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European Union Rules: You Can Resell Downloaded Games.
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MetalGuru
Jul 6, 2012, 12:38:55 AM7/6/12
to
Or where is John Lewis when you need him?
http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2012/07/03/crikey-eu-rules-you-can-resell-downloaded-games/
Take that Steam!
http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2012/07/03/crikey-eu-rules-you-can-resell-downloaded-games/
Take that Steam!
John Lewis
Jul 6, 2012, 3:39:51 AM7/6/12
to
NAMED....in this newsgroup..
I saw this news on Ars Technica a few days ago. Exactly how that would
affect S****'s business model in Europe is still not at all clear.
John Lewis
Rin Stowleigh
Jul 6, 2012, 5:50:39 AM7/6/12
to
On Fri, 06 Jul 2012 07:39:51 GMT, john...@frontier.com (John Lewis)
wrote:
I don't think it affects Steam at all. You are not buying a copy of a
game through Steam, nor "downloading from a website". You are
subscribing to services offered by Steam.
"All title, ownership rights and intellectual property rights in and
to the Software and any and all copies thereof are owned by Valve
and/or its licensors".
http://store.steampowered.com/subscriber_agreement/
You can't be granted the right to resell something you never owned in
the first place, and even that is not a physical copy versus digital
download issue.
wrote:
game through Steam, nor "downloading from a website". You are
subscribing to services offered by Steam.
"All title, ownership rights and intellectual property rights in and
to the Software and any and all copies thereof are owned by Valve
and/or its licensors".
http://store.steampowered.com/subscriber_agreement/
You can't be granted the right to resell something you never owned in
the first place, and even that is not a physical copy versus digital
download issue.
Unknown
Jul 6, 2012, 10:04:11 AM7/6/12
to
In reply to "Rin Stowleigh" who wrote the following:
Wonder how this would apply to Skrym, which I purchased and have the DVD but
cannot be used except in conjunction with Steam?
cannot be used except in conjunction with Steam?
Ross Ridge
Jul 6, 2012, 10:36:43 AM7/6/12
to
John Lewis <john...@frontier.com> wrote:
>I saw this news on Ars Technica a few days ago. Exactly how that would
>affect S****'s business model in Europe is still not at all clear.
It suggests that Valve can't prevent the sale of used Steam games in
>I saw this news on Ars Technica a few days ago. Exactly how that would
>affect S****'s business model in Europe is still not at all clear.
Europe. It all comes down to whether the software is licenced for an
"unlimited" term or not.
Note that same principle of first sale applies in the US as well so they
probably can't legally prevent used game sales in there either.
Ross Ridge
--
l/ // Ross Ridge -- The Great HTMU
[oo][oo] rri...@csclub.uwaterloo.ca
-()-/()/ http://www.csclub.uwaterloo.ca/~rridge/
db //
Rin Stowleigh
Jul 6, 2012, 12:19:24 PM7/6/12
to
there. It was originally cross-posted then got partially disjointed,
like so many cross-posted topics.
Klaatu
Jul 6, 2012, 4:38:18 PM7/6/12
to
On Fri, 06 Jul 2012 14:04:11 GMT, hr...@com.com posted to
comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.rpg:
> Wonder how this would apply to Skrym, which I purchased and have the
> DVD but cannot be used except in conjunction with Steam?
Probably no different than any other Steam game. If and when the Steam key
were to be transferred to someone else, they could just download it from
Steam; no need for that DVD (and it would essentially become useless).
--
... I am dyslectic of Borg. Your ass will be laminated.
comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.rpg:
> Wonder how this would apply to Skrym, which I purchased and have the
> DVD but cannot be used except in conjunction with Steam?
were to be transferred to someone else, they could just download it from
Steam; no need for that DVD (and it would essentially become useless).
--
... I am dyslectic of Borg. Your ass will be laminated.
David Lamb
Jul 7, 2012, 10:05:41 AM7/7/12
to
On 06/07/2012 5:50 AM, Rin Stowleigh wrote:
> I don't think it affects Steam at all. You are not buying a copy of a
> game through Steam, nor "downloading from a website". You are
> subscribing to services offered by Steam.
>
> "All title, ownership rights and intellectual property rights in and
> to the Software and any and all copies thereof are owned by Valve
> and/or its licensors".
>
> http://store.steampowered.com/subscriber_agreement/
>
> You can't be granted the right to resell something you never owned in
> the first place, and even that is not a physical copy versus digital
> download issue.
If you read the article, it appears on the surface the EU decision
> I don't think it affects Steam at all. You are not buying a copy of a
> game through Steam, nor "downloading from a website". You are
> subscribing to services offered by Steam.
>
> "All title, ownership rights and intellectual property rights in and
> to the Software and any and all copies thereof are owned by Valve
> and/or its licensors".
>
> http://store.steampowered.com/subscriber_agreement/
>
> You can't be granted the right to resell something you never owned in
> the first place, and even that is not a physical copy versus digital
> download issue.
overrides such contracts and those clauses become unenforceable. IANAL
and the wording is, like most legal decisions, kind of obscure to the
non-lawyer, so you could be right instead.
David Lamb
Jul 7, 2012, 11:46:40 AM7/7/12
to
like one more step towards your interpretation. I think I need to read
the whole thing 2-3 times before I begin to figure out what it means.
Were I a distributor, I'd sure want to hire a few experts in European
Union law before deciding what to do.
Rin Stowleigh
Jul 7, 2012, 11:56:18 AM7/7/12
to
On Sat, 07 Jul 2012 10:05:41 -0400, David Lamb <dal...@cs.queensu.ca>
wrote:
>On 06/07/2012 5:50 AM, Rin Stowleigh wrote:
>> I don't think it affects Steam at all. You are not buying a copy of a
>> game through Steam, nor "downloading from a website". You are
>> subscribing to services offered by Steam.
>>
>> "All title, ownership rights and intellectual property rights in and
>> to the Software and any and all copies thereof are owned by Valve
>> and/or its licensors".
>>
>> http://store.steampowered.com/subscriber_agreement/
>>
>> You can't be granted the right to resell something you never owned in
>> the first place, and even that is not a physical copy versus digital
>> download issue.
>
>If you read the article, it appears on the surface the EU decision
>overrides such contracts and those clauses become unenforceable.
They can try all they want, but whether or not software is a product
to be owned or a service to be subscribed to is really defined by how
the vendor brings it to market and not legislation.
Worst case scenario, let's say I sell some software application as a
service with a fee of $10 per year. The EU says its not a service,
its a product and I have make ownership transferable. Fine, customer
is paid through the year so they "own it" going forward, even after
that first year. Like almost every application written in the last
several decades, that application most likely needs maintenance for it
to be useful, if nothing else to continue working as operating systems
evolve with service packs and security updates (this is assuming it
doesn't involve some sort of online connectivity, authentication to a
central server, etc like the majority of useful apps these days do).
Well, since Joe Customer *only* owns the product now, he is no longer
entitled to maintenance to ensure that program continues to work in
perpetuity. At some point the app will break and he's screwed. He
still owns it, but its worthless unlike when he first bought it.
Software "products" cannot be guaranteed to continue working without
either ongoing maintenance and support (which costs someone somewhere
something) or "hobbyist workarounds" such as sandboxing the OS
environment to work the way it did when the game was released. With
consoles, that type of environment configuration is probably out of
reach of most console owners.
For this fact alone, whether or not a software application is provided
as a sold product or licensed service is always going to be entirely
up to the vendor, because only they can construct and maintain the
business model that makes either type of model possible. Legislative
attempts to get in the way of that are probably just going to
backfire, as in the example I gave before of offering free DLC to the
initial registrant of the game.
Besides, if the EU tried to make all games resellable, they're in for
some serious backlash when everyone realizes that this contradicts
trends in DRM and things like limited activations, and that forcing a
software product resellable is paving the road to increase piracy
rather than curb it.
If nothing else, companies would just say "screw this" and pull out of
markets that make it a pain in the ass to do business in.
wrote:
>On 06/07/2012 5:50 AM, Rin Stowleigh wrote:
>> I don't think it affects Steam at all. You are not buying a copy of a
>> game through Steam, nor "downloading from a website". You are
>> subscribing to services offered by Steam.
>>
>> "All title, ownership rights and intellectual property rights in and
>> to the Software and any and all copies thereof are owned by Valve
>> and/or its licensors".
>>
>> http://store.steampowered.com/subscriber_agreement/
>>
>> You can't be granted the right to resell something you never owned in
>> the first place, and even that is not a physical copy versus digital
>> download issue.
>
>If you read the article, it appears on the surface the EU decision
>overrides such contracts and those clauses become unenforceable.
to be owned or a service to be subscribed to is really defined by how
the vendor brings it to market and not legislation.
Worst case scenario, let's say I sell some software application as a
service with a fee of $10 per year. The EU says its not a service,
its a product and I have make ownership transferable. Fine, customer
is paid through the year so they "own it" going forward, even after
that first year. Like almost every application written in the last
several decades, that application most likely needs maintenance for it
to be useful, if nothing else to continue working as operating systems
evolve with service packs and security updates (this is assuming it
doesn't involve some sort of online connectivity, authentication to a
central server, etc like the majority of useful apps these days do).
Well, since Joe Customer *only* owns the product now, he is no longer
entitled to maintenance to ensure that program continues to work in
perpetuity. At some point the app will break and he's screwed. He
still owns it, but its worthless unlike when he first bought it.
Software "products" cannot be guaranteed to continue working without
either ongoing maintenance and support (which costs someone somewhere
something) or "hobbyist workarounds" such as sandboxing the OS
environment to work the way it did when the game was released. With
consoles, that type of environment configuration is probably out of
reach of most console owners.
For this fact alone, whether or not a software application is provided
as a sold product or licensed service is always going to be entirely
up to the vendor, because only they can construct and maintain the
business model that makes either type of model possible. Legislative
attempts to get in the way of that are probably just going to
backfire, as in the example I gave before of offering free DLC to the
initial registrant of the game.
Besides, if the EU tried to make all games resellable, they're in for
some serious backlash when everyone realizes that this contradicts
trends in DRM and things like limited activations, and that forcing a
software product resellable is paving the road to increase piracy
rather than curb it.
If nothing else, companies would just say "screw this" and pull out of
markets that make it a pain in the ass to do business in.
David Lamb
Jul 7, 2012, 12:18:18 PM7/7/12
to
On 07/07/2012 11:56 AM, Rin Stowleigh wrote:
> They can try all they want, but whether or not software is a product
> to be owned or a service to be subscribed to is really defined by how
> the vendor brings it to market and not legislation.
Uh, what? A sovereign government doesn't get to decide what constitutes
> They can try all they want, but whether or not software is a product
> to be owned or a service to be subscribed to is really defined by how
> the vendor brings it to market and not legislation.
a "sale" within its own borders?
> Well, since Joe Customer *only* owns the product now, he is no longer
> entitled to maintenance to ensure that program continues to work in
> perpetuity. At some point the app will break and he's screwed. He
> still owns it, but its worthless unlike when he first bought it.
from changes to the operating system? Those are far enough apart, and
there are enough play-once or play-only-a-few-times that the resale
market is still viable for a while.
> Besides, if the EU tried to make all games resellable, they're in for
> some serious backlash when everyone realizes that this contradicts
> trends in DRM and things like limited activations, and that forcing a
> software product resellable is paving the road to increase piracy
> rather than curb it.
that's a whole other flamewar. I expect the EU will be forced to
consider limited activations and always-online in some future lawsuit. I
mean, if they're serious about wanting to protect the resale market, and
if they come to believe that some kinds of DRM are deliberately aimed at
killing the resale market, they're going to want to at least consider
whether to extend their earlier rulings. I'm not saying they will try to
ban such DRM, but they're going to have to consider the legal implications.
I suppose "not for sale in Europe" might be the ultimate out, but it's a
big market to abandon; a different business model compatible with EU law
might be more profitable. Also maybe there would be legal fuss about
someone, especially a visitor, buying in the US and selling while in
Europe. US laws aren't inherently extraterritorial, so the "no resale"
clause of a EULA might be unenforceable in Europe.
Rin Stowleigh
Jul 7, 2012, 12:40:48 PM7/7/12
to
On Sat, 07 Jul 2012 12:18:18 -0400, David Lamb <dal...@cs.queensu.ca>
wrote:
>On 07/07/2012 11:56 AM, Rin Stowleigh wrote:
>> They can try all they want, but whether or not software is a product
>> to be owned or a service to be subscribed to is really defined by how
>> the vendor brings it to market and not legislation.
>
>Uh, what? A sovereign government doesn't get to decide what constitutes
>a "sale" within its own borders?
Not really. As I said before if they enact something so rediculously
stupid that it makes it a pain in the ass to do business in that
market, vendors will just not do business in that market.
>> Well, since Joe Customer *only* owns the product now, he is no longer
>> entitled to maintenance to ensure that program continues to work in
>> perpetuity. At some point the app will break and he's screwed. He
>> still owns it, but its worthless unlike when he first bought it.
>
>A good point for the most part, but isn't that likely to arise mostly
>from changes to the operating system? Those are far enough apart, and
>there are enough play-once or play-only-a-few-times that the resale
>market is still viable for a while.
I'm not saying the resale market isn't viable. I'm just saying that
legislative attempts to make software-as-a-service impossible will
fail miserably.
>> Besides, if the EU tried to make all games resellable, they're in for
>> some serious backlash when everyone realizes that this contradicts
>> trends in DRM and things like limited activations, and that forcing a
>> software product resellable is paving the road to increase piracy
>> rather than curb it.
>
>Some people would love for governments to oppose "trends in DRM" but
>that's a whole other flamewar. I expect the EU will be forced to
>consider limited activations and always-online in some future lawsuit. I
>mean, if they're serious about wanting to protect the resale market, and
>if they come to believe that some kinds of DRM are deliberately aimed at
>killing the resale market, they're going to want to at least consider
>whether to extend their earlier rulings. I'm not saying they will try to
>ban such DRM, but they're going to have to consider the legal implications.
>
>I suppose "not for sale in Europe" might be the ultimate out, but it's a
>big market to abandon; a different business model compatible with EU law
>might be more profitable. Also maybe there would be legal fuss about
>someone, especially a visitor, buying in the US and selling while in
>Europe. US laws aren't inherently extraterritorial, so the "no resale"
>clause of a EULA might be unenforceable in Europe.
I think its all been made too much of, both in that article and in
this thread.
Let's look at the salient portion of the article:
The specific rule seems to be that if a license is sold indefinitely –
i.e. not a license for a year, or similar – that the rightholder
“exhausts his exclusive distribution right”.
“Such a transaction involves a transfer of the right of ownership of
the copy.”
That means that all the software vendor has to do is say "you are
licensed to use this product for one year from purchase. Join the
uPlay network" (or pre-purchase, or some other excuse) "and get free
annual auto-renewals for life!"... They have just bypassed the rule
while barely lifting a finger.
There are a gazillion workarounds to legislative silliness like this.
The EU action described in the article is a particular shot at Oracle,
who deserves every shot they get; it had nothing to do with games.
Linking all of this to Steam or any other game licensing discussion
was really sensationalism on the part of the article author.
wrote:
>On 07/07/2012 11:56 AM, Rin Stowleigh wrote:
>> They can try all they want, but whether or not software is a product
>> to be owned or a service to be subscribed to is really defined by how
>> the vendor brings it to market and not legislation.
>
>Uh, what? A sovereign government doesn't get to decide what constitutes
>a "sale" within its own borders?
stupid that it makes it a pain in the ass to do business in that
market, vendors will just not do business in that market.
>> Well, since Joe Customer *only* owns the product now, he is no longer
>> entitled to maintenance to ensure that program continues to work in
>> perpetuity. At some point the app will break and he's screwed. He
>> still owns it, but its worthless unlike when he first bought it.
>
>A good point for the most part, but isn't that likely to arise mostly
>from changes to the operating system? Those are far enough apart, and
>there are enough play-once or play-only-a-few-times that the resale
>market is still viable for a while.
legislative attempts to make software-as-a-service impossible will
fail miserably.
>> Besides, if the EU tried to make all games resellable, they're in for
>> some serious backlash when everyone realizes that this contradicts
>> trends in DRM and things like limited activations, and that forcing a
>> software product resellable is paving the road to increase piracy
>> rather than curb it.
>
>Some people would love for governments to oppose "trends in DRM" but
>that's a whole other flamewar. I expect the EU will be forced to
>consider limited activations and always-online in some future lawsuit. I
>mean, if they're serious about wanting to protect the resale market, and
>if they come to believe that some kinds of DRM are deliberately aimed at
>killing the resale market, they're going to want to at least consider
>whether to extend their earlier rulings. I'm not saying they will try to
>ban such DRM, but they're going to have to consider the legal implications.
>
>I suppose "not for sale in Europe" might be the ultimate out, but it's a
>big market to abandon; a different business model compatible with EU law
>might be more profitable. Also maybe there would be legal fuss about
>someone, especially a visitor, buying in the US and selling while in
>Europe. US laws aren't inherently extraterritorial, so the "no resale"
>clause of a EULA might be unenforceable in Europe.
this thread.
Let's look at the salient portion of the article:
The specific rule seems to be that if a license is sold indefinitely –
i.e. not a license for a year, or similar – that the rightholder
“exhausts his exclusive distribution right”.
“Such a transaction involves a transfer of the right of ownership of
the copy.”
That means that all the software vendor has to do is say "you are
licensed to use this product for one year from purchase. Join the
uPlay network" (or pre-purchase, or some other excuse) "and get free
annual auto-renewals for life!"... They have just bypassed the rule
while barely lifting a finger.
There are a gazillion workarounds to legislative silliness like this.
The EU action described in the article is a particular shot at Oracle,
who deserves every shot they get; it had nothing to do with games.
Linking all of this to Steam or any other game licensing discussion
was really sensationalism on the part of the article author.
Procession Machine
Jul 11, 2012, 1:59:00 AM7/11/12
to
On 7/6/2012 3:50 AM, Rin Stowleigh wrote:
> On Fri, 06 Jul 2012 07:39:51 GMT, john...@frontier.com (John Lewis)
> wrote:
>
>> On Fri, 6 Jul 2012 00:38:55 -0400, "MetalGuru" <fa...@mail.com> wrote:
>>
>>> Or where is John Lewis when you need him?
>>>
>>> http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2012/07/03/crikey-eu-rules-you-can-resell-downloaded-games/
>>>
>>> Take that Steam!
>>>
>>>
>> Shhhhh..... quiet....You are talking about IT WHICH MUST NOT BE
>> NAMED....in this newsgroup..
>>
>> I saw this news on Ars Technica a few days ago. Exactly how that would
>> affect S****'s business model in Europe is still not at all clear.
>
> I don't think it affects Steam at all. You are not buying a copy of a
> game through Steam, nor "downloading from a website". You are
> subscribing to services offered by Steam.
>
> "All title, ownership rights and intellectual property rights in and
> to the Software and any and all copies thereof are owned by Valve
> and/or its licensors".
Yes, yet what about when Steam goes to Hell for this ridiculous policy?
> On Fri, 06 Jul 2012 07:39:51 GMT, john...@frontier.com (John Lewis)
> wrote:
>
>> On Fri, 6 Jul 2012 00:38:55 -0400, "MetalGuru" <fa...@mail.com> wrote:
>>
>>> Or where is John Lewis when you need him?
>>>
>>> http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2012/07/03/crikey-eu-rules-you-can-resell-downloaded-games/
>>>
>>> Take that Steam!
>>>
>>>
>> Shhhhh..... quiet....You are talking about IT WHICH MUST NOT BE
>> NAMED....in this newsgroup..
>>
>> I saw this news on Ars Technica a few days ago. Exactly how that would
>> affect S****'s business model in Europe is still not at all clear.
>
> I don't think it affects Steam at all. You are not buying a copy of a
> game through Steam, nor "downloading from a website". You are
> subscribing to services offered by Steam.
>
> "All title, ownership rights and intellectual property rights in and
> to the Software and any and all copies thereof are owned by Valve
> and/or its licensors".
--
Four Gods. Dwarves piling out of a volcano that was Nigeria.
Gnat map hijack. Torture those bugs till they get the message.
Guilty, your honor. I guarantee it.
Rin Stowleigh
Jul 11, 2012, 8:11:34 AM7/11/12
to
On Tue, 10 Jul 2012 23:59:00 -0600, Procession Machine
<nochs...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>Yes, yet what about when Steam goes to Hell for this ridiculous policy?
They've been in hell since day one, but apparently making the most of
<nochs...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>Yes, yet what about when Steam goes to Hell for this ridiculous policy?
it with consistent 200% year over year growth.
Christian Brandt
Jul 11, 2012, 10:40:00 AM7/11/12
to
Am 06.07.2012 11:50, schrieb Rin Stowleigh:
> You are subscribing to services offered by Steam.
Thats irrelevant in the EU too. If it looks like a sale then it is a
> You are subscribing to services offered by Steam.
sale, no matter what the fine print says. On the other hand I am
absolutely sure that Steam does not want to "subscibe games" to EU
customers because by EU law a subscription has a lot of caveats which
steam surelly doesn't want, e.g. ongoing caretaking, extended liability
and many other nasty things.
> "All title, ownership rights and intellectual property rights in and
> to the Software and any and all copies thereof are owned by Valve
> and/or its licensors".
> http://store.steampowered.com/subscriber_agreement/
>
> You can't be granted the right to resell something you never owned in
> the first place, and even that is not a physical copy versus digital
> download issue.
(didn't run on his new W7 system) from steam and they complied when he
threatened legal actions for not fullfilling ongoing caretaking a
subscription service. The whole Steam EULA is pretty much toilet paper
outside the US. And most likely also inside the US, at least in 36 states.
Christian Brandt
Rin Stowleigh
Jul 11, 2012, 11:22:26 AM7/11/12
to
On Wed, 11 Jul 2012 16:40:00 +0200, Christian Brandt
<bra...@psi5.com> wrote:
>Am 06.07.2012 11:50, schrieb Rin Stowleigh:
>
>> You are subscribing to services offered by Steam.
>
> Thats irrelevant in the EU too. If it looks like a sale then it is a
>sale, no matter what the fine print says. On the other hand I am
>absolutely sure that Steam does not want to "subscibe games" to EU
>customers because by EU law a subscription has a lot of caveats which
>steam surelly doesn't want, e.g. ongoing caretaking, extended liability
>and many other nasty things.
I'll assume that Valve's lawyers have calculated their risk, and that
<bra...@psi5.com> wrote:
>Am 06.07.2012 11:50, schrieb Rin Stowleigh:
>
>> You are subscribing to services offered by Steam.
>
> Thats irrelevant in the EU too. If it looks like a sale then it is a
>sale, no matter what the fine print says. On the other hand I am
>absolutely sure that Steam does not want to "subscibe games" to EU
>customers because by EU law a subscription has a lot of caveats which
>steam surelly doesn't want, e.g. ongoing caretaking, extended liability
>and many other nasty things.
all folks with a stake in it have evaluated it at a level that is far
more in depth than the above attempt to change my mind.
>> "All title, ownership rights and intellectual property rights in and
>> to the Software and any and all copies thereof are owned by Valve
>> and/or its licensors".
>
> Statements illegal by EU law are irrelevant by EU law.
probably gives a flying fuck, but personally I'm having a hard time
doing same.
Valve is in a position to pull out of any market that becomes too much
of a pain in the ass to do business in, if they have to. However it's
never that simple, and organizations that want to be as successful as
possible, and most of those run by smart people will find a way to
accomodate international law and if necessary do as the Romans do when
in Rome. Valve has plenty of legal resources that specialize in
international commerce, and I'd suggest we leave it to the folks who
know what they are talking about with regard global legal matters,
because I'm not a lawyer and I don't think you are either.
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