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Epic Games to pay $245M for tricking users into making unwanted charges

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Re: Epic Games to pay $245M for tricking users into making unwanted charges

#191

Post by intelVISA »

tagyro wrote: post #126
YeahNO wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Articulating why a certain function is bad design or is actively harmful is not the same as gatekeeping. I have lost opportunities because I chose to follow my ethics over my bank account. I do not regret those decisions. Software developers should have a professional code of ethics. Other professions have them, why not computer scientists, computer engineers, and software developers? There is the ACM/IEEE-CS Softwar…

When I studied (industrial) engineering, we had a creed and naïve me still believes in that. https://order-of-the-engineer.org/about-the-order/obligation...

We're young as a profession, once ML automates away a lot of the low hanging fruit I'd imagine we'll go a similar path.

Re: Epic Games to pay $245M for tricking users into making unwanted charges

#192

Post by yatac42 »

justinclift wrote: post #172
yatac42 wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> > music I've purchased > They really ought to stop using "buy"/"purchase" metaphorically to mean something more like "one time fee for an indefinite lease that ends upon account termination." That doesn't really apply to buying music though, does it? If Amazon banned my account, that wouldn't prevent me from listening to the MP3s I've bought from them. It would only prevent me from re-downloading them from their se…

> But if I buy a CD from a physical store ... This is literally the nature of physical vs digital goods. We can, and should, do better for customers than the current systems from Steam and Amazon (among others) allow.

Which current systems?

For games on Steam and movies basically anywhere, the current system is that after I buy the game/movie, I can watch/play it for as long as I have access to the account. If I lose the account or the service shuts down, I'm fucked. That sucks.

For games on GOG or MP3s basically anywhere, the current system is that I buy it and then I can play the game/music forever as long as I don't lose the downloaded files. If I do lose the files, I can still redownload them as long as the service is still operating and I still have access to the account.

The second system seems fine to me.

Re: Epic Games to pay $245M for tricking users into making unwanted charges

#193

Post by fidgewidge »

michpoch wrote: post #151
fidgewidge wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Note that chargebacks are mostly a US thing. In Europe you basically can't charge back and last time I enquired about even blocking a company from making new charges I was told that doing this required me to block the entire card and get a new one issued. It'd really very odd to see Americans insist that they should have the right to take a service, get the money back for it from the business i.e. get the service for…

There's no problem with making chargebacks in Europe. Maybe you should move to another bank?

Maybe, but I've never heard anyone I know in Europe ever refer to making a chargeback or even raising the possibility of doing one. It certainly isn't common. Perhaps it depends on what country you're in.

Re: Epic Games to pay $245M for tricking users into making unwanted charges

#194

Post by ChickenNugger »

grog454 wrote: post #100
tagyro wrote: post #84

My comment is going to get downvoted (or worse, ignored), but here I go again: We, as software engineers (or working in the field), have the power to not implement these features when our employer asks us to do it. Everyday we read about organisations using dark patterns in their (software) products and then we come to HN to complain about it. How did these features get built? By whom? Yes, I realise not everyone has…

> software engineers (or working in the field), have the power to not implement these features when our employer asks us to do it. Realize that you're statment is a euphemism. What you really mean is we have the choice between implementing a dark pattern or finding another job and letting someone else implement it. Stated this way it's a lot easier to understand people's behavior.

Maybe what we need are unions. I realize it's hard to do with H1Bs, contractors, remote work, and offshoring. But maybe we should try anyway?

One could be tempted to think we're overpaid or have it too good as is, but we're basically lightning wizards making rocks think for us from sometimes thousands of miles away from where we physically are. When put that way it doesn't seem so farfetched to pay us a lot of money for our works.

Re: Epic Games to pay $245M for tricking users into making unwanted charges

#195

Post by lp0_on_fire »

vuln wrote: post #45
paulmd wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Came here to say this too. This just needs to be the rule generally. Steam and Amazon do the same thing - get hacked and get charged for some items, if you dispute the Steam charge you lose your $5000 account, that's not a fair playing field and effectively negates the protection offered by credit card networks. Hopefully steam resolves it, that's always the first line of defense, but if they don't, you still can't c…

You purchased _access_ to the media for as long as the company decides to host it. You don't physically own the media. Think of it as renting or a lease.

> Think of it as renting or a lease.

Then they should be forced to clearly explain that and not be allowed to put words like "buy" and "purchase" in their advertising because those words have very specific meanings. That they've been allowed to basically get around deceptive advertising laws by inserting some legalese into their TOS, which are deliberately written in the most inaccessible way as possible, is repugnant.

Re: Epic Games to pay $245M for tricking users into making unwanted charges

#196

Post by imiric »

tagyro wrote: post #84

My comment is going to get downvoted (or worse, ignored), but here I go again: We, as software engineers (or working in the field), have the power to not implement these features when our employer asks us to do it. Everyday we read about organisations using dark patterns in their (software) products and then we come to HN to complain about it. How did these features get built? By whom? Yes, I realise not everyone has…

Never mind dark patterns. If engineers had that kind of moral fibre to choose doing the right thing over getting paid, social media as we know it today wouldn't exist, and adtech giants wouldn't rule the web.

The reality is that most of us think we're making the world a better place, when truthfully we're just trying to make a decent living, while making the unscrupulous shot callers rich. And that's the percentage that does actually want to make an honest living. Others will happily apply their knowledge to deceive and exploit, and then go on to make successful companies of their own. The circle of tech.

Re: Epic Games to pay $245M for tricking users into making unwanted charges

#197

Post by thewebcount »

my_usernam3 wrote: post #23
PurpleRamen wrote: post #6

That's the second time now I read about Epic Games paying a fine for doing something obviously shady and illegal. I slowly get the impression that Epic Games might be a bit more scammy than your average company.

I think I agree with you, but to play devil's advocate, the video game industry is struggling to monetize their work. No one wants to pay for games anymore, no one wants a pay to win system in a game, and cosmetic items seem like a waste of money to most. The result is the gaming industry pulling out all the tricks to try to separate the consume from his or her wallet to pay for content.

> No one wants to pay for games anymore

Is that true, or are games so broken that nobody is willing to pay for them anymore. I've completely stopped buying almost any game that isn't on Apple Arcade because I know those games will be free of pay-to-win mechanics and nickel-and-diming you with more charges and dark patterns. On Apple's service, they all have to ask if they want to steal my data and resell it. I always say "No." I have a Steam account for playing older games I bought a while ago, but I buy maybe 1 game per year on it, if even, and only because it's not available anywhere else I'm willing to spend money. I'm playing more games than ever before now, too!

Re: Epic Games to pay $245M for tricking users into making unwanted charges

#198

Post by airstrike »

hinkley wrote: post #67
acomjean wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As an adult who’s partner plays Fortnite with her cousins and occasionally gets dragged in, I haven’t seen this. I’ve spent maybe 25, and it seemed pretty obvious what was going on. Maybe I just haven’t found the dark pattern path. It should be clear what’s going on before charging. I don’t love the “v bucks” vs real dollars they charge for things. though I get that the reward for those who grind isn’t actual dollars…

I play Civ VI on my tablet to wind down, and I’m not happy about owning the whole thing on Steam and only half on iOS. They need a license transference process. If memory serves Klei might have a solution for this but I haven’t bought anything on steam in some time so I may be thinking of some other game.

I'm honestly more upset about how shitty it is to download DLCs and mods on iOS. The whole thing is botched beyond belief

Re: Epic Games to pay $245M for tricking users into making unwanted charges

#199

Post by hug »

CobrastanJorji wrote: post #180
mahathu wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Didn't they use to let users download mp3s when they bought an album? Did that change?

Ah, you're behind the times. You may be remembering 2008 when Amazon had those big "DRM Free" messages and t-shirts and talked a lot about how music wanted to be free. It was a big part of their sales pitch. That faded away, and then some music started using DRM. However, if you purchase a music song or album, you can still mostly download MP3s, as far as I know. On the other hand, if you use Amazon Unlimited or Amaz…

> On the other hand, if you use Amazon Unlimited or Amazon Music Prime, you cannot download music as MP3s. You need to use a player that supports their DRM.

This seems entirely reasonable: No one thinks that by subscribing to Unlimited that they're actually purchasing a copy of every single song forever. It's very much known that it's a subscription.

Re: Epic Games to pay $245M for tricking users into making unwanted charges

#200

Post by mardifoufs »

paulmd wrote: post #50
vuln wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You purchased _access_ to the media for as long as the company decides to host it. You don't physically own the media. Think of it as renting or a lease.

That may be true, but the EU can simply outlaw those types of contractual arrangements going forward, and require that prior purchases be either defaulted into the new purchase arrangement or refunded. Welcome to governments that are actually responsive to protecting their citizens. It doesn't have to be the way it is in the US with corporations holding all the cards, that's just regulatory capture in action. That's…

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