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Sony Refuses To Sanction PS3 "Other OS" Refunds
Stoobalou writes "Sony says that it has no intention of reimbursing retailers if they offer users partial refunds for fat PS3s. Last week, the first PS3 user successfully secured a partial refund from Amazon UK as compensation for the removal of the ability to run Linux on the console. The user quoted European law in order to persuade the online retailer that the goods he had bought in good faith were no longer fit for his purposes because of the enforcement of firmware update 3.21, which meant that users who chose to keep the Other OS functionality would lose the ability to play the latest games or connect to the PlayStation Network."
Usually I'd be out here saying let Sony do what they want with their own platform, but this is really kind of a dick move. They don't lose anything keeping the extra functionality, and they lose a ton of goodwill by blocking out some of their most ardent supporters.
Sucky
Onerous
Nasty
Ydiots.
I'd get in on that. There is no fucking way a company should be able to disable a feature years after the purchase.
Naturally I'm only a deskjockey but in Australia you can get refunds if the item you bought doesn't do what was claimed. To use a car analogy: Like buying a car only to have GM come around and remove the fuel tank at some future date. GM would claim in their terms and conditions it clearly said they could alter the purchased item at any time. Somehow I don't think that would fly.
http://www.accc.gov.au/content/index.phtml/itemId/8818#h3_125
...if they didn't actually give a shit about it? What were they expecting people to do with it, if not make homebrew games and rip Blu-rays? Seems like really poor product design on their part.
totally. I guess it will be even more successful than the total boycott of Modern Warfare 2 for lack of dedicated servers. That certainly showed them!
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To prop up and advertise cell as a high performance super computing platform.
Your own country's consumer law will tell you if you (as a PS3 owner) are entitled to any form of compensation for this, regardless of Sony's opinion, or the retailer's. But you can't sue Sony over it AFAIK, since you have no contract with them directly.
However, retailers do have a contract with Sony - and many countries also have some statutory laws regarding contracts between corporations. Thus there may be grounds for retailers to claim compensation, or even sue for breach.
Of course, this might be a great way to piss off a major supplier, so I'm betting most retailers won't go after Sony, and will either write off a few customer claims or do their best to deny them.
Why would anyone engrave "Elbereth"?
Note that in the EU, your contract is with (and therefore the organisation you have to sue if it all goes pear-shaped) the retailer, not the manufacturer. But now that Sony has made an official announcement, there is no way most retailers will even contemplate offering a partial refund until they receive court papers - and possibly not until it's heard and an order is handed down.
Even if ordered to by a court, a retailer isn't going to bother trying to sue Sony unless and until they have had to refund a sufficiently large number of customers as to make it worthwhile. They're certainly not going to take Sony on over a single £70 refund (which I believe is what Amazon refunded), and they probably won't until they have dealt with hundreds, if not thousands of similar refunds.
I'm not convinced there are enough people who are sufficiently bothered by it as to make that happen.
Sony: "Any refunds you offer are between you and your customers, and we're not obligated to reimburse you."
Amazon: "Thanks for the clarification. Also, we're not obligated to carry any Sony products. Just letting you know."
Hey, a guy can dream...
The PSP was infamous for having bad pixel problems. More so then any other device including the cheaper DS. So naturally Sony dug in and claimed that bad pixels were normal and it wouldn't repair or replace.
Dutch consumer watchdog program Kassa took up the story and voila, Holland become the only country were Sony replaced the PSP with ANY dead pixel or subpixel.
It is amazing how much consumer rights are being eroded by big companies who hope that the enough consumers just won't push the issue far enough for them to be forced to regonize the law.
OF course Sony has NO such problem prosecuting the consumer if they happen to violate the law (copyright infringement).
It seems that to big companies the law is a buffet. You take what you need and ignore the rest. And we are letting them get away with it.
And no, it ain't just Sony fanboys either. Apple lovers and MS apologists are just as bad.
We the consumer need to grow some balls.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
I bought a PS3 because it could run Linux. It was interesting for me to see what Linux could do in that machine. After some time, I became bored by it, I couldn't turn it into a decent Linux media center, many video formats didn't play properly, and I wasn't really playing much with it. DVDs or Blu-Ray discs from other zones wouldn't work in it, and I think the device was too locked for my open sourcer taste. I felt like when I had an iPhone. Then I get the news on the firmare update that would disable Linux compatibility, and that was the end for me. I sold that motherfucker through online auctions along with all games. So much for proprietary platforms and me.
I read someone here on slashdot who claimed it was done so that they could avoid certain taxes (putting the PS3 as a general computation machine) but do not quote me on that... in fact I would be happy if someone shed more light to that claim.
Ubuntu is an African word meaning 'I can't configure Debian'
The same law that dictates whether the customer should receive a refund from the retailer determines whether that retailer has recourse against Sony for their costs incurred. So if this ever ends up in court (and I know of at least one case where it looks likely that it will) then if a precedent is set that the consumer deserves a refund it's going to be hard for Sony to fight. They can refuse all they like to sanction it, but if national law says they have to pay up, then they have to pay up.
++ Say to Elrond "Hello.".
Elrond says "No.". Elrond gives you some lunch.
The retailers have more power than the suppliers in most cases. Unless the supplier is one of those things that makers or breaks a business, and that is very rare these days, the retailers are the ones who have the big stick. Reason is that a retailer sells many things. There are some things or brands they won't carry simply because of space reasons, at least in the case of physical retailers and even online retailers to an extent (warehouses are finite storage). There are always tradeoffs, and they can't carry everything. For any sufficiently large one, one item more or less won't hurt them much.
This is not true of a supplier. You live and die by your goods getting in to the hands of consumers. For that to happen for most of them, you need retail availability. You need to be in Walmart and Target, you need to be on Amazon, etc. If consumers can't find you easily, they'll pass you over. That is less true of special items like the PS3, but still the case. A parent goes to buy a game console and the PS3 simply isn't in the stores they shop at, they go and get a 360 instead.
This is precisely the reason why so many people put up with Walmart's shit. They are assholes to suppliers, but you really need to be in their store since so many people shop there. Not every supplier will (Rainbird is a big one that doesn't) but most do. Walmart is why you don't see many AO games, because they refuse to stock them.
Also, in the case of something like this, there is the simple issue of possession of money. In the business world you ship out your products, and the store pays you once they get them. There's various reasons why it works that way, and some of it is due to problems. Say the items are defective or what not. If something is broken and the consumer brings it back, the supplier doesn't get paid for that one. So, the store doesn't always (or even usually) pay you the full amount. They write off things. You then have to negotiate with them over that. There are whole departments that work on that, accounts receivable departments.
So consumer returns PS3. Store refunds money. New shipment comes in, store pays Sony, less the return unit (and other stuff). Sony says "No you have to pay," the store says "Sorry but no, the unit was returned in accordance with European law and store policy, you have to take the writeoff." At this point Sony can more or less live with it, or stop selling to the store. Not very likely to stop selling to the store, unless this was a major problem.
Sony can bluster all they like, but when it comes down to it if Amazon tells them they are taking a writeoff for a PS3, they'll damn well do it. Blacklisting Amazon would hurt their bottom line in a major way.
A lot of countries consumer protection laws provide for protection that devices should operate as advertised. Sony advertised the "Other OS" option and many purchased PS3's instead of Wii because it could run Linux. Sony pulling that feature retroactively after the purchase is worse than a bait-and-switch, which is also illegal.
Sony has always had a slightly dodgy rep, but given the popularity of the "Run Other [Linux] OS" feature, it is possible that they have rats or cockroaches in their larder: "Find and Lean on your insider friend, 'the fox' Having a trusted MS friend in the account is critical. Some people (unix Bigots) can think of lots of reasons not to have a MS solution. MS folks may not be the strongest voice but they are true believers (Protect them, make them look good)". Sony can gain a lot of goodwill, and thus cash, by cleaning house if these are present. Yahoo's is not the only company Microsofters have worked at destroying through entryism.
Beta is broken and the link to classic doesn't work. Stop wasting our time or there won't be anybody left here.
Taken from the Playstation.com forums (nice work!):
----------------
CREDIT goes to Xrobx who posted these in another thread and i wanted to make sure that everyone sees them...
Sony Computer Entertainment Inc.:
"In addition to playing games, watching movies, listening to music, and viewing photos, you can use the PS3 system to run the Linux operating system. By installing the Linux operating system, you can use the PS3 system not only as an entry-level personal computer with hundreds of familiar applications for home and office use, but also as a complete development environment for the Cell Broadband Engine (Cell/B.E.)."
http://www.playstation.com/ps3-openplatform/index.html
(http://74.125.113.132/search?q=cache:byasL-PxEiMJ:www.playstation.com/ps3-openplatform/index.html+http://www.playstation.com/ps3-openplatform/index.html&cd=1&hl=en&ct=cln
k&gl=us&client=safari) - google's cached page of the above hyperlink from March 30th 2010 which does not say anything about FW 3.21 removing Other OS. I've saved the page in case it goes offline, copy http address into browser as link probably won't work. Or, just search google and get the cached page. - kiyyto.
Phil Harrison, February 2007,
President of Sony Computer Entertainment Worldwide Studios 2005-2008:
"One of the most powerful things about the PS3 is the 'Install Other OS' option."
http://kotaku.com/235049/20-questions-with-phil-harrison-at-dice
Sony Computer Entertainment Inc., 2006-2009:
"The Linux Distributor's Starter Kit provides information, binary and source codes to Linux Distribution developers who wants to make their distro support PS3."
http://www.kernel.org/pub/linux
Izumi Kawanishi, Sony, May 2006:
"Because we have plans for having Linux on board [the PS3], we also recognize Linux programming activities... Other than game studios tied to official developer licenses, we'd like to see various individuals participate in content creation for the PS3."
http://www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/news_index.php?story=9290
Geoffrey Levand, August 2009,
Principal Software Engineer at Sony Corporation:
"Please be assured that SCE is committed to continue the support for previously sold models that have the "Install Other OS" feature and that this feature will not be disabled in future firmware releases."
mailing list to PS3 customers using Linux
Phil Harrison, May 2006,
President of Sony Computer Entertainment Worldwide Studios 2005-2008:
"The Playstation 3 is a computer. We do not need the PC."
http://www.spiegel.de/netzwelt/web/0,1518,418642,00.html
SONY
Make.Believe... you didn't see that
I know that there are countries in Europe that have lower VAT rates for computers, as opposed to game consoles.
I suspect that by adding the Linux option to their PS3s, Sony was able to switch to the reduced VAT level, as hence bag more profits for the same retail price.
This may have been revoked/no longer valid/overturned/whatever recently and hence Sony has no further incentive to offer this feature.
Could also be that being classified as a computer made the console eligible for government subsidies to buy "computers" (such as in the UK the Home Access Program - http://www.becta.org.uk/homeaccess)
Artificial intelligence is no match for natural stupidity
No EULA ever overrides a national law (unless the law in question has special provisions that specifically allow to override/waive it). If the EULA has provisions that are contradicting local law, local law takes priority.
That's one of fine points of labor laws in EU. The employer can give the employee a draconian contract to sign, with many nasty points that, say, raise the number of hours, reduce the number of days off, cut into the salary and so on. The employee can then just smirk, sign, and then sue if the employer tries to assert any of the points that are against labor laws.
Most of "protection laws" are written specifically in a way that makes it impossible for the protected to give up the protection, even willingly - they override any contracts that might contradict them.
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There used to be a differential tax rate between computers and games consoles. During the PS2 days, Sony tried to circumvent this by shipping BASIC with PS2 in Europe, claiming this made it a general purpose computer. This didn't work.
Since then the tax differential has vanished, so general computing capabilities have no bearing on PS3's tax status.
This is my understanding of things, anyway.
++ Say to Elrond "Hello.".
Elrond says "No.". Elrond gives you some lunch.
The ACCC responded to my complaint regarding this latest move of Sony's and they are looking into the matter. Whether or not anything will come of it is anyone's guess, but the ACCC do have a history of standing up for the consumer and not being afraid of multinational corporations.
Specifically, they're looking into the sale of a PS3 with OtherOS support being removed after the sale. The issues raised are being considered in the context of the Trade Practices Act 1974 .
Specialist Mac support for creative pros, Melbourne
Glad I never bought one, I just don't trust Sony enough.
Funny, since the Sony ROOTKIT fiasco I have felt the same way about Sony.
Ditto, I desperately wanted to own a PS3 but I didn't feel (despite the calls at the time of "they've changed, they've changed") that they were trustworthy for a number of reasons, culminating in rootkits. They obviously care nothing for their customers, and it appears from this latest news that they care nothing for their retailers or EU law, either - I wonder, do they now feel they're too big to fail?
As for the box pictures, that makes little difference. As a customer you would only have to demonstrate that you could reasonably be expected to know about the feature - considering the amount of press the console got on the web before launch, with every single function and feature dissected and analysed, you'd have to have been living under a rock to not know about Other OS. I certainly was aware of it before the console launched (it was one of the key things that almost swayed me to buy one).
My experience is that very few electronics corporations give a rat's ass about consumer protection laws. I believe Sony also claims to sell their consoles here with a 1-year warantee, despite the fact that the legal minimum is 2 years.
But that is still a breach of contract(1): the machine was sold as a machine that can run Linux *and* use the service. Now all of sudden it's either one or the other. According to several jurisdiction (France is cited in the example) Sony owes their customer some money.
Close, but not quite correct. In the UK (and the EU), an item must be sold as "fit for purpose" and it is the retailer that is obliged to ensure that is the case not the manufacturer. In terms of electronic devices, fit for purpose usually means that it must perform the functions that it was advertised as performing at the time of purchase for a minimum of 6 years. Clearly this action by Sony breaks this sales contract, but the refund must come from the retailer as it was they that the consumer entered into contract with.
However, the retailer would then claim the compensation back from the manufacturer as they are also entitled to the same "fit for purpose" guarantee. Therefore it will Amazon (in this case) that come knocking on Sony's door for a refund, not Joe Public. Sony may have a harder time brushing them off.
Listen to my latest album here
The funny thing was that even with the lower import taxes and counting out the VAT sony mostly charged 30-50% more for the consoles here than they did in the states, so they tried to ripp off the governments of their import taxes and sack them in themselves by also using a 1:1 dollar Euro calculation!
Speaking of slimey behavior!
If people listened to Richard Stallman the would have seen this coming.
The Tea Party isn't going after Sony because they're not your personal fantasy fulfilling device.
Sony will get bit by this by Retailers and lawsuits, we already have existing laws and methods for dealing with this.
You're dealing with issues emotionally instead of logically.
Democrats or Republicans. They are both taking us to the same place and they are not afraid of us anymore.
I called SONY customer relations to chat with them about the dropping of linux in their latest PS3 update. After very civily conveying my dismay at their decision to punish honest users of the PS3 by retro-actively ripping out the previously advertised, supported, and paid for "Other OS" feature I asked what they could do for me to even things up for effectively turning my non ps2 compatible fat into an oversized-overpriced slim. Their answer: "Sir I take hundreds of calls a day and you are the first to call and complain about this particular issue." Linux fans, PS3 owners who are linux fans... If that statement is true I'm dissappointed in you. 1-800-345-7669 (SONY) Hours: Mon-Sat 6:00AM-8:00PM / Sun 7:00AM-6:30PM PT If you are going to call be civil. But make it clear their action hasn't gone unnoticed and is unnacceptable. According to a friend of mine who has also called if you want to escalate it further, you can apparently call 1-866-286-5123 Monday through Friday from 8am-5:30pm Pacific time, a.k.a. 11am-8:30pm Eastern. They need to know just how much this bothers their customers. The impression I have so far is that it's not even a blip on their radar.
The important phrase in that disclaimer is "TO THE FULL EXTENT PERMISSIBLE BY APPLICABLE LAW".
Many countries expressly do not give the customer the luxury of being able to throw their rights away like that. The retailer might just as well say "TO THE FULL EXTENT PERMISSIBLE BY APPLICABLE LAW, THE SUN WILL NOT RISE TOMORROW".
Never buy any Sony product ever again. I was sort of leaning that way anyway due to the other snafus they have been involved with.
I mean for me it just seems like s simple decision. Don't trust them, then don't buy them. They have a history of doing underhanded things in the name of profit protectionism at the cost to their clients. Why bother anymore? Besides, I am pretty sure Sony's time has come and gone anyway, the glory days are over and there are plenty of better choices out there.
Please stop perpetuating lies that various entities have claimed but are utterly, completely, legally incorrect.
Under the law, if you exchange money for something without making any sort of agreement beforehand, you have, indeed, purchased that thing. If you walk into a store, pick something up off the shelf, carry it to the counter, set it down, hand money to the clerk, get a receipt, and walk out with that thing, you own it. There's plenty of case law about this.
Including a copy of software in a box.
Now, it's a copy of a copyrighted thing, so you can't make copy or do various other things forbidden by copyright law, but it is still a copy that you own. Copyright restrictions are restrictions under the law, not ones that the publisher has randomly made up. They don't get to randomly make up new ones. (The law does give the publisher to grant permissions to violate those rules if they want, but the rules themselves are legal ones.)
It's like you buy a car, and the city you live in forbids parking on a street unless you are a resident of the house you park in front of, or unless you have permission of the owner. The fact they can grant you one exception to how you are normally disallowed, by law, from using your car does not mean you have leased your car from that house! No, not even if you bought it from that homeowner.
And, on a more practical note, it's hard to see how anyone could be in a contractual agreement with the publisher anyway. 99.99% of the time software owners never even interacted with the publisher...most of the time, software is purchased from a third party. So, at best, you could have a contract with them. (Which you don't.)
Did GameStop license the software and somehow got the ability to sublicense it to other people? I'd really like to see that contract. I suspect they simply made a purchase, just like any other reseller makes with a wholesaler. You can't magically jump up the chain and have a contractual relationship with the publisher when you buy from a reseller!
Now, later, you might have agreed to some EULA that (claim to) restrict what you can do with the software more than normal copyright law, but that's irrelevant to the fact you purchased that copy. An EULA can't retroactively undo a purchase from a third party. (I supposed, in theory, it could assert that you're selling it back to them in exchange for something, but I've never seen one do that.)
The idea that you 'license' software dates from ages ago, when copyright law didn't really cover software, and hence you actually did license it...and by 'you', I mean 'people running mainframes', as that was all that existed at the time. And, indeed, plenty of mainframe software is still licensed...by which , I mean, people actually sit down and sign contracts beforehand.
This 'licensing' concept does not, and has never, under any circumstances, applied to any copyrighted work that people walk into stores and purchase.
If corporations are people, aren't stockholders guilty of slavery?
I bought two generation one PS3's because they had the Cell processor and I wanted to experiment with high performance multi-core systems. Sony has stated that they lose money on each PS3 that doesn't get additional game revenue. They didn't state that while they were selling the first PS3 units. It wasn't part of the EULA that you were expected to buy their games. I am used to buying hardware and doing what I like with it. That didn't include any intention to reverse engineer any part of the machine, which I have not done. I guess I cannot let either of my machines accept any further updates from Sony, because Yellow Dog Linux is my development environment for Cell experimentation. I wonder if there will bea class action suit down the road about this. As an aside, I will not be buying any more Sony products, ever.