirating is basically unlicensed use.

CMay 1mo ago

This is not a bold claim, this is just how it is. If you ask any average gamer, "if you buy a game on Steam or on a CD from Walmart, do you operate on the understanding that you are now legally allowed to make as many copies of it as you want and sell those copies?" The answer will unanimously be no. If they owned it, the answer would be yes. They might say they own it, but they will clearly and reasonably understand that they do not own it in legal terms, because they understand what they cannot do with it. Some of them will understand that they can legally make copies for backups, but why would you need the law to tell you that it's legal for you to make a backup of something you own? You wouldn't. You can buy a hard drive, but buying it does not give you the IP for all the technology that went into it. No reasonable person believes that would be the case, either. You can buy a car, but you can't then copy all the parts and start mass producing your own copies of that car. Do any of you go through the McDonalds drive thru and believe you now own the burgers, fries and all the packaging that goes with it to the extent that you can start up your own McDonalds with logo and all? Whether it's physical or digital, even if people have contradictions in their head since they aren't lawyers, they understand enough about how things work to conclude that what they understood when they pressed the purchase button equates to not obtaining total ownership of all aspects. It is simply true. This is so broadly understood that I don't even think you would need to use a jury. A judge could simply throw the case out at this point on that alone, if it hadn't already been settled in past legal precedent, which it has.

Ekaros 1mo ago

Unless it is subscription based online game I take that buying game is perpetual unrevocable licence. Sadly non-transferable but that is trade-off for digital.

revlolz 1mo ago

If purchasing isn't buying, how can it be stolen? Seems like a pretty self defeating stance regarding "piracy."