4 ms·

Could we have "Fair Trade" games?

7 points by paulgerhardt 17y ago

pmichaud 17y ago
Why should a game developer get to profit from the resale of the game? That flies in the face of every other after-market. Do the engineers at Ford get a bump every time an old mustang changes hands?
jerf 17y ago
This is not necessary. Games prices factor in the value they bring to the first purchaser for their ability to resell it. Blocking reselling (whether by making it harder or flat out banning it) will result in either lowering the price the game can sell for, or, more realistically, lowering the number of games sold. Making reselling more expensive lowers the value of the game to the customer, and this won't be made up for in any other way. (If the used game purchasers were willing to pay full price, they already would be; they are demonstrating their price consciousness by not doing so.) This plan won't result in raised profits for game makers; it will lower them.
Periodic 17y ago
The used game market already gives the developers money, because a market for used goods increases the value of new goods. It comes into play whenever an item retains at least some of its value after being used by the primary consumer. For example, take home prices. If there were no market for used homes (say there was some strange DRM on houses) very few of us would be willing to put down the huge sums of money required to buy a house, but we do because we know that we can recover a lot of that value later if necessary. Additionally, houses loose very little value over time and land rarely loses value, making it worth buying a $100k house even if $90k is just tied up as value that you can get back when you sell it. Video games, now that we're beyond the days of cartridges, never actually degrade. There should be a perfect market for used games, though popularity and time take their tolls. I'm willing to copies of good year-old games for $30. If you buy a $60 game and then find me a year later it is almost like you only paid $30 making that other $30 more like an investment required to get the game earlier. If developers continue to try to restrict games to single systems or other ways of limiting the amount of resale, that makes the game worth LESS to me, as I lose the ability to resell or loan out the game. A healthy used market actually incrases the first-sale market. Perhaps someone else can provide a citation, as I'm unable to find a relevant link via Google.
- sachinag 17y ago
  We're trying to build that perfect market for used games at http://www.dawdle.com http://www.dawdle.com. No, seriously, we have market orders and limit orders (we call them StandingOffers). The best cite was an OMX report that $1 billion in U.S. new game purchases were funded through the proceeds received through used game sales.
- paulgerhardt 17y ago
  The "Fair Trade" approach seems irrelevant in the retail model of distribution (trading cartridges and discs - much like used books), but takes on vastly different implications in the service model (Xbox Live, Steam, Appstore). I would be more comfortable with the downloadable platforms (as a curator at an archeological media lab) if it were possible to maintain the same kind of liquidity associated with the physical media by trading them in public markets (given that most game vendors prohibit or discourage transferring game licenses), even if it meant paying a royalty to an existing corporation to do so until such a time as the work enters the public domain. What scares me is not being able to access these works in a hundred years. Would a royalty system enable one to open the markets by fostering greater income much like how the traditional used game market in brick-and-mortar "allows" for higher prices on new games. Related: "Valve: Are Games Too Expensive?" http://tr.im/zEJW http://tr.im/zEJW or http://www.edge-online.com/features/valve-are-games-too-expensive http://www.edge-online.com/features/valve-are-games-too-expe...
  - Periodic 17y ago
    Similar to the digital music industry, it seems that the publishers are trying to spin software as something you have licensed instead of something you own. This can be seen very readily in the MDY v Blizzard case that's going on right now. Blizzard claims that they only license the game to you, even though you bought a physical copy at a store front. Because they own the game and you only license it they can say that you don't have the right to modify the memory. You would essentially be bound to anything they want to put in their EULA/ToS in this case. This does have a very chilling effect on archival systems. When you aren't able to format-shift a piece of media or it is bound to only one player then eventually you will loose access to that media, either through hardware failure or obsolescence. Copyright law section 117 gives you a lot of rights for software you've purchased and owned, but treating it as a license circumvents that clause and gives the publisher full control. http://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2009/09/you-bought-it-you-own-it-mdy-v-blizzard-appealed http://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2009/09/you-bought-it-you-own-i...
hughprime 17y ago
I'm not sure what this guy's problem is. If this is what he wants then every time he buys a used game he can just send a one-pound cheque to Electronic Arts or whoever.
robotron 17y ago
If anything, there should be attention and pressure brought on these companies for their abhorrent practices during crunch time and worse post-crunch ("oh you just gave up months of your life to line our pockets - here's your pink slip. We'll call if we're hiring again").

7 points by paulgerhardt 17y ago

Why should a game developer get to profit from the resale of the game? That flies in the face of every other after-market. Do the engineers at Ford get a bump every time an old mustang changes hands?

jerf 17y ago

This is not necessary. Games prices factor in the value they bring to the first purchaser for their ability to resell it. Blocking reselling (whether by making it harder or flat out banning it) will result in either lowering the price the game can sell for, or, more realistically, lowering the number of games sold. Making reselling more expensive lowers the value of the game to the customer, and this won't be made up for in any other way. (If the used game purchasers were willing to pay full price, they already would be; they are demonstrating their price consciousness by not doing so.) This plan won't result in raised profits for game makers; it will lower them.

Periodic 17y ago

The used game market already gives the developers money, because a market for used goods increases the value of new goods. It comes into play whenever an item retains at least some of its value after being used by the primary consumer. For example, take home prices. If there were no market for used homes (say there was some strange DRM on houses) very few of us would be willing to put down the huge sums of money required to buy a house, but we do because we know that we can recover a lot of that value later if necessary. Additionally, houses loose very little value over time and land rarely loses value, making it worth buying a $100k house even if $90k is just tied up as value that you can get back when you sell it. Video games, now that we're beyond the days of cartridges, never actually degrade. There should be a perfect market for used games, though popularity and time take their tolls. I'm willing to copies of good year-old games for $30. If you buy a $60 game and then find me a year later it is almost like you only paid $30 making that other $30 more like an investment required to get the game earlier. If developers continue to try to restrict games to single systems or other ways of limiting the amount of resale, that makes the game worth LESS to me, as I lose the ability to resell or loan out the game. A healthy used market actually incrases the first-sale market. Perhaps someone else can provide a citation, as I'm unable to find a relevant link via Google.

sachinag 17y ago
We're trying to build that perfect market for used games at http://www.dawdle.com http://www.dawdle.com. No, seriously, we have market orders and limit orders (we call them StandingOffers). The best cite was an OMX report that $1 billion in U.S. new game purchases were funded through the proceeds received through used game sales.
paulgerhardt 17y ago
The "Fair Trade" approach seems irrelevant in the retail model of distribution (trading cartridges and discs - much like used books), but takes on vastly different implications in the service model (Xbox Live, Steam, Appstore). I would be more comfortable with the downloadable platforms (as a curator at an archeological media lab) if it were possible to maintain the same kind of liquidity associated with the physical media by trading them in public markets (given that most game vendors prohibit or discourage transferring game licenses), even if it meant paying a royalty to an existing corporation to do so until such a time as the work enters the public domain. What scares me is not being able to access these works in a hundred years. Would a royalty system enable one to open the markets by fostering greater income much like how the traditional used game market in brick-and-mortar "allows" for higher prices on new games. Related: "Valve: Are Games Too Expensive?" http://tr.im/zEJW http://tr.im/zEJW or http://www.edge-online.com/features/valve-are-games-too-expensive http://www.edge-online.com/features/valve-are-games-too-expe...
- Periodic 17y ago
  Similar to the digital music industry, it seems that the publishers are trying to spin software as something you have licensed instead of something you own. This can be seen very readily in the MDY v Blizzard case that's going on right now. Blizzard claims that they only license the game to you, even though you bought a physical copy at a store front. Because they own the game and you only license it they can say that you don't have the right to modify the memory. You would essentially be bound to anything they want to put in their EULA/ToS in this case. This does have a very chilling effect on archival systems. When you aren't able to format-shift a piece of media or it is bound to only one player then eventually you will loose access to that media, either through hardware failure or obsolescence. Copyright law section 117 gives you a lot of rights for software you've purchased and owned, but treating it as a license circumvents that clause and gives the publisher full control. http://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2009/09/you-bought-it-you-own-it-mdy-v-blizzard-appealed http://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2009/09/you-bought-it-you-own-i...

hughprime 17y ago

I'm not sure what this guy's problem is. If this is what he wants then every time he buys a used game he can just send a one-pound cheque to Electronic Arts or whoever.

robotron 17y ago

If anything, there should be attention and pressure brought on these companies for their abhorrent practices during crunch time and worse post-crunch ("oh you just gave up months of your life to line our pockets - here's your pink slip. We'll call if we're hiring again").