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Apple Faces Class-Action Suit For In-App Purchases
suraj.sun writes with this excerpt from Ars Technica:
"Garen Meguerian and a team of lawyers are taking Apple to task for 'inducing' children to spend hundreds of dollars of their parents' money on in-app game purchases. Meguerian filed a class-action lawsuit this week in California, acknowledging that Apple has already addressed the problem, but saying that the company continues to unfairly profit from sales of virtual 'smurfberries' and 'fish bucks.' The issue at hand is related to games that rely on a 'freemium' business model, giving away the game for free on the App Store and relying on in-app purchases of virtual currency, extra levels, or other add-ons as a revenue stream."
So, neglectful parents are suing Apple because they can't be fucked with to watch what their children are doing?
How about this: don't give your kid the iTunes account password?
I guess taking a multinational corp to court is easier than being a responsible parent these days.
Here's a hint: if they are too young and dumb^H^H^H^Hnaive to be trusted with a toy or device that lets them spend money, a parent who's worth a damn will wait until they're old enough to handle it before giving it to them. A parent who's worth a damn would blame themselves for not knowing what they were giving them too if that was the case.
No, nothing is ever your fault and it's always somebody else who causes every problem you have in life. Kids spent a ton of money using a device you gave them? Blame the company. Can't lose weight because you eat more calories than you burn? Sue McDonalds. War on personal responsibility.
... that parents are buying their children (who clearly aren't yet older enough to understand financial responsibility) expensive pieces of technology so that they don't actually have to parent or spend time with their children. IMO it's becoming far to common place for parents to sit their children in front of a TV or video game so that they don't have to keep them occupied. Who told them parenting wasn't hard work?
I'm not saying Apple hasn't been somewhat irresponsible for making it so easy to run up bills but a class action lawsuit is a little extreme for something that the parents are equally, if not more responsible for.
I can't really say Apple is doing anything wrong here. They have not only the option to disable said purchases available, they also went the extra step of modifying their password handling. Seems just like another case of stupid parenting to me.
It was like the uproar over Beavis and Butthead many years ago. Even though parents were evidently responsible enough to get a tv, pay the electricity and the cable bill, they were not deemed responsible enough to monitor what the kids watched. Therefor MTV got in trouble when Beavis and Butthead tortured animals of set them afire. Evidently the kids would do the same and it was TV, not the parents fault.
So yes children are impressionable. Parents have to set limits on what kids are and are not able to do. But when parent make an explicitly decision to allow kids access to something, either by driving them there, or ordering a product, or giving access to a credit card, or whatever, it is no longer the companies fault. We saw this when kids were racking up huge phone and texting bills. I don't know what the issue was. If the kid can't use the phone, they don't get one, or have a prepaid.
"She's a scientist and a lesbian. She's not going to let it slide." Orphan Black
From the complaint: "The sale of an App and/or Game Currency is a transaction between Apple and the consumer. There is no privity between the user and the developer of the App...."
They're so right. Remember how Apple won't approve apps which do transactions that don't go through Apple? This is where that bites Apple. Apple is the seller, and the developers are its suppliers. There's no contractual relationship between the consumer and the developer. ("Privity" refers to the legal concept that if A has a contract with B, and B has a contract with C, A does not have a contract with C.)
Do people really plug in their credit cards into iTunes and then let there kids just do what they want with a device that has access to that resource? There is no way i would even leave a credit card attached to that kind of account, let alone let a child have unrestricted access that device. I have two iPod touches that my kids play with. At this point they are too young to grasp the concepts of accounts or passwords, but that day is coming. I only do iTunes cards so that there is no way that any financial damage can go beyond the amount i have already pre-paid (usually in the $15 to $25 range). A little common sense goes a long way in this world, but i guess that's asking too much.
Crisis is the rule, not the exception.
Would you like to buy a cookie for your pet?
o_o
It's a really good cookie!
O_o
With chocolate and stuff!
O_O
Your pet will wuv oo!
@_@
You bought a cookie!
It was nummy!
Your pet wuvs oo!
Buy another?
@_@
Yay! Your pet weally, weally wuvs oo!
[repeat n times]
Thanks for buying all the cookies for your very happy pet!
Charging $483.75 to account.
+_+
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
Apple has already released a workaround for this issue:
iOS Settings/Store/AppleID/Sign Out
Also, it appears NYC is also helping out with the issue.
The Admin and the Engineer
Yes there is, because with an in-app purchase the consumer is saying they wish to give the app writer money in exchange for something.
But they're saying it to Apple. As the complaint points out, the app developer never sees the customer's payment data.
Now, if Apple's system let third parties collect payments directly, there would be a contractual relationship between the end user and the app developer. But Apple doesn't allow that. All the money passes through Apple's hands, and they take a cut. So they get hit with the liability if the transaction is illegal.
http://support.apple.com/kb/ht2534
How can I believe you when you tell me what I don't want to hear?
> I'm not sure that Apple should itself be held responsible for the slimy practices of third-party developers
They are a platform tyrant.
They have chosen to make themselves responsible.
Now that there are consequences, they should own up to them.
Now web games do the same sort of thing. Although it's more difficult to get carried away with it.
The iTunes approach to in-app purchases is kind of like a slot machine that takes credit cards.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
Newsflash: if you give your kids the ability to spend your money, they will, generally speaking, spend it on "flashy things".
A simple answer to that is not to give them the ability to spend money. Last I checked, all purchases on iPhone require entering the Apple ID password. So you can create an account for them and tie the card to it so that you can buy apps for their phone, but you only need to not tell them the password.
Alternatively, open an account for them at the bank, and tie a debit card from that account to Apple ID. That way they can only spend as much as you deposit into their account. It's probably even better, because it teaches to manage money.
Unless you actually have kids, your opinion about what is right and wrong involving raising kids means less than nothing. It's a bunch of assumptions glued together with logic that has absolutely no bearing on what it's really like to raise children.
Don't get me wrong, there's plenty of bad parenting out there -- but knee-jerk reactions saying "BAD PARENTS" is so naive it's almost not worth the trouble to respond to.
NO NO NO! It comes down to an unethical business model relying on causing young children to spend their parents money without ever knowing they're doing it.
And don't try and pull the "what about gamers who know better?" If you think there is even a slightly significant percentage of mature gamers playing these stupid games you're insane. These games are developed with the explicit intention of separating "fools" from their money, even if the "fool" in question is too young to know better. But hey, that's the American Way! A sucker is born every minute, amirite??
Celebrity worship is a poor substitute for Deity worship and costs more to boot.