With the end of physical PlayStation games looming, the need for clear digital ownership rights is more pressing than ever.
For its part, Sony believes your rights are very clear: you do not own your digital games, and it’s unlikely you’re stupid enough to believe otherwise. At least, that’s roughly the argument the company’s lawyers are presenting in response to a proposed class-action lawsuit.
Sony argues that its current customer-facing disclosures ensure that “reasonable consumers would not be misled” into believing they actually own their digital games. That’s according to a Game File report (paid article link) citing an August 21 filing Sony’s lawyers made in California’s Northern District.
Sounds like they went to the Donald Trump school of logic.
Sony said click “Agree” when downloading.
Sadly, they’re not wrong.
Right, like, how “owning” a car means that you need to purchase the entire means of production required to produce said car, including all patents and trademarks.
This guy is somehow multi-rail drifting his pseudo-capitalist argument with like, a cartoon version of communism. It’s like he dropped acid and decided to become Frankenstein’s Economist.
Or if you buy a print copy of a famous art work you some how don’t own it because it’s a copy?
Or a book is a good analogue. I can own a copy of a book, a reprint. It’s mine.
sony’s even considered a game publisher… ya know, just like random house is a book publisher.
Sony argues that its current customer-facing disclosures ensure that “reasonable consumers would not be misled” into believing they actually own their digital games.
They can make that argument, but I think they’ll have a hard time finding evidence to support it. Judges aren’t stupid, but they can be corrupt, however.
if only one person can buy GTA 6, how can more than one person rent GTA 6?
The answer is always the human centipede
So lets say one person owns it then through the magic of technology everybody else is playing their shared version
… wait. That’s not obvious. If it was obvious, it wouldn’t be a “Buy now” it would be like a “Purchase License.”
Because thats literally how the rest of the software industry works.
One thing I’ve noticed is that, while they call it a store, they’ve gone out of their way to not use the word buy. It says “add to cart”, and that there are “purchases”, and that you can “check out”. But it’s been a long time since I’ve seen an actual buy button in any App Store I think they’ve seen this coming for a minute.
And, you know, English.
You don’t by Microsoft 365, you subscribe. But you do buy games. Oh wait…
Sony’s lawyers are dumb af
“You can’t, like, own a digital title, man. Like, if you, like, play a game it doesn’t make it your game, you know, it’s God’s game, man! It’s God’s game!”
Oh really? Then it’s not a store, and it’s not a sale. It’s a leasing office and a lease.
Actually this is an alright solution.
They should be forced to change the name of their platform if they want to keep using it. They should be barred from using the term “store”.
They can either continue their business model as is, (as “PlayStation Leasing”) or they can change their policy to include full ownership of games and the right to transfer the games they own to other accounts.
But they don’t get to call it a “store” or use words like “buy” or “sale” if that’s not what they’re actually offering.
Absolutely
Good point. Don’t say we’re buying it. They use the terminology of ownership when you’re paying money.
They dont need to keep trying to convice me to never buy another Sony/ Rockstar product. They keep giving more reasons though.
Sony convinced me that years ago when they sold me an expensive af dvd camcorder and then they hobbled it so it was unusable unless you edited in their crappy software and exported it through their expensive dongles.
I always knew but it got confirmed for me about 20 years ago when I bought a 60$ dvd player that could play XviD discs and burned discs with no issues at all, my friend’s 300$ brand new Sony DVD player would not even play some legit DVD’s and refused any burned discs.
how would somebody even go about making lives of the people responsible for this bullshit worse?
like how does the average person say “fuck you” to the assholes coming up with this shit?
The average person? Like you and me what can we do? Don’t buy any Sony products and if anyone asks for a recommendation, don’t reccomend anything by Sony. That’s the only power you wield, really.
yeah that’s not enough of a “fuck you” for my liking
Well then, I’d look into car bombing Sony executives. Sounds like it’s more your speed. Maybe hack into their servers and leak all the info and emails. You could also find their personal addresses and personally threaten individual executives.
You can start by tracking who they are and who they are working on behalf of. Then target their interests, undermining their ability to wield the power necessary to make these decisions at all.
The average consumer? Do not spend money that will go to them. Do not engage in content that helps them. Devalue any product or service they are associated with. Help create a cultural that makes them toxic to business.
Following that logic, pirating software is quite all right, no one is stupid enough to believe someone loses if they make a copy.
If that’s so obvious, then why not state it clearly on the packaging?
Most people assume they own the rights, and if not, should.
The problem with this argument was their short-sighted business model. They sold digital games for the same price as physical games.
If consumers are accustom to “owning” physical games, and then pay the same price for digital, of course they would assume they own those as well.
If instead you needed to buy a subscription to each game that came out, and they only charged $10/month for the latest AAA game, the “you don’t own it” argument would actually be reasonable.
I find it interesting that the article uses GTA 6 as the example when Sony uses Resident Evil Requiem as the example. It’s clickbait tactics and I hate it.
