This topic will come over and over. The more games will be monetarized , the bigger pressure and discussion about buyer right will be. It is unavoidable.
I is always like that when something becomes more common and more money are used.
I can see new laws about that cause of consumer organization and goverments steeping in.
Here lays the issue EULA the cmpany is able to put any thing in it and can change it on the fly and the have been brain washing people to think that there as some of you put it renting the items and its theres. Yet who was the ones who payed with cash or time I can tell you one thing it was not the company it was the person AKA buyer/grinder.
Now times have changed since ingames items are worth real cash game companys know this love it and sell it all the time hideing behind a one way EULA knowing thay can be a casion with not 1 cent lost and keep taking the money.
Best case a player/buyer/seller dose something the dont like they dont brake a hand they just sue you and put you in jail.
They are not hiding behind anything. It's their property. You don't actually 'buy' the item, you purchase the right to use said item ingame, and ingame only. You can't walk away with it.
You should know the risks of buying anything ingame, as even if the game goes belly up as it did with TR, you still have no right to anything made to be ingame. Even your if lifetime subscription goes bye bye.
Just like investing, you take chances and roll the dice, but you should have at least some form of knowledge on how things operate before you venture forth into those waters.
Once this becomes more known thing and overall value of item shop sales , and especially ideas like D3 RMAH will be more common , Tax Offices and goverments will take a look there for taxes. I guess consumer's organisations might take a look at that in future as well.
Once that happens game companies might write anything they want in EULA's but countries law always override EULA's laws , well at least in EU it does. If it will state that in game item is property of layer then it will be irrelevant to what's in EULA.
Goverments won't miss to tax all of this I assure it. I see Vat on all item shop sales and income tax from RMAH sales, at least.
Maybe even having to write virtual items assets value in yearly tax reort but that's more in future if ever.
Actually I think EQ2 already charges taxes for cash shop purchases.
In some games, ingame items may have a value equivalent to a certain sum of real money, but since players usually cannot "cash out" (not legally anyway), there is no real money value. In other words, under normal circumstances the value of your virtual items never realise (if I now use the term correctly). Every cent you've put into that game, you have lost the second you pressed "I accept the transfer". You pay for a service, not for a virtual product.
But the SERVICE was RIGHT TO ACCESS THOSE ITEMS. If I rent a vehicle at an airport for a week, I realize that I don't OWN that vehicle. However, I do have the right to expect access to that vehicle for the rest of the week. That is how a contract works. If the rental company decides to take back the car early, I have the right to get a refund. If I'm paying for the service of getting access to cash shop items, that's ANOTHER contract- this time between me and an online MMO publisher allowing me use of these items for the duration of my online account. Unless we specifically agree otherwise beforehand, they cannot legally cut off access to our items for no reason whatsoever.
Services like Steam are a great example of this, the only reason Valve can do things like ban accounts or limit access to games without getting the pants sued off of them is because they make us agree to their long Steam Subscriber Agreement beforehand.
And if you take that rental car and smash it into a tree while drunk, they have every right to terminate that contract early. Just as if you get yourself banned, well you broke the rules. You said yourself "for the duration of my online account" you know the rules. If they terminate your account because you broke the rules. No you do not have a right to ask for a refund.
If they ban you for no reason, and you can prove it. Well thats another story, but companies rarely ban someone for no reason when they want to make money.
Sorry, but buying items ingame is still the game maker's property. You don't own anything ingame except the box it came in. You get banned for doing something against their RoC or terms, then it's your loss. Period.
Anything else is ranting of self-entitlement and not adhering to their terms and conditions when you started playing.
I dunno, OPs question is interesting.
The consumer rules are really not made for virtual items and I think most people agree that virtual stuff should have some regulations just like anything else you buy.
I am not so sure that I feel that they should be refunded if the player gets banned since anyone in that case could use that to get his money back after playing the game for a while. It would be missused and the player did get banned because he broke the deal anyways. But I think that the company should have actual proof for the banning in that case.
I am more interested in when they change the item you bought, that is common. Since they take away what you bought and give you something else instead you should at least have the option to return it and get something of equal value from the cash shop as well.
The law is also fuzzy about people stealing virtual goods you have bought, but that is something that really should be handled by the police.
As I said, I would welcome a law that would clearify the consumers right in virtual goods, just how such a law would look could be discussed but I don't like the idea that you can buy something for a huge sum of money and the company just can take it away from you legally the next day.
Its clear that is a a very blurry area when it come to virtual goods in mmos and laws. They have EULA, but it doesn't mean that everything written in them even fit the most obvious law. Heck if every agreement was force of law you would never have to go to court.
One thing is sure in every single court example that i'm aware of, every single the gamer got the right over said item/character/account. And if i recall well, every time the time invested was what counted. But since i'm neither a lawyer neither have any real knowledge i probably don't know much either.
But when i see some games selling virtual good, i would really like to know how much do you own, what happen when the game close, the item is changed by the dev team, someone hacked you or any similar situation.
And there is an other domain of how much game companies can charge their customer and for what service. Sure you can always charge a billion dollar over a single zero and one line on a hard drive, but it doesn't mean customers protection cannot deal against those kind of nonsense, especially if they become a habit from game companies. As i said in an other post customer protection organizations dealt with "scam" like habits from telephony companies over the world, and if in some few country those kind of scam still exist, they are pretty much gone everywhere. Sometime you just need a leading action to clean a mess. Tobacco industry is an other very good example. You just cannot scam people to no end expecting no reactions from them, not in our world anymore. But you would need a real work, first to understand and be fully aware of the situation (which i guess very few people are) to then point where the "scam" like practice are. Proper information here is a killer of such practice. Also you would have to be sure if their is "scam" practices, which is not sure, i don't want to throw the first rock. For me they are at the border actually, i was a lot more pissed few years ago when RMT grown so much over some game mechanism, and i couldn't but think this was kind of made on purpose.
Thats my 2cent over this. Also you would well better predict and stop such scamming practices if they exist, or have the ability to exist, rather than waiting for them to take roots. It is clear the all mmo and game industry is going berserk, and it is probably the proper time to take action.
The law is also fuzzy about people stealing virtual goods you have bought, but that is something that really should be handled by the police.
Where I live (Poland) already cases like that have been handled by Police , and scammers and thieves stealing virtual goods have been prosecuted. Not common , but it already happened more than few times.
So I really believe that buyer's right WILL be placed on virtual goods sold to you by game companies. Just because game companies say in their EULA's that you just rent their property , will not matter. This is just matter of time imho , selling virtual goods by companies just have to be more common , more people have to experience that and this have to be more money involved.
Once this will start to get to mainstream media (and it will sooner or later) then things will start to change.
Comments
This topic will come over and over. The more games will be monetarized , the bigger pressure and discussion about buyer right will be. It is unavoidable.
I is always like that when something becomes more common and more money are used.
I can see new laws about that cause of consumer organization and goverments steeping in.
Actually I think EQ2 already charges taxes for cash shop purchases.
And if you take that rental car and smash it into a tree while drunk, they have every right to terminate that contract early. Just as if you get yourself banned, well you broke the rules. You said yourself "for the duration of my online account" you know the rules. If they terminate your account because you broke the rules. No you do not have a right to ask for a refund.
If they ban you for no reason, and you can prove it. Well thats another story, but companies rarely ban someone for no reason when they want to make money.
This is where entitlement culture gets you, they give you the game on a plate, so why are you actually playing for anything?
I dunno, OPs question is interesting.
The consumer rules are really not made for virtual items and I think most people agree that virtual stuff should have some regulations just like anything else you buy.
I am not so sure that I feel that they should be refunded if the player gets banned since anyone in that case could use that to get his money back after playing the game for a while. It would be missused and the player did get banned because he broke the deal anyways. But I think that the company should have actual proof for the banning in that case.
I am more interested in when they change the item you bought, that is common. Since they take away what you bought and give you something else instead you should at least have the option to return it and get something of equal value from the cash shop as well.
The law is also fuzzy about people stealing virtual goods you have bought, but that is something that really should be handled by the police.
As I said, I would welcome a law that would clearify the consumers right in virtual goods, just how such a law would look could be discussed but I don't like the idea that you can buy something for a huge sum of money and the company just can take it away from you legally the next day.
psst... here is a sekret that the founding fathers of the United States found out.
you only have as many rights as you are willing to fight for them.
blizzard is willing to throw millions of dollars worth of lawyers at you. are you willing to fight?
Its clear that is a a very blurry area when it come to virtual goods in mmos and laws. They have EULA, but it doesn't mean that everything written in them even fit the most obvious law. Heck if every agreement was force of law you would never have to go to court.
One thing is sure in every single court example that i'm aware of, every single the gamer got the right over said item/character/account. And if i recall well, every time the time invested was what counted. But since i'm neither a lawyer neither have any real knowledge i probably don't know much either.
But when i see some games selling virtual good, i would really like to know how much do you own, what happen when the game close, the item is changed by the dev team, someone hacked you or any similar situation.
And there is an other domain of how much game companies can charge their customer and for what service. Sure you can always charge a billion dollar over a single zero and one line on a hard drive, but it doesn't mean customers protection cannot deal against those kind of nonsense, especially if they become a habit from game companies. As i said in an other post customer protection organizations dealt with "scam" like habits from telephony companies over the world, and if in some few country those kind of scam still exist, they are pretty much gone everywhere. Sometime you just need a leading action to clean a mess. Tobacco industry is an other very good example. You just cannot scam people to no end expecting no reactions from them, not in our world anymore. But you would need a real work, first to understand and be fully aware of the situation (which i guess very few people are) to then point where the "scam" like practice are. Proper information here is a killer of such practice. Also you would have to be sure if their is "scam" practices, which is not sure, i don't want to throw the first rock. For me they are at the border actually, i was a lot more pissed few years ago when RMT grown so much over some game mechanism, and i couldn't but think this was kind of made on purpose.
Thats my 2cent over this. Also you would well better predict and stop such scamming practices if they exist, or have the ability to exist, rather than waiting for them to take roots. It is clear the all mmo and game industry is going berserk, and it is probably the proper time to take action.
Edited DNA for Eula
Where I live (Poland) already cases like that have been handled by Police , and scammers and thieves stealing virtual goods have been prosecuted. Not common , but it already happened more than few times.
So I really believe that buyer's right WILL be placed on virtual goods sold to you by game companies. Just because game companies say in their EULA's that you just rent their property , will not matter. This is just matter of time imho , selling virtual goods by companies just have to be more common , more people have to experience that and this have to be more money involved.
Once this will start to get to mainstream media (and it will sooner or later) then things will start to change.
Don't be tard to play item shop game & pay for it. Very easy
try before buy, even if it's a game to avoid bad surprises.
Worst surprises for me: Aion, GW2