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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

#251

Post by nurettin »

matheusmoreira wrote: post #223
endisneigh wrote: post #15

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…

We should go in the complete opposite direction and abolish data ownership straight up. Copyright needs to end. The second it's gone it will no longer be a crime to copy and these problems will no longer exist.

How to profit from written material without some sort of government enforcing my rights to ownership? Do I have to go begging on social media?

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

#252

Post by watwut »

pdonis wrote: post #122
jbay808 wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This sounds great on paper but I really don't think that feedback channel is effective in practice. First of all, when a game or a platform does poorly, the reason for that can be very hard to discern (unless there's some kind of coordinated vocal protest). "The customers are disagreeing with the fine print of our end-user license agreement" usually isn't high up on the list of reasons. Secondly, there are many degre…

Your point about market inefficiency and misaligned incentives is a valid one, but government intervention, which is what many people in this thread are calling for, does not make market inefficiencies better; it makes them worse. Ultimately, people get the market they create through their buying decisions. The reason these market inefficiencies and misaligned incentives exist is that game distributors know that peop…

Government being involved in issues like this is the point of government.

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

#253

Post by toper-centage »

philliphaydon wrote: post #217

For auditing purposes these companies have to keep records of transactions. So I don’t understand the need to delete accounts and digital items. Sure they could delete non essential data like activity, game saves, screenshots etc. but how difficult is it to keep a login and list of owned games. It’s prob a few kb of data…

Keeping that list doesn't make them money. Forcing you to buy new games does.

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

#255

Post by unicornmama »

Mathiciann wrote: post #246
birracerveza wrote: post #222

Decentralized ownership and file storage using NFTs on low energy blockchains would solve this. But no, let's keep complaining about the same problems over and over while we keep chanting that crypto is evil and can't be used to solve said problems.

My knowledge on blockchain is very limited so I don't understand how it could solve this problem. Can you elaborate?

He means you can mint an NFT to represent ownership, and store the game bytes on a decentralized file storage like IPFS.

It would be like driving a nuclear submarine to commute from Alameda to San Francisco.

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

#256

Post by tjoff »

amarshall wrote: post #109

When possible, try to prefer DRM-free versions of games. If there's DRM, then one doesn't really own it. PCGamingWiki [1] is a great resource that will list the DRM status of a given game for different distributors (yes, some stores may have DRM while others do not). In general, GOG [2] is all DRM-free games. [1]: https://www.pcgamingwiki.com [2]: https://www.gog.com

Lack of DRM wouldn't help if you don't have any way of getting the copy or getting past the license check.

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

#257

Post by mattdesl »

endisneigh wrote: post #208
okwubodu wrote: post #205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You would download the game from the same place you’d get updates if you bought a physical copy off a friend. The purpose isn’t decentralized downloads. It’s retaining the ability to virtually press the eject button and put the disc in a different console.

You're being very vague. If the game is centrally located there's absolutely no point of using a distributed ledger to begin with. The same place the game is stored can store your license.

The OP thread is about the centralized entity revoking your digital ownership over these licenses at their will. The parent you are replying to is imagining a hypothetical future where licenses around digital ownership are not merely private records on centrally owned and mutable ledgers, but rather, public records on decentrally owned and immutable ledgers. This has nothing to do with files/media and of course it is all hypothetical and legally untested, as no publisher is using public blockchain tokens to issue licensing rights.

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

#259

Post by FpUser »

People get arrested and put in jail because car rental company "mistakenly" declared them as thieves on a basis of their fucked up accounting.

I have a proposal. Let's extend the same courtesy the other way around. If I feel that company had stolen / interfered with enjoyment of my right to do certain things (which they in effect did) why don't police upon my complaint go and stick their CEO/Owner to jail with no bail and let them wait till the dust settles.

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

#260

Post by AussieWog93 »

ramchip wrote: post #197
AussieWog93 wrote: post #194

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>A downloader can only be sued for the retail value of what they downloaded Is this the actual law? I remember hearing about people being sued for $100k+ just for downloading a few albums back in the Limewire days.

Most likely they were also distributing (uploading), not just downloading.

Reading the EFF's history (and thinking about how the technology works for one second!), it seems this was how the lawsuits were put forth.
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