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'My son spent £3,160 in one game'

bbc.co.uk

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Re: 'My son spent £3,160 in one game'

#11

Post by willk »

filoleg wrote: post #2

Another one of those oversensationalized outrage articles that can be boiled down to "I cannot put even a minimal effort in keeping an eye on my children, so I will blame someone else for it and make it their responsibility." There is literally a setting on iOS for that specific specific scenario, which allows to prevent in-app purchases[0]. And it is very easy and intuitive to set up too, so it isn't like it is hidd…

These games were not just on Apple's platform. I think these types of games are predatory. What is wrong with just selling a whole game? It is hard to find any game these days that comes out complete. Blizzard did it with Star Craft 2 and for that reason, I refused to buy it.

Re: 'My son spent £3,160 in one game'

#12

Post by djhworld »

The amount of crap in the app stores that encourage this sort of behaviour is truly, truly shocking.

The gaming community often lambast companies like EA etc for loot boxes ("surprise mechanics"), which is definitely a problem that needs to go away, but from this article I suspect there's a lot of examples of absolute bottom of the barrel shovelware on the app stores that's raking it in from accidental purchases from children or vulnerable adults.

I remember Apple saying they were putting together some sort of curated program for high quality games, maybe with a subscription model. Which is cool and everything but creating a two-tier system doesn't solve the underlying problem.

Maybe any transaction should have a 2FA style system where the cardholder need to explicitly approve it through their phone. Or maybe a daily spending cap or something like that

Re: 'My son spent £3,160 in one game'

#13

Post by o_p »

darkpuma wrote: post #3

It's astonishing that the developers of games like this can sleep at night. Do they lie to themselves and pretend all the kids spending thousands of dollars are the children of Saudi royals or something? They must know that they're exploiting people who can't afford it. Edit: these developers know damn well if their target demo is children, and they know damn well that the phenomenon of children running up huge debts…

One would assume that children spending was authorized by their parents.

Re: 'My son spent £3,160 in one game'

#14

Post by notus »

This is disgusting. Yes parents should be aware of these things but shifting the burden of locking down every system a child uses when this could be handled at the app store or financial processor level is ridiculous. It seems that some of these people are claiming that the game is not distinguishing well between fake and real currency. There are definitely games I've played where this is ambiguous as well.

IMO there needs to be a more rigorous opt-in process for different types of apps. You can opt in for automatic purchases for utility type apps but not for game purchases for example and it needs to be off by default. There also needs to be ways for people to get their money back in certain situations. If a child has a cognitive disability of some kind then holding them accountable seems kind of exploitative. Parents can prove these things with documentation and if proven the money should be refunded.

Re: 'My son spent £3,160 in one game'

#15

Post by la_barba »

darkpuma wrote: post #3

It's astonishing that the developers of games like this can sleep at night. Do they lie to themselves and pretend all the kids spending thousands of dollars are the children of Saudi royals or something? They must know that they're exploiting people who can't afford it. Edit: these developers know damn well if their target demo is children, and they know damn well that the phenomenon of children running up huge debts…

Personally.. I don't really like the idea of an application developer knowing my age or gender or any other personal details.

Re: 'My son spent £3,160 in one game'

#16

Post by ajross »

filoleg wrote: post #2

Another one of those oversensationalized outrage articles that can be boiled down to "I cannot put even a minimal effort in keeping an eye on my children, so I will blame someone else for it and make it their responsibility." There is literally a setting on iOS for that specific specific scenario, which allows to prevent in-app purchases[0]. And it is very easy and intuitive to set up too, so it isn't like it is hidd…

> "I cannot put even a minimal effort in keeping an eye on my children, so I will blame someone else for it and make it their responsibility."

For centuries, it's been trivially possible for parents to manage their children's access to funds. Nineteenth century homesteaders could send their kids off to market with appropriate funds to buy what they needed. Now all of a sudden this doesn't work and kids by default have access to near infinite (at their scales) lines of credit because of internet purchasing.

Why is this burden suddenly on the parents? Why can't app vendors (and in particular their middlemen who manage the purchases) make even a minimal effort at not having this system be broken by default?

Re: 'My son spent £3,160 in one game'

#17

Post by notus »

filoleg wrote: post #2

Another one of those oversensationalized outrage articles that can be boiled down to "I cannot put even a minimal effort in keeping an eye on my children, so I will blame someone else for it and make it their responsibility." There is literally a setting on iOS for that specific specific scenario, which allows to prevent in-app purchases[0]. And it is very easy and intuitive to set up too, so it isn't like it is hidd…

> boiled down to "I cannot put even a minimal effort in keeping an eye on my children, so I will blame someone else for it and make it their responsibility."

When you add multiple devices/platforms/app stores it becomes a lot more difficult. Sure it is a relatively seamless experience on one platform, but not all of them. Additionally, parents who didn't grow up with cellphones don't even think about this stuff until it happens. It isn't common sense for them.

Re: 'My son spent £3,160 in one game'

#18

Post by filoleg »

shakyshakyshaky wrote: post #9
vorpalhex wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They are unless you add a card, and sign in, and enable the ability to pay without using your password.

most children are using their parents' apple IDs.

So you are admitting that the default users of those phones are adults. In which case, it makes sense that the defaults are set for adults. If an adult is handing their phone (with a credit card enabled on it) to their child, it is expected that they should think of things that can go wrong and disable in-app purchases. If a parent cannot even attempt to keep an eye on what their child is doing on their phone OR click a simple menu setting that disables in-app purchases, I would personally worry about their child way beyond what they can do on their phone.

Re: 'My son spent £3,160 in one game'

#19

Post by la_barba »

filoleg wrote: post #2

Another one of those oversensationalized outrage articles that can be boiled down to "I cannot put even a minimal effort in keeping an eye on my children, so I will blame someone else for it and make it their responsibility." There is literally a setting on iOS for that specific specific scenario, which allows to prevent in-app purchases[0]. And it is very easy and intuitive to set up too, so it isn't like it is hidd…

Its written in a click-bait style (what news story isn't these days?) but the only take-home here for parents is that smartphone==credit card. The other issue is that usually for physical credit cards, its easy for a parent to keep it off limits. But if you're signed into services that can auto-charge you, things are a bit more tricky. Even if you had a separate account for your child, and only use a CC to authorize on a per-transaction basis, services can auto-save your CC info, and bury this fact inside some 20 page ToS.

Re: 'My son spent £3,160 in one game'

#20

Post by hombre_fatal »

willk wrote: post #11
filoleg wrote: post #2

Another one of those oversensationalized outrage articles that can be boiled down to "I cannot put even a minimal effort in keeping an eye on my children, so I will blame someone else for it and make it their responsibility." There is literally a setting on iOS for that specific specific scenario, which allows to prevent in-app purchases[0]. And it is very easy and intuitive to set up too, so it isn't like it is hidd…

These games were not just on Apple's platform. I think these types of games are predatory. What is wrong with just selling a whole game? It is hard to find any game these days that comes out complete. Blizzard did it with Star Craft 2 and for that reason, I refused to buy it.

There are plenty of games you can buy on the iOS store. What's wrong with buying a whole game?
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