Steam Subscriber Argeement

Sin_Chase said:
At the end of the day I also believe this ruling will only look to ultimately hurt the consumer.

What I want to retain as a right is to be able to use a service such as Steam, with the terms they have set out and forgo my right to sell on whatever I 'purchase' irrespective of what the EU court has ruled because I have zero interest in the second hand market and am perfectly happy to agree to the terms set out.

I think it's ridiculous I cannot use Steam in it's current incarnation because some people want a second hand digital distribution market and the whole model has to change.
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Can't agree more.

The only thing that I would possibly like to see, is similar to the Playstation plus 1hr demo functionality. You get a fully functional copy of the game, the only limitation is that it cuts off after an hour. Plenty of time to see if the game is worth buying, and Valve have already shown that it's perfectly possible to do with their current systems with the free weekends :)
 
Sin_Chase said:
Does this now mean that I can sell any digitally purchased music tracks and iTunes and the alike need to provide a way for me to revoke the DRM assigned to me on a track and transfer it to a 3rd party who buys the music from me?
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Law does not work like this, otherwise all companies would just ignore regulations as certain customers would still use it, so no company would comply with laws. This is why you can't and again just like the ruling is another shock common sense law.
 
Sin_Chase said:
At the end of the day I also believe this ruling will only look to ultimately hurt the consumer.

What I want to retain as a right is to be able to use a service such as Steam, with the terms they have set out and forgo my right to sell on whatever I 'purchase' irrespective of what the EU court has ruled because I have zero interest in the second hand market and am perfectly happy to agree to the terms set out.

I think it's ridiculous I cannot use Steam in it's current incarnation because some people want a second hand digital distribution market and the whole model has to change.
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I believe that there's a potential for this ruling to go very wrong too...though I do think their hearts are in the right place...sadly though, as per most courts, understanding of technology is not always their strong point.

Given that people would need to re-download the game from Steam if they had bought it second-hand I don't think it's unreasonable for Steam to charge something for that service, or for the integration with their platform.

I tend to agree that the whole thing is potentially a nightmare waiting to happen. I just think that we should never have been in this position to start with.
 
Glaucus said:
It's not a rental :D
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Simply saying "it's not a rental" doesn't make it so when it meets all the criteria of a rental. ;)

http://legal-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/rent:

rent 1) v. to hire an object or real property for a period of time (or for an open-ended term) for specified payments. 2) n. the amount paid by the renter and received by the owner. Rent may be specified in a written lease, but also may be based on an oral agreement for either a short period or on a month-to-month basis in which the hiring may be terminated on a month's notice. (See: lease)
 
Glaucus said:
Law does not work like this, otherwise all companies would just ignore regulations as certain customers would still use it, so no company would comply with laws. This is why you can't and again just like the ruling is another shock common sense law.
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None of that made any sense in relation to what you quoted from me.

Are you saying "Law does not work like this so you cannot sell your purchased iTunes tracks.....but you can sell your purchased Steam games" ?
 
Dunno why your bothering Sin_Chase - aside from the fact your absolutely right.

While an EULA or ToS can't over-ride local statutory rights that is completely beside the point in this case as its not the EULA that is involved in whether steam conflicts with the EU ruling in this case.

Steam is a little bit of a complicated case tho as there are some titles, especially legacy ones you may have in your library where you did obtain them in a manner that gives you rights to resell under statutory law but thats not the story for the platform as a whole.
 
Sin_Chase said:
None of that made any sense in relation to what you quoted from me.
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:confused:

You said why can't you can on and use it and agre eti these terms, despite eu.
Because its detrimental to everyone else. Why would any company comply to any legislation if they can right a contract/Eula that negates it. That is why you can't and again it's common sense why that is a good thing and why you can't do what you want.


Haggisman said:
Which is extremely worrying and should not be the case. :(

If the EU court decided to rule that black was white would you simply think "meh, obviously they must be right" and follow it as blindly?
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Yet again, the ruling makes perfect sense. How is a one of payment with no time limit a rental? It's not by definition. It is nothing like any other common rental service you have used.
The court has actually made a common sense ruling. it's extremely easy to get around, just give it a 70year rental.
 
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All in all all I can say is that law is severely out of touch with the times especially when it comes to the internet.

Can someone tell me why my on-line purchases of digital products have VAT applied even though I am VAT exempt because the digital product and/or service still resides in a VAT jurisdiction but as far as my second hand resale rights are concerned they apply in my jurisdiction and not the one in which the product was 'bought'?

Basically it's a total mess.
 
Sin_Chase said:
So basically Steam will change as outlined a few posts back.

1 pence per year for access to Steam's library of games. Activation fees for titles on the subscription.

Or will the EU Court turn around and say you are not allowed to charge subsidies on-top of a subscription?
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What would happen to the games which had been purchased under the old agreement? These couldn't be held to the same terms could they?

Otherwise, that would be the same as OCUK deciding that all the hardware you bought from them in the past was really a rental, and you can either return it now or start playing a subscription!
 
Glaucus said:
:confused:

You said why can't you can on and use it and agre eti these terms, despite eu.
Because its detrimental to everyone else. Why would any company comply to any legislation if they can right a contract/Eula that negates it. That is why you can't and again it's common sense why that is a good thing and why you can't do what you want.
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That's not what you quoted. You quoted the resale of music part and deleted the rest.
 
Sin_Chase said:
All in all all I can say is that law is severely out of touch with the times especially when it comes to the internet.

Can someone tell me why my on-line purchases of digital products have VAT applied even though I am VAT exempt because the digital product and/or service still resides in a VAT jurisdiction but as far as my second hand resale rights are concerned they apply in my jurisdiction and not the one in which the product was 'bought'?

Basically it's a total mess.
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I'm not an expert, but if you get the companies tax code can't you claim it back from the tax man on your tax return?
 
Sin_Chase said:
All in all all I can say is that law is severely out of touch with the times especially when it comes to the internet.
.
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How is it out of touch in this case? It's simply making companies comply with the law, they aren't saying they can't have a rental service, just that in its current form, it is not and as such the EULa goes against eu law and so needs changing one way or the other.
 
ZombieFan said:
I'm not an expert, but if you get the companies tax code can't you claim it back from the tax man on your tax return?
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Nope.

I have to cross a border from the country I purchased from (Who is part of the Retail Export Scheme in the UK for example) and submit a form in person at the relevant office.

I cannot retrospectively claim back VAT from Jersey for a product I bought in the UK on-line. To pay VAT free the company has to zero-rate it for me and they are not obliged to do so.
 
Haggisman said:
Actually, Valve can terminate the rental whenever they feel like it ;)



What's worrying is that whatever the intentions of this ruling - it will ultimately prove worse for the end consumers :(

I can't help but feel it will end in one of the following scenarios.

  • Digital downloads can be re-sold. Virtually no incentive to buy new, therefore sales go down, and developers become reluctant to develop for PC.
  • Valve implement a subscription fee for Steam - gamers end up paying more in the long term for a huge library of games, 90% of which you'd never play anyway, particularly if you're a casual gamer.
  • Valve implement a time limit on rentals, so your game is deactivated after X weeks/years - a much worse deal than an undefined period.

The only way I could really see this possibly working is if you can sell pre-owned games back to Steam, but you can't buy pre-owned games. Although this would probably just result in new prices increasing to compensate. :(
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I quite like the sound of that. You get some money back and then Steam will have a license to re sell for potentially less than what they paid the developer for it originally. I wouldn't trade any of my AAA titles in really, but I might do the absolutely rubbish ones I will never play again. It screws the developers though :/
 
Has anyone stopped to think that the way in which Steam works and the great deals we get on some titles in sales is because there is no second hand market.

If Steam offers no "protection" against second hand sales then maybe developers will just ramp up their prices to combat their second hand sale losses and we all lose out.

This could ultimately just be a law which shafts us for the sake of it "being the law!"

Yes, we are protecting your rights under EU law but the ACTUAL reality is the model in which your products were bought has been shafted and you will end up paying more......enjoy!
 
Or perhaps they'll do something easy and state a 100year rental, and as such change nothing.
Nothing but doom mongering in this thread.

And as I pointed out, if they didn't protect your rights and companies could write your rights away, you wouldn't have any rights and you wouldn't have a choice.
 
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