"Games as a service" is fraud - An informative and hard-hitting video about software ownership rights and need for advocacy

[ARikozuM]

1 hour ago, kpluck said:

But the argument here is that companies should not be able to operate this way even if the consumer is fully aware of what they are getting into? That just doesn't make sense to me.

If the servers are active, you still have the ability to use your purchase. The moment they're offline, your purchase(s) is gone. 

 

If unofficial servers can be made available, it can prolong the life of the game. It could also give the developers a way to continue selling the game while not costing anything on the server side. 

[Delicieuxz]

12 hours ago, straight_stewie said:

Software is copyrighted, not patented. The difference is astronomical when it comes to situations like this.

Taking another look at things, here.

 

Although your comment is correct about the difference between a copyright and a patent, the ruling hinges on the belief that the patent-holder may no longer exercise authority over their patents in that item specifically because the product itself became the private, individual property of the purchaser:

 

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When a patentee sells an item, that product “is no longer within the limits of the [patent] monopoly” and instead becomes the “private, individual property” of the purchaser."

 

If the court's judgment is because the product itself becomes the private individual property of the purchaser, then the same reasoning could apply to an EULA's capability to exercise any post-sale authority over that item, because the point that the product has become the private, individual property of the purchaser remains the same.

[mr moose]

There is a bit of confusion as to what consumer protections exist for a "product".

 

With regard to software products:

The private owner of a software product is allowed to do almost anything they want with that software, except change any of the code and/or make it available publicly or (in most places) break DRM.   As soon as they do that it becomes copyright infringement.  (if you wish to argue that is unfair then by all means, but that is a separate discussion). Consumer law (especially Australian consumer law which I am well versed in) only determines a product for consumer protections purposes, it does not supersede copyright law and unless the consumer wasn't made aware of an extra internet service requirement (which is legal obligation here) then they are not entitled to server software after the game becomes EoL. 

 

As a consumer you are entitled to all the same protections with software as you are with physical products.   Those protections are (in most cases) tied to the product description at the point of sale. In other words if you are told you have to buy a sub to play the game and the game server is only guaranteed to run for 10 years, then when that ten years is up you have no rights to compensation on the code for said product.  This is because the consumer willingly bought a consumable product with a known EoL.  Services (regardless of the type of service) when properly explained at the point of sale are not fraud, and calling it that is disingenuous.  I say this because when a service (even a game sold as a service like AoC) is properly explained to the customer it is the customers choice to engage, they are not being promised a product that has an unknown usage limit.

 

 

https://www.accc.gov.au/consumers/consumer-rights-guarantees

 

These rights generally apply to all software purchases in Australia, they are the reason valve changed its refund policy.*

 

Consumer guarantees exist for services, they are listed on the same page because services are legal contracts between suppliers and consumers:

 

https://www.accc.gov.au/consumers/consumer-rights-guarantees/consumer-guarantees

 

All product and services (they can be bundled) must meet the following:

 

• be provided with acceptable care and skill or technical knowledge and taking all necessary steps to avoid loss and damage
• be fit for the purpose or give the results that you and the business had agreed to
• be delivered within a reasonable time when there is no agreed end date.

 

The last bullet point is crucial to this discussion, because this indicates that if a game service has no agreed end date, then what is determined to be a reasonable time will be at the discretion of the ACCC.    Hence why my post on the very first page asks a very important question, how long should a company be held to maintaining the service?  Because infinite is just not going to happen and if it does it will come with an added cost to consumers,  and if leaving the time frame top a government agency makes you uncomfortable then you need to actually consider what you want. 

 

 

*The EU also did the same thing at the same time making it much harder for valve to ignore.

 

[Delicieuxz]

1 hour ago, mr moose said:

There is a bit of confusion as to what consumer protections exist for a "product".

 

With regard to software products:

The private owner of a software product is allowed to do almost anything they want with that software, except change any of the code and/or make it available publicly or (in most places) break DRM.   As soon as they do that it becomes copyright infringement.

People are allowed to modify their own products including software, movies, music, etc. Otherwise, modding, tweaks, work-arounds, community patches, add-ons / extensions, movie fan edits, etc, would be illegal. But, all those things are protected uses of a person's own goods. It's distributing modified copyrighted works that is prohibited and that is a copyright violation.

 

In the US, it's legal to bypass DRM if it interferes with the intended functioning of the software.

 

In the EU, it's been speculated by the EU's Court of Justice that bypassing DRM is OK if it's necessary to access and use software that a person owns, though establishing that wasn't the goal of the court case where it was suggested.

 

I'm not aware of any countries that explicitly do not allow the bypassing of DRM when it comes to software a person owns. If you know of cases, I'd like to be made aware of them. I think that the right to repair concept can generally apply to software.

 

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unless the consumer wasn't made aware of an extra internet service requirement (which is legal obligation here) then they are not entitled to server software after the game becomes EoL.

AFAIK, currently nobody is, anywhere. Ross argues that either that should change or that it should be standard for some minimum of helpful resources to be made available upon service EoL for communities to work with to get a game functional again.

 

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In other words if you are told you have to buy a sub to play the game and the game server is only guaranteed to run for 10 years, then when that ten years is up you have no rights to compensation on the code for said product.  This is because the consumer willingly bought a consumable product with a known EoL.  Services (regardless of the type of service) when properly explained at the point of sale are not fraud, and calling it that is disingenuous.

Ross' video doesn't find fault with services ending, and whenever the server host chooses, but takes issue with the goods part going down with the services part. It's there that Ross sees a potential violation of software ownership rights.

 

Online subscription-based games sometimes involve two separate licenses to play them on the official servers:

 

1. A perpetual license for the base software

2. A subscription license to engage with the online servers to play the game

 

In other cases, an online game involves just a perpetual license, or maybe just a subscription license.

 

In cases where a game is truly subscription-based, Ross doesn't put up much of a fight. He contests when it's a perpetual licensed-based game that becomes unplayable because a service component was retired.

 

In those cases where the consumer has an entitlement to use of the software by ownership of a perpetual license for it, Ross wants to see a reasonable EoL plan that gives owners of those games at least the chance to do something on their own to make their games playable again.

 

Quote

https://www.accc.gov.au/consumers/consumer-rights-guarantees

 

These rights generally apply to all software purchases in Australia, they are the reason valve changed its refund policy.*

 

Consumer guarantees exist for services, they are listed on the same page because services are legal contracts between suppliers and consumers:

 

https://www.accc.gov.au/consumers/consumer-rights-guarantees/consumer-guarantees

 

All product and services (they can be bundled) must meet the following:

 

• be provided with acceptable care and skill or technical knowledge and taking all necessary steps to avoid loss and damage
• be fit for the purpose or give the results that you and the business had agreed to
• be delivered within a reasonable time when there is no agreed end date.

Ross also looks a bit at the ACCC Consumer Guarantees and gives his thoughts on some of them, in the section of his video about various countries' consumer protections.

 

 

[mr moose]

2 hours ago, Delicieuxz said:

People are allowed to modify their own products including software, movies, music, etc. Otherwise, modding, tweaks, work-arounds, community patches, add-ons / extensions, movie fan edits, etc, would be illegal. But, all those things are protected uses of a person's own goods. It's distributing modified copyrighted works that is prohibited and that is a copyright violation.

pretty I sure I said that.

Quote

In the US, it's legal to bypass DRM if it interferes with the intended functioning of the software.

 

In the EU, it's been speculated by the EU's Court of Justice that bypassing DRM is OK if it's necessary to access and use software that a person owns, though establishing that wasn't the goal of the court case where it was suggested.

Which are both instances within consumer law, however one is speculation because it hasn't been tried in a court yet, and if DRM interferes with the intended functionality of the program then it is a faulty program and you are entitled to your money back or a working replacement under Australian law.  Which means circumventing DRM is moot for consumer law purposes.

 

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I'm not aware of any countries that explicitly do not allow the bypassing of DRM when it comes to software a person owns. If you know of cases, I'd like to be made aware of them. I think that the right to repair concept can generally apply to software.

Most likely because it is one of those cases that hasn't really been tried in a court yet.  I do agree, right to repair should apply to software, the problem with that is that software doesn't usually break, when it stops working it's usually an outside situation (I.E OS update or external resources cease to operate).

 

Quote

AFAIK, currently nobody is, anywhere. Ross argues that either that should change or that it should be standard for some minimum of helpful resources to be made available upon service EoL for communities to work with to get a game functional again.

 

Ross' video doesn't find fault with services ending, and whenever the server host chooses, but takes issue with the goods part going down with the services part. It's there that Ross sees a potential violation of software ownership rights.

 

Online subscription-based games sometimes involve two separate licenses to play them on the official servers:

 

1. A perpetual license for the base software

2. A subscription license to engage with the online servers to play the game

 

In other cases, an online game involves just a perpetual license, or maybe just a subscription license.

 

In cases where a game is truly subscription-based, Ross doesn't put up much of a fight. He contests when it's a perpetual licensed-based game that becomes unplayable because a service component was retired.

 

In those cases where the consumer has an entitlement to use of the software by ownership of a perpetual license for it, Ross wants to see a reasonable EoL plan that gives owners of those games at least the chance to do something on their own to make their games playable again.

 

Ross also looks a bit at the ACCC Consumer Guarantees and gives his thoughts on some of them, in the section of his video about various countries' consumer protections.

 

 

I get where he is coming from, but again, If a consumer buys a game knowing there is a limitation to it's online support (even if that makes the game unplayable) then it is still not in violation of consumer law,  the consumer entered into the purchase knowing this.   This is why it is not fraud.  It would be fraud if the game dev promised ten years of online play and then didn't deliver, it would also be fraud if the company promised a perpetual single player experience then pulled the always on DRM support.  But the actual application of games as a service (be it combined with a paid product or not) is still covered under the same consumer laws I listed earlier.  

 

The biggest issue here that does not have a current solution is what to do when games become EoL due to age and dwindling revenue but still have consumers who want to play.  My suggestion to that was to amend copyright and IP laws so companies could make their servers available under a semi open license while still retaining full legal ownership rights.  I.E being able to cancel the free license should they wish to start their own servers up a gain.

 

I don't think this is vastly different from the outcome you and Ross wish to see, but it is different in that it does not prevent businesses from running their own business models and it doesn't require a change to consumer law (which should that occur could result in higher costs to consumers as companies try to recoup the costs of relinquishing IP).

 

Hell,  to be honest, I don't even know why these companies don't already offer cheaper licenses for small groups to run official game servers and charge a small sub fee.  But given the amount of times they try to take each other to court for CR and IP I'd wager it had something to do with that.

 

 

 

 

 

[Guest]

 

On 4/26/2019 at 8:51 PM, Delicieuxz said:

*snip~licenses can be transferred*

 

Good. Selling accounts should be legal. 

On 4/26/2019 at 8:51 PM, Delicieuxz said:

 

Here's another related thread:

 

Excellent... *sinister smile* 

because I’m an EU citizen, I can just say “oh really... the EU would like to have a word with you.” 

[Thaldor]

On 4/30/2019 at 11:59 AM, mr moose said:

I get where he is coming from, but again, If a consumer buys a game knowing there is a limitation to it's online support (even if that makes the game unplayable) then it is still not in violation of consumer law,  the consumer entered into the purchase knowing this.   This is why it is not fraud.  It would be fraud if the game dev promised ten years of online play and then didn't deliver, it would also be fraud if the company promised a perpetual single player experience then pulled the always on DRM support.  But the actual application of games as a service (be it combined with a paid product or not) is still covered under the same consumer laws I listed earlier. 

There's one kind of big problem. Game publishers just slap "Network connection" to the system requirments and from that the customer has zero chance without a lot deeper research to know whether that network connection is A) complete optional multiplayer B) completely multiplayer C) the game DVD is empty and the whole thing needs to be downladed D) DRM that requires all time network connection E) whatever I missed for reasons for a game to have network connection listed in its system requirments. Quite often games have "For multiplayer" in their requirments which makes things somewhat easier, but in some cases you don't really know into what pile of poop you're stepping in especialy if the game has always-on DRM.

 

Quote

The biggest issue here that does not have a current solution is what to do when games become EoL due to age and dwindling revenue but still have consumers who want to play.  My suggestion to that was to amend copyright and IP laws so companies could make their servers available under a semi open license while still retaining full legal ownership rights.  I.E being able to cancel the free license should they wish to start their own servers up a gain.

 

I don't think this is vastly different from the outcome you and Ross wish to see, but it is different in that it does not prevent businesses from running their own business models and it doesn't require a change to consumer law (which should that occur could result in higher costs to consumers as companies try to recoup the costs of relinquishing IP).

 

Hell,  to be honest, I don't even know why these companies don't already offer cheaper licenses for small groups to run official game servers and charge a small sub fee.  But given the amount of times they try to take each other to court for CR and IP I'd wager it had something to do with that.

There's one huge thing in way for this with modern titles and somewhat modern ones: "expected sales". And that's a problem because there's always someone at the financial branch thinking that every player who wants to play the game spends money on microtransactions and other crap even when every single research, poll and statistic shows that the most of the players don't buy them at all. So it's quite clear why they wouldn't sell the server kit for people to run servers by themselves; It's not profitable to run servers for 100 players, but if those 100 players would run their own server that would be "huge losses of revenue" because in-game purchases (which in the reality most of the players don't even use). It would also more or less allow piratism because the developer couldn't be able to monitor the servers and users [sarcasm] and that always means loss of sales [/sarcasm].

 

Not to mention if the company was to release a server pack at the EoL it would take probably few weeks and there would be a ton of servers with different settings when people get to play with the server software (there is no protection that would protect it) and players get to choose how they want the game (bigger droprates, game breaking level cap removals, ability to delete all of the grind and so on), probably pretty few players would come back to play on vanilla servers with every bit of earlier monetization applied and probably it would take couple of days for people to crack whatever system that server pack would have to restrict it from working after official servers were rebooted and even if not, most of the players would probably quit.

 

So, basicly a bunch of BS excuses that only make sense for people who are completely separated from the reality.

[mr moose]

1 minute ago, Thaldor said:

There's one kind of big problem. Game publishers just slap "Network connection" to the system requirments and from that the customer has zero chance without a lot deeper research to know whether that network connection is A) complete optional multiplayer B) completely multiplayer C) the game DVD is empty and the whole thing needs to be downladed D) DRM that requires all time network connection E) whatever I missed for reasons for a game to have network connection listed in its system requirments. Quite often games have "For multiplayer" in their requirments which makes things somewhat easier, but in some cases you don't really know into what pile of poop you're stepping in especialy if the game has always-on DRM.

That is all covered in consumer law, especially Australia's (which is the root of my discussion).  If the game requires a separate paid sub it must be included in  the sales description.  Otherwise it is not the product the consumer bought and a full refund is required.  The only other option is that thee store you bought it from provide you with a product that doesn't require a paid sub to work as described (not going to happen).

 

1 minute ago, Thaldor said:

There's one huge thing in way for this with modern titles and somewhat modern ones: SNIP

That is why I was talking about EoL and not modern titles, I addressed modern titles under the consumer law definitions and requirements earlier in the thread.

1 minute ago, Thaldor said:

 

Not to mention if the company was to release a server pack at the EoL it would take probably few weeks and there would be a ton of servers with different settings when people get to play with the server software (there is no protection that would protect it) and players get to choose how they want the game (bigger droprates, game breaking level cap removals, ability to delete all of the grind and so on), probably pretty few players would come back to play on vanilla servers with every bit of earlier monetization applied and probably it would take couple of days for people to crack whatever system that server pack would have to restrict it from working after official servers were rebooted and even if not, most of the players would probably quit.

Which is why my suggestion permitted the company to retain all IP and CR entitlements as if they were contracting the software out, that way server software can still be locked down and legal action can be taken against those who do not abide the terms.   It's kind of a weird grey area that has little precedent set in law because it is solely a predicament of the internet and new technology.  such issues with CR have not existed before.  

 

1 minute ago, Thaldor said:

So, basicly a bunch of BS excuses that only make sense for people who are completely separated from the reality.

It is indeed that in many ways, but it is also a tricky situation that seems to have people leaning in either extreme and not spending much time trying to find a middle ground.   I guess on one side you have people who think they shouldn't be entitled to everything and on the other side you have large corporations who think walking over customers is acceptable money making policy.

 

 

[Thaldor]

7 minutes ago, mr moose said:

That is all covered in consumer law, especially Australia's (which is the root of my discussion).  If the game requires a separate paid sub it must be included in  the sales description.  Otherwise it is not the product the consumer bought and a full refund is required.  The only other option is that thee store you bought it from provide you with a product that doesn't require a paid sub to work as described (not going to happen).

Sub is only one thing and that's one thing game companies have noted since the beginning. The other things hanging around like the always-on DRM, they don't tell you before excpet that vague "Internet access required". The problem went even so far that the DMCA in US has exception that allows anyone use whatever ways to bypass always-on DRMs when the servers have been down for 6 months.

 

Quote

That is why I was talking about EoL and not modern titles, I addressed modern titles under the consumer law definitions and requirements earlier in the thread.

 

Which is why my suggestion permitted the company to retain all IP and CR entitlements as if they were contracting the software out, that way server software can still be locked down and legal action can be taken against those who do not abide the terms.   It's kind of a weird grey area that has little precedent set in law because it is solely a predicament of the internet and new technology.  such issues with CR have not existed before.

IIRC battle.net/Blizzard once tried to go after private WoW servers, didn't end that well because "those bastards" actually knew how to mask themselves. They still go after them but one Google search and you find probably hundreds of them, so that's how much they are really doing and we are talking about probably the biggest corporation in MMO world. So, it's really a comes to the same roots as "Do you need drivers licence to drive a car?" while legally yes you need, in the other hand you don't drive a car with your licence and you can drive it quite a long time without one if you don't get gaught.

That makes the grey area kind of problematic when there really isn't any protection that couldn't be cracked and it's quite easy to hide your identity in the net, at least if you have enough skills to crack strong protections. So, basicly releasing any kind of server pack would be very bad if you think from the perspective of the normal guy in a suit whos expertise in games comes from owning stocks.

 

Quote

It is indeed that in many ways, but it is also a tricky situation that seems to have people leaning in either extreme and not spending much time trying to find a middle ground.   I guess on one side you have people who think they shouldn't be entitled to everything and on the other side you have large corporations who think walking over customers is acceptable money making policy.

Pretty much. Only solutions I can come up with is that the governments would step in and make the rules, but then again I don't really trust in politicans because reasons. If the corporations get what they want the players will be unhappy and vice versa and in any case the unhappy side will find the ways to get what they want, no matter what (players turning to piracy and cracking - corporations finding the legal loopholes to shit on the players).

But there's still hope as long as developers can resist the urge to go for the easy money they might be able to keep their head and bring better solutions for everyone (except the stock holders who seem to usually fuck up everything in their greed), like it's not one or twice (very rare still) that develoeprs have actually released their game to pirates just because every kind of interest is good and it's better to release safe version so everyone can enjoy without fear of malwares and hopefully spread the word so others get interested and hopefully buy the game. The same mentality could be in multiplayer games with servers sometime, hopefully.

[mr moose]

22 minutes ago, Thaldor said:

Sub is only one thing and that's one thing game companies have noted since the beginning. The other things hanging around like the always-on DRM, they don't tell you before excpet that vague "Internet access required". The problem went even so far that the DMCA in US has exception that allows anyone use whatever ways to bypass always-on DRMs when the servers have been down for 6 months.

I can't really comment on consumer law or conditions in the US.

22 minutes ago, Thaldor said:

IIRC battle.net/Blizzard once tried to go after private WoW servers, didn't end that well because "those bastards" actually knew how to mask themselves. They still go after them but one Google search and you find probably hundreds of them, so that's how much they are really doing and we are talking about probably the biggest corporation in MMO world. So, it's really a comes to the same roots as "Do you need drivers licence to drive a car?" while legally yes you need, in the other hand you don't drive a car with your licence and you can drive it quite a long time without one if you don't get gaught.

That makes the grey area kind of problematic when there really isn't any protection that couldn't be cracked and it's quite easy to hide your identity in the net, at least if you have enough skills to crack strong protections. So, basicly releasing any kind of server pack would be very bad if you think from the perspective of the normal guy in a suit whos expertise in games comes from owning stocks.

From this it would be more logical to blame the server and game pirates for the fact companies don't license out free versions of EoL servers.  It seems like the old adage, one bad apple spoils the bunch comes true again.  Although this time it's a few apples and the bunches are spread out.

22 minutes ago, Thaldor said:

Pretty much. Only solutions I can come up with is that the governments would step in and make the rules, but then again I don't really trust in politicans because reasons. If the corporations get what they want the players will be unhappy and vice versa and in any case the unhappy side will find the ways to get what they want, no matter what (players turning to piracy and cracking - corporations finding the legal loopholes to shit on the players).

But there's still hope as long as developers can resist the urge to go for the easy money they might be able to keep their head and bring better solutions for everyone (except the stock holders who seem to usually fuck up everything in their greed), like it's not one or twice (very rare still) that develoeprs have actually released their game to pirates just because every kind of interest is good and it's better to release safe version so everyone can enjoy without fear of malwares and hopefully spread the word so others get interested and hopefully buy the game. The same mentality could be in multiplayer games with servers sometime, hopefully.

I hold hope that the balance of market forces (people not being able to or willing to pay stupid prices for stupid services will keep the system in check, although it's not working terribly well in the GPU market, I am sure there are other factors involved there.

[79wjd]

On 4/29/2019 at 4:02 PM, kpluck said:

I guess I am not understanding this.

 

If I purchase a MMO, I know that if the company shuts down the servers I can no longer play. That means the money I spent to get the software and any money I spent on microtransactions is gone…and I know this going in. I don't see any problem with this as long as these conditions are known before I make the first purchase.

 

As a consumer, it is my job to understand the pros and cons of what I am purchasing and to make an informed decision either way.

 

But the argument here is that companies should not be able to operate this way even if the consumer is fully aware of what they are getting into? That just doesn't make sense to me.

 

-kp

 

A sense of personal responsibility is rare these days. 

 

Everything is always someone else's fault, and that someone else should have done everything differently.