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“If you leave, we'll smash all your digital purchases into oblivion.”

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Re: “If you leave, we'll smash all your digital purchases into oblivion.”

#21

Post by slayback »

stubish wrote: post #17
WorldMaker wrote: post #13

I think Digital Asset rights fights are going to be big in the next couple of decades. Especially as account owners start to mature and realize their investments and start asking hard questions such as estate planning. (Can you pass on your digital assets/libraries to your children? The answers there [which currently are most "no"] are going to surprise an increasing number of people over the next few years.)

Uptake of subscription services might make this a non-issue, if it is sizable enough to make a minority of people who want to own media. If the providers of subscription services can solve the disappearing and exclusive content problems. Maybe fights over rights will be there instead, with 'exclusive' distribution rights to media being limited and a right to buy. I tend to think that a change such as requiring copyri…

I think it reduces the risk to consumers, but it won’t eliminate the need. It’ll be a long while before my entire Steam library will be available via subscription.

Re: “If you leave, we'll smash all your digital purchases into oblivion.”

#22

Post by redis_mlc »

T3OU-736 wrote: post #5
downerending wrote: post #2

Yeah, super-irritating. I bought about a dozen movies through Google Play before I realized that their platform was going to fail.

(IANAL) This is fairly pedantic, and I do apologize foe this, but it feels inaccurate to state (or to think) that you were able to buy those movies. We don't buy movies. At least in the US, we buy license/right to view. This gets... into interesting legal territory, but also this leads to situations like digital assets being unavailable after the account to which they are licensed being deleted.

> This is fairly pedantic

Congrats on reaching self-awareness, HN!

Re: “If you leave, we'll smash all your digital purchases into oblivion.”

#23

Post by nitwit005 »

jjgreen wrote: post #7
ALittleLight wrote: post #4

I don't get it. You delete or close the account you use to access the digital content, what is the expectation here? That you can keep accessing it without an account? How would they know what you own?

If I buy a cheese sandwich and there's no cheese in it, then I'm entitled to my money back. Same here, give the "purchaser" their money back.

There isn't an issue with the purchase being somehow bad. The issue is they're intentionally destroying the means to authenticate they were the ones who purchased it.

I'm totally on board with purchases being tied to a single company being an issue, but for a lot of people the value of digital books and music is the online availability. You're going to need some sort of auth for that to work.

Re: “If you leave, we'll smash all your digital purchases into oblivion.”

#24

Post by robomartin »

I have this problem right now, sort of. I purchased dozens of Kindle books through my personal Amazon account over the years. Now I prefer to do so through my business account. Yet, I want all of them available through the same device. Well, that’s a pain in the behind. I have to call Amazon support for help and have been procrastinating because I know it will be a one hour ordeal.

This is why I prefer to purchase digital books as PDF files. I keep them on Dropbox and my local drive and they are great to handle and read.

Re: “If you leave, we'll smash all your digital purchases into oblivion.”

#25

Post by stubish »

slayback wrote: post #21
stubish wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Uptake of subscription services might make this a non-issue, if it is sizable enough to make a minority of people who want to own media. If the providers of subscription services can solve the disappearing and exclusive content problems. Maybe fights over rights will be there instead, with 'exclusive' distribution rights to media being limited and a right to buy. I tend to think that a change such as requiring copyri…

I think it reduces the risk to consumers, but it won’t eliminate the need. It’ll be a long while before my entire Steam library will be available via subscription.

If you can rent out a purchased copy (one for the courts, jurisdiction specific), then Steam/Microsoft/GOG/Humble could offer things as a subscription quite easily. If publishers are required to sell to them and not allowed to create roadblocks. Given the concurrent player counts for most games the subscription service wouldn't need to purchase many copies to allow almost-always access. The interesting games to consider are the 'always online' ones, where the software could be given away for free, because it is useless without access to the game servers. Which pretty much operates like a subscription ('lifetime' or monthly), and is expected to stop working one day.

Re: “If you leave, we'll smash all your digital purchases into oblivion.”

#26

Post by shadowprofile77 »

robomartin wrote: post #24

I have this problem right now, sort of. I purchased dozens of Kindle books through my personal Amazon account over the years. Now I prefer to do so through my business account. Yet, I want all of them available through the same device. Well, that’s a pain in the behind. I have to call Amazon support for help and have been procrastinating because I know it will be a one hour ordeal. This is why I prefer to purchase di…

Calibre. Convert those books to DRM-free formats asap and you're good to go. They become completely yours. I do it by default for all my Amazon kindle format purchases. It's "forbidden" but if I paid near physical book retail pricing for it, as far as i'm concerned, that copy of digital content deserves to be mine.

Re: “If you leave, we'll smash all your digital purchases into oblivion.”

#28

Post by dredmorbius »

T3OU-736 wrote: post #5
downerending wrote: post #2

Yeah, super-irritating. I bought about a dozen movies through Google Play before I realized that their platform was going to fail.

(IANAL) This is fairly pedantic, and I do apologize foe this, but it feels inaccurate to state (or to think) that you were able to buy those movies. We don't buy movies. At least in the US, we buy license/right to view. This gets... into interesting legal territory, but also this leads to situations like digital assets being unavailable after the account to which they are licensed being deleted.

Contra: First-Sale Doctrine:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First-sale_doctrine

See also, "The Right to Read":

https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.en.html

Re: “If you leave, we'll smash all your digital purchases into oblivion.”

#29

Post by NullPrefix »

harry8 wrote: post #18

Apple did this to my wife when she moved countries. Property is theft, apparently so some are justified in stealing it without compensation. How it is legal in any civilized country or not against WTO rules i can't understand. Maybe it is illegal. Maybe it is contrary to WTO rules?

What lesson did she learn?

Re: “If you leave, we'll smash all your digital purchases into oblivion.”

#30

Post by anticodon »

shadowprofile77 wrote: post #26
robomartin wrote: post #24

I have this problem right now, sort of. I purchased dozens of Kindle books through my personal Amazon account over the years. Now I prefer to do so through my business account. Yet, I want all of them available through the same device. Well, that’s a pain in the behind. I have to call Amazon support for help and have been procrastinating because I know it will be a one hour ordeal. This is why I prefer to purchase di…

Calibre. Convert those books to DRM-free formats asap and you're good to go. They become completely yours. I do it by default for all my Amazon kindle format purchases. It's "forbidden" but if I paid near physical book retail pricing for it, as far as i'm concerned, that copy of digital content deserves to be mine.

I was unable to do this for any recent purchase. Calibre could strip DRM only from very old books, like 7-10 years old.
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