Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

It's not about physical vs. digital games, it's about ownership

popcar.bearblog.dev

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

301–310 of 549 posts

Re: It's not about physical vs. digital games, it's about ownership

#301

Post by Terr_ »

autoexec wrote: post #286
RHSeeger wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I have no problem with Sony not offering DRM free versions of games that I can still download and play with the store. But if that goes away -> you must give me a path to local ownership. I worry about shenanigans where you "buy" the game from a shell company and that shell company "folds" and doesn't uphold it's promises. Same is true for a smaller, but not shell, company. If the non-DRM version isn't already crea…

We should require companies to submit a DRM-free version of their product to the US copyright office in order to get copyright protection. If the company goes under, or the copyright term expires, the US Copyright office should then provide those files to the people free of charge.

If the Copyright Office doesn't have enough funding/infrastructure, a compromise would be that the company regularly provides encrypted copies into the public domain in advance, and the decryption key is in escrow.

Re: It's not about physical vs. digital games, it's about ownership

#302

Post by jdboyd »

jbombadil wrote: post #39

I am generally not in favor of adding regulation, but this is a place where I would support it. Anything that you BUY needs to be your property. This means you must have the ability to: 1. Transfer ownership of it (either temporarily as a loan or permanently as a sale). Digital-only doesn't preclude this: the store can have a "transfer" functionality. 2. (Within reason) use it at your discretion at any point after th…

> I am generally not in favor of adding regulation, but this is a place where I would support it. >Anything that you BUY needs to be your property.

This could also be fixed by removing regulation.

Re: It's not about physical vs. digital games, it's about ownership

#303

Post by NoPicklez »

pseudocomposer wrote: post #222
feoren wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're not in favor of adding regulation, except when it comes to issues you understand and care about. All the oversight and regulation about everything you don't care and/or know about is big bad government overreach. Every government agency is a useless waste of your tax dollars, except the ones you rely on and the ones where you have friends that work there. Do I have that right?

I think “when you buy a product, be it a game, a house, a car, a computer, a tractor, washer, TV, it should continue to operate without rent-seeking behavior” is the best type of straightforward, uniformly-applicable pattern of regulation one could hope for. Opposing rent-seeking is literally why we have American democracy, which paved the way for French, Brazilian, Canadian, Indian, Mexican and so many other democra…

I don't think the above commenter disagreed with the need for regulation and the justification for it in this context. But that regulation isn't just for the things you think should be regulated and everything else shouldn't be.

Re: It's not about physical vs. digital games, it's about ownership

#304

Post by meh2frdf »

tonyhart7 wrote: post #299
jbombadil wrote: post #39

I am generally not in favor of adding regulation, but this is a place where I would support it. Anything that you BUY needs to be your property. This means you must have the ability to: 1. Transfer ownership of it (either temporarily as a loan or permanently as a sale). Digital-only doesn't preclude this: the store can have a "transfer" functionality. 2. (Within reason) use it at your discretion at any point after th…

"Anything that you BUY needs to be your property." do you own the film when you buy ticket to cinema ????

Yeah the OP doesn't understand licensing, seems to only think of purchase in terms of physical goods, and is trying to poorly apply their reasoning based on that.

Re: It's not about physical vs. digital games, it's about ownership

#305

Post by meh2frdf »

sph wrote: post #47
jbombadil wrote: post #39

I am generally not in favor of adding regulation, but this is a place where I would support it. Anything that you BUY needs to be your property. This means you must have the ability to: 1. Transfer ownership of it (either temporarily as a loan or permanently as a sale). Digital-only doesn't preclude this: the store can have a "transfer" functionality. 2. (Within reason) use it at your discretion at any point after th…

All they have to do then is say that they license you a game, and you're not buying anything, despite paying for it. They already do that with online games.

You are 'buying' some thing, a licence that grant you some permissions (aka rights). That licence has some constraints, you don't like them, then don't buy the licence. It's literally how it works, you just don't seem to grasp that.

Now are the constraints on licences (aka agreement), not great, not consumer friendly .. different set of questions.

Re: It's not about physical vs. digital games, it's about ownership

#307

Post by AnthonyMouse »

scott_w wrote: post #280
homer456 wrote: post #236

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It takes a minimum of 600 hours of training to get licensed to cut hair in California. Pex plumbing is banned in Chicago as a union protectionist regulation. The "chicken tax" regulation scheme has screwed up the US truck market for decades. Electrical code requirements for the wiring of kitchen islands have changed drastically with very small justification within a short span of time. To this day it is illegal to tr…

I’ll take your word on the other points but this one: > Many European countries have draconian laws about air conditioning that are killing people this summer. Needs some debunking. In fact, I think you may have been fed lies because the UK government felt the need to specifically call this out: https://mhclgmedia.blog.gov.uk/2026/06/25/air-conditioning-r... In short: AC in the home is legal in the UK subject to foll…

Reading that sort of thing is kind of amusing, e.g.:

> In most cases, planning permission is not required to install it for a small home if it would not materially affect the appearance of the building from outside.

Substantially all air conditioning units affect the appearance of the building from the outside because they require a coil or vent somewhere on the exterior of the building to expel heat.

> Building regulations already require new residential buildings, including houses, flats, student accommodation, residential care homes and children's homes, to be designed to minimise overheating.

If planning permission for aircon was denied, worry not, because the building code now requires measures that will keep some new buildings to a temperature ten or twenty degrees cooler than the older buildings (planning permission for aircon likewise denied), which is quite a difference when even the newer buildings are over 100 degrees Fahrenheit.

They wouldn't need to spin it like this if there weren't actually buildings where people want to install air conditioning and are prohibited from it, because if that was the case they would have said that.

Re: It's not about physical vs. digital games, it's about ownership

#308

Post by meh2frdf »

eldaisfish wrote: post #79
krzyk wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is literally in any software since like 90s. You buy license.

right, but back in the 90s, the onus of maintaining a working copy of any software was on you. Now, Sony simply reaches into you home and can deny you access to software/movies you "bought". These are not the same situation.

Which is all detailed as something they can do in the licence you bought but obviously didn't understand (which is fine I don't read the details either).

You seem to have semantics you apply to the word 'buy' and think the world should align to that, it clearly does not.

Re: It's not about physical vs. digital games, it's about ownership

#309

Post by skotobaza »

BatFastard wrote: post #216

Does anyone here remember owning games on disk? It was a royal pain in the ass! You had to inset the disk every time you wanted to play game. The disks got scratched, destroyed, or rearranged by the wife. Steam has saved me from all of that. Plus I can share my whole library with my family members. Sure I might lose access to them all when I die, but 20 years from now who is going to care?

I care about having access to my games 20 years from now. I've been playing more older games for the past few years (most of them were released 20+ years ago). And I want to be able to play games that are being released now and that I have missed because I was playing older games. It's a normal expectation.

Re: It's not about physical vs. digital games, it's about ownership

#310

Post by noduerme »

What's scary is how quickly the lack of ownership of things we used to own can become a "new normal".

Forget about explainin to the youngins. My girlfriend is 7 years younger than me and barely grasps the concept of why I'd have 20,000 mp3s on my phone that I ripped off CDs I owned. Why not just pay for a subscription? She doesn't understand the utility of anything being hers.

So I say, send me a song. And she sends a link.

It's hard to even explain to someone who doesn't know what it means to have anything that isn't rented.

Post reply on HN