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SOE station exchange policy
Jd1680a
Member Posts: 398
If anyone who havent read through SOE service agreement, I think you should. I find it to be the dumbest thing.
You agree that you do not and will not own anything. You agree that, as between you and SOE, SOE owns all copyrights, trademarks and other intellectual property rights in game characters, items and coin (characters, items and coin are, collectively, "Virtual Goods"). SOE hereby grants you the limited right to transfer and receive the licensed right to use Virtual Goods, in return for real money, solely through the Station Exchange and solely in accordance with this Agreement. AS USED IN THIS EXCHANGE AGREEMENT, THE GAME AND ON THE STATION EXCHANGE SITE, TO "SELL" MEANS "TO TRANSFER TO ANOTHER PERSON THE LICENSED RIGHT TO USE VIRTUAL GOODS IN ACCORDANCE WITH THIS EXCHANGE AGREEMENT;" TO "BUY" MEANS "TO RECEIVE FROM ANOTHER PERSON THE LICENSED RIGHT TO USE VIRTUAL GOODS IN ACCORDANCE WITH THIS EXCHANGE AGREEMENT." Accordingly, regardless of SOE's shorthand use of the words "buy" and "sell," whether in this Exchange Agreement, any game, any message board, on the Station Exchange site or elsewhere, SOE has not granted, is not granting and will not grant you ownership of any Virtual Goods. (http://eq2.stationexchange.com/tos.vm)
Whoa, this is really scary, something that personally I would say go kiss my arse. Lets say you get something for auction for $200 knowing that you dont really "own" what you are paying real life money for? Of all my 25 years of my life I have never heard of buying something and you dont "own" it. Still, would you be willing to pay $200 knowing there would be a chance that SOE could delete the item that you paid at any time and have the right to? Its like buying a ford truck for $15,000 then ford says you dont "own" the vehicle and we could and have the right to modify, change, take back and resell, or test drive the vehicle anytime we shall please. Would this work for anyone if they bought any item that would that they didnt really "own" and used the same policy as SOE have listed up above?
SOE is in a really hairy mess with this station exchange, if they were to delete a person's character that s/he spend $500 on a character on the auction, what do you think that person would do? I really dont see how this agreement will ever float if someone did take it to court against SOE. SOE would then use the same logic to a grand jury as you could pay $500 but you really get nothing for it?
I personally dont like SOE's agreement, to me I think its a big scam to "sell" you something but you dont really "own" it. This is something I would suggest to anyone not to really get into station exchange and save your self the trouble in not paying your hard earn money. If you are interested in buying something fromt his exchange, know that you have a chance of lossing what ever you paid for.
Have played: CoH, DDO EQ2, FFXI, L2, HZ, SoR, and WW2 online
Comments
Still I rather not put any money down if I dont "own" it.
Have played: CoH, DDO EQ2, FFXI, L2, HZ, SoR, and WW2 online
What are you talking about you do it all the time.
You probably don't own a single piece of sofware on your computer right now. You don't own the OS (unless you're using Free BSD or the like) you don't own the games installed on them (unless you programmed it yourself on your own time). All you have paid for is the right to use that software.
Ever been to an amusement park or a movie? Same concept. Just because you plopped down some real money for a ticket doesn't mean you own the movie or park.
When you buy a CD do you own all the songs on that CD? When you buy a book do you own the story that was written in that book?
even when people buy things on IGE or whatever, you still dont "own" them. its still a peice of code in SOE's game. they can do whatever they want with it.
Schutzbar - Human Warrior - Windrunner Alliance - World of Warcraft
Nihilanth - Kerra Paladin - Blackburrow - EverQuest II
XBL Gamertag - Eagle15GT
This concept I already know. If were to buy the book I own that book but not any of the words on the book. Any game that you buy have a lisences on that game and thats what you buy. I own all the liscences on my computer, thats what I own. The $15 some people pay for EQ2 is a service fee, still I know I dont "own" anything on EQ2, I know that Im paying for the service.
Im talking about buying an armor, sword, coin, a character from an auction that SOE is well aware of and lets their customers pay real money for virtual items. Im also talking about how you pay for $200 for that sword, coin, armor, or a character with real life money, not for the service fee, but for individual items The liscense for the software that we pay for and the service fee that we pay for the game, but there isnt anywhere in the liscense that says I "own" anything. My point is when people are paying for individual items. Its no longer a service fee or the liscense. Its paying for a product that SOE says nobody "owns".
Have played: CoH, DDO EQ2, FFXI, L2, HZ, SoR, and WW2 online
Of course, this won't be settled except in a court of law. The first time SOE decides to remove all "uber swords of righteousness" from the game, or even nerf them, all the people who "bought" one will sue. Intellectual property rights and law, especially involving computer technology, is not well-formed yet. I don't think there are any laws on the books covering "virtual property." If SOE gets away with this (i.e., wins a lawsuit involving Station Exchange), you can expect to see more companies doing it.
And when you buy armor, a sword or a level 50 character, you are also buying a service. You just bought the time it took the seller to get to level 50 or get that armor or sword or whatever.
If you are playing EQ2 now, it's the same thing with anything in your inventory or your character. At any time SOE can just delete you character and there wouldn't be a darn thing you could do about it. Your character is still their intellectual property. Obviously SOE would never do this, as they would loose customers quickly.
I think you're really over reacting to something you deal with everyday, you've just never bothered to read it until now.
Again, SOE CAN nerf or even get rid of anything in the game, including your character. All you a paying for is the ablility to play their game. If they deleted every character you had you could still play the game and get what you were paying for.
Everthing that is on their servers is theirs to do with as they please. Everything created in or with their game is theirs. If you pay 15USD all they are obligated to do is let you play for 30 days on their servers.
Im talking about the station exchange here. Its about auctioning of virtual items to other players that SOE is well aware and knowing of. This is no longer a service when SOE does this, its merchandise. I know what the difference between a service and merchandise.
Ive read the EULA a few times actually right before I normally click accept. Tho Im talking about the agreement to the station exchange that SOE has toward their customers. Paying $200 for a level 50 character knowing that SOE at any time could delete the character for no reason at all, it would be in a lost. really would you be want to buy something, knowing that it isnt yours?
Have played: CoH, DDO EQ2, FFXI, L2, HZ, SoR, and WW2 online
There are a number of games out there that already don't charge a monthly fee, but you have to pay real money for virtual money or items. There are a larger number of them coming up as well. Roma Victor being one of the new ones, Project Entropia being an older one. Don't you remember hearing about the Aussie guy who bought a virtual island in Project Entropia for something like $20,000 REAL DOLLARS??!!??!!?? It's the same deal there as it is on the SOE servers. There is no guarantee that they won't delete the item/island/whatever. But it would be extremely bad mojo for them to do so, no one would buy anything from them again. SOE will do the same. And if they nerf something, who says they need to nerf it on the exchange servers too?? As far as I remember, you can't transfer characters off the exchange servers, so they are stuck in that world, which is seperate from the others.
Im talking about the station exchange here. Its about auctioning of virtual items to other players that SOE is well aware and knowing of. This is no longer a service when SOE does this, its merchandise. I know what the difference between a service and merchandise.
Ive read the EULA a few times actually right before I normally click accept. Tho Im talking about the agreement to the station exchange that SOE has toward their customers. Paying $200 for a level 50 character knowing that SOE at any time could delete the character for no reason at all, it would be in a lost. really would you be want to buy something, knowing that it isnt yours?
Wow. I dont' know how else to explain it you just don't get it.
SOE isn't selling anything with the Station Exchange, the other players are doing the selling SOE is just facilitating that sale i.e. Providing a Service. Now if I were selling a sword that you wanted to buy, I can't really sell you a piece of merhcandice since I don't own the sword to begin with. What you are giving me money for is my time and luck to be able to get that sword.
And like I said before, SOE can delete any character on any of their servers at any time they want, regardless of if you use the station exchange or not. YOU DO NOT OWN ANYTHING ON THEIR SERVERS. You don't own your character, you don't own the gear on your character, and you don't own the gold on your character, SOE own all of that, they just let you use it. The same way you don't own Windows Operating System, Microsoft just lets you use it.
Whilst I agree with you that SOE is treading murky waters here, seems they are asking for more issues then exchange is going to solve, I have to agree with the overall sentiment of most people in this thread.
I pay for many things every day that I don't actually get to "own" outright. For example, I lease my Jetta from volkswagen, I pay for it every month but I don't actually own the car, I'm just paying for it for a set number of time and return it when that time is up. I realize that this is a different example then software or a game but the over all methodology is similar.
What it boils down to is being an informed consumer, read the agreement, if you don't like it, don't use the service.
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Oh, I found out where everyone is in EQ II. Has anyone started a toon on an exhange server? My girlfriend did on accident this weekend remaking her druid and not clicking off the default server and she said it was rather thick with people.
- Scaris
"What happened to you, Star Wars Galaxies? You used to look like Leia. Not quite gold bikini Leia (more like bad-British-accent-and-cinnamon-bun-hair Leia), but still Leia nonetheless. Now you look like Chewbacca." - Computer Gaming World
To the first poster: Duh.
If you don't like it then don't participate.
Over 500 Million dollars a year was being pumped into that market BEFORE the exchange server, and the same EULA applied then as does now. The only difference is that before if they caught you selling/buying, you'd lose it all. On the Exchange Server, it's allowed.
I fail to see your issue. It's the exact same EULA you have for everything else, and if you weren't going to buy imaginary items for real money before, then you won't now. There is no scandal here, and you're not convincing anyone who participates to stop participating.
Habit is not to be flung out the window by any man, but coaxed down the stairs one step at a time. - Mark Twain
Station exchange is a more valid concept, than what all these supposedly "free to play" games are doing, which is selling items directly that have no relation to the game environment because they are not earned in-game.
I am glad station exchange is succeeding. Taking Ebay and Playerauctions out of the equation, keeping transactions honest, and giving the game company the profit for facilitating the transaction is the logical way to go.
All players will benefit by this since these earnings contribute to the overall success of the game, which in turn helps provide new and updated content and services for everyone. Any player that does not want to participate can simply play on a server that doesn't allow it. Try doing that in one of the so called "free to play" games. They don't give you that option.
"We feel gold selling and websites that promote it damage games like Vanguard and will do everything possible to combat it."
Brad McQuaid
Chairman & CEO, Sigil Games Online, Inc.
Executive Producer, Vanguard: Saga of Heroes
www.vanguardsoh