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Ubisoft deleted account with hundreds of dollars’ worth of games for inactivity

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Re: Ubisoft deleted account with hundreds of dollars’ worth of games for inactivity

#81
post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's definitely fine morally, but unfortunately it's illegal anyway.

Quoted post unavailable.

Is there any chance you misunderstood? They said they wouldn't feel bad morally about pirating things they had in fact already paid for? Does your ethics require you to stick to the letter of the terms and conditions including allowing people to keep your money and take back the value they promised you?

Re: Ubisoft deleted account with hundreds of dollars’ worth of games for inactivity

#82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

they had a database entry linking his account to a purchase. it's not like his access to the game was forgotten. they just chose not to honor it. a blockchain proof isn't any more compelling than the info they already had + his payment records.

"We irreversibly logged an entry deactivating your account to the blockchain. Nothing we can do to reactivate it."

[deleted]

Re: Ubisoft deleted account with hundreds of dollars’ worth of games for inactivity

#83
post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would be interested in knowing if that would be legal. As might you technically have purchased your license?

I remember a story a while back of a gentleman who had a house fire and then went and later pirated all the music CDs he had lost. I think they interviewed a copyright lawyer who basically says that the law doesn't permit that, I remember the quote that buying a copy entitles you to a copy and that "there is no such thing as a listening right".

That's a little different. Copyright, without any license involved, is very strict about the copying, how the copy gets made and where it's copied from. But if there's a license, things might get fuzzier.

Re: Ubisoft deleted account with hundreds of dollars’ worth of games for inactivity

#84
post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I do not have an expectation of indefinite ownership But you said you were nervous about buying these things. What are you nervous about? And why do you pay money anyway if you're nervous about what you're getting? > even though I should have indefinite ownership On what grounds? These are companies operating in a free market. They're offering a product whose terms are right out there in the open. If you don't like…

The terms are not a negotiated contract - they are dictated by one side and even if they are read by the purchaser, the implications of the terms may not be obvious. Many/most people will not understand that after paying hundreds of dollars for games, their games could suddenly be taken away from them without recourse. For a ridiculous example, imagine there was a clause buried in the fineprint that allowed the store…

> The terms are not a negotiated contract

That doesn't mean they aren't a contract. They're simply a contract where your only options as the buyer are to buy or not to buy.

That said, a unilateral contract like this can be treated somewhat differently by courts. See below.

> removing the right to play a game you have bought with money because you haven’t played it “enough” (according to the vendor) may also be considered unreasonable.

As I posted in response to someone else upthread, it would be an interesting case if someone actually did try to take a game store to court on these grounds. Contract law does include general rules about reasonableness, and courts are more likely to apply them for unilateral contracts like these where one party does not have the opportunity to bargain.

Re: Ubisoft deleted account with hundreds of dollars’ worth of games for inactivity

#85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't understand how NFTs would solve the problem I described. Even if all of my Oculus games are NFTs - if I'm banned and can't access my account to download the games then I'm out of luck.

the games wouldn't be released on exclusively on a closed system because they have other paths to monetize the games you possess and the digital items you possess would have an independent record of your possession and continued access if you did use a company's platform because of its convenient UI, even if you lost access to that company's platform you should still be able to access all of your games and items in t…

In the NFT scenario , what would prevent people from sharing licenses?

Re: Ubisoft deleted account with hundreds of dollars’ worth of games for inactivity

#86
post #25

This article is a great example of why we need legislation around ownership of digital items. I generally hate getting the government involved in things, but if you're paying money for goods, there needs to be a way to be credited or receive your digital goods in a way that still works without your "account". Personally I always get kind of nervous around buying things on PSN, Xbox, Stadia, Steam, Oculus, etc. If the…

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

You are of course correct but at the same time I often buy games for $5 - $10 on sale that are a few years old and after completion they have little to no replay value. Although many may not be as frugal they might well have the same attitude towards reuse/replay/resale. Play and forget.

Re: Ubisoft deleted account with hundreds of dollars’ worth of games for inactivity

#87
post #28

I paid extra for a disc version of the PS5 for exactly this reason. If I buy a game today I want to be able to play it 20 years from now. I can bet money that none of the mainstream digital stores of today will be operational by then.

Is that even a guarantee though? In particular, I know that you could buy the Orange Box (HL2, TF2, and Portal) on DVD in retail stores, but you needed a Steam account to play anyway.

For PlayStation it is, but I think it is the only one. The console can operate 100% offline.

Re: Ubisoft deleted account with hundreds of dollars’ worth of games for inactivity

#88

People won't like this, but we at Ultra.io are trying to tackle this exact problem by deploying certificates of ownership to a decentralized ledger as proof of your owning a game. AKA, we want to mint NFTs for each game sold, which allows a user to prove they own it. People hate those words, but we think that the tech has real value and a use-case in the market for solving inequity between publishers and users. This…

Selling ownership, not licenses, is great. Both ownership and licenses can be sold with or without NFTs. How do NFTs help?

Re: Ubisoft deleted account with hundreds of dollars’ worth of games for inactivity

#89
post #72
post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I have way more rights than that. Or if not I will fight to get them. So let me get this straight: companies are offering a recreational product, games, on terms you don't like. But instead of not paying them money, so they will be forced to either change their business model or go out of business, you want to get the government involved? For games ? > I do not want to depend on the good will of corporations. Good…

> you want to get the government involved? For games? The government is already involved, I cannot copy the games from my friend because the government does not allow me to do it. The government protects Ubisoft from me hacking them, or from paying in a fraudulent way. The government is fully involved in all the steps, I just want that my interests are represented in that involvement. > Good luck with that. I do not…

> I cannot copy the games from my friend because the government does not allow me to do it.

No, you can't do it because the seller of the game does not allow you to do it. There is no law requiring sellers to lock down their games with DRM or other forms of restriction.

> I do not live in the USA.

So what? Are you saying you can magically get access to this website without Y Combinator's cooperation and goodwill because you're not in the USA? Are you saying you can magically ensure that you can buy groceries without a corporation providing them to you because you're not in the USA?

Re: Ubisoft deleted account with hundreds of dollars’ worth of games for inactivity

#90

This article is a great example of why we need legislation around ownership of digital items. I generally hate getting the government involved in things, but if you're paying money for goods, there needs to be a way to be credited or receive your digital goods in a way that still works without your "account". Personally I always get kind of nervous around buying things on PSN, Xbox, Stadia, Steam, Oculus, etc. If the…

That’s because you never actually bought the item. You got a license to run it on someone else’s server.

Let’s say you bought a bunch of things for The Matrix Online, do you expect that server to run forever? It won’t. It didn’t. Why should someone else maintain it forever? Are you getting a refund? Why? You already extracted the useful life of it.

If there’s government regulation it’s around the deceptive use of the word “purchase” it’s just a long term rental

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