Slashdot Mirror
UK Gov To Investigate 'Aggressive' In-app Purchases
hypnosec writes "The UK Government will be examining whether free to download apps are putting unfair pressure on kids to pay up for additional content within the game through in-app purchases. Office of Fair Trading (OFT), UK, will be carrying out the investigation of games that include 'commercially aggressive' in-app purchases after a number of cases have been reported whereby parents have incurred huge bills after their kids have spent huge amounts on in-app purchases."
You mean like a game that lets you make steady progress for a few hours, then suddenly ups the difficulty level to a point where the only way to continue is to pay for something? Few adults can resist, how many kids would be able to?
Slashdot social media options: AIM, ICQ, Yahoo, Jabber and Mobile Text. Why no MySpace?
This is myopic, and I bet you are not a parent. In fact I bet you're probably still a kid, with that attitude.
It is not a new trend that companies make it easy to spend huge amounts of money before a parent knows what's going on. Buying a kid a toy used to be a safe bet, the purchase of the item was the sum total of the toy's price. Nowadays, every device has a built in app-store or similar functionality and a credit card is required to even make the device function (why does Apple require a credit card to download free apps or update apps that you've already paid for?!).
Expecting parents to be looking over the shoulder of their kids, who are still too young to have developed the ability to fully comprehend the consequences of spending 50c every few minutes over the span of a month, is unreasonable, and companies that engage in predatory sales in this manner should not be given a free pass on the back of the "well parents should be looking after their kids" argument.
I owned and ran a cell phone shop for 10 years, and one of the most frequent complaints was parents giving a "safety phone" to their kids at age 15 only to rack up huge bills on premium ringtone services. Sure, those kids should probably have been on prepaid, but that does not clear the companies charging $5 per ringtone, and then auto subscribing the number to a $5/day new ringtone service of responsibility. Yes, this happened, just like I'm describing it.
Companies feeding on the impulsiveness of children should be strung up and flogged. So should Apple, for making it a requirement that a credit card be entered into the phone at all times.
I hate printers.
... the gaming industry has turned into a crime syndicate over the last 6-7 years. It's been discusting with the rise of F2P and charging for virtual items in MMO's with both WoW and diablo 3 being among the biggest offenders.
Reality is we need to crack down on software you can never own and can be "turned off" whenever a company says so. So many older apps/games functionality is fubar because of current anti-customer industry practices. The bad thing is kids and stupid adults feed these companies money year after year.
Except it is not 50c every few minutes. In some cases it is £69.99 ($99.99 at Apple exchange rates) every few minutes.
Give kids their own debit cards so they can spend their allowance/paychecks online without risking their family's budget. No need nanny-state crackdowns here.
Thank you, Edward Snowden.
"Arguments from authority are worthless." —Carl Sagan
My 5 year old son taught me a very important lesson about having a PIN on your payment methods...
Luckily it only cost me £25 ($40).
Not being a great reader my son just clicks OK to all the boxes that pop up, so there is great opportunity for game manufacturers to dupe unsuspecting parents into spending lots of their cash.
It is a one time only scam though which I really should have thought through but I, along with thousands of other hapless parents, have inadvertently contributed to Zepto Labs' coffers.
Education for parents is the solution IMHO. I got mine the hard way ;-)
Every man for himself, all in favour say "I"
I can't believe that more parents don't set up a limited balance bank card so that their kids can learn about budgeting etc. Just load a small amount of money per week onto the card and let them use that to pay for in-app purchases. When it runs out of money, the kids have to wait until next week and maybe learn a bit about delayed gratification.
You're a temporary arrangement of matter sliding towards oblivion in a cold, uncaring universe
Just for the record Apple does not require a credit card for using your phone, your computer or even the itunes store. If you want you can open a prepaid account (for free) that needs to be fed itunes vouchers to order something.
And this was precisely done to prevent kids to overspend on their itunes account. At least that's how it was presented at the introduction of the iTunes store (Yes that feature exists that long).
Frankly I don't feel sorry for parents who could not bother to protect their children from overspending by using simple limiters like prepaid accounts. It's like soft-padding your house when you have a toddler. But for some reason when it comes to technology parents are not supposed to bother and a law has to be done do cover the parents lazyness.
I can't believe that more parents don't set up a limited balance bank card so that their kids can learn about budgeting etc.
Such accounts are very, very rare. Even the most basic debit card account at my local bank has an implicit overdraft 'just in case' I 'overspend'.
http://www.money.co.uk/prepaid-cards.htm/ lists a few. I wouldn't trust another adult with full access to my bank/credit card, so why trust a child?
You're a temporary arrangement of matter sliding towards oblivion in a cold, uncaring universe
I'd hazard a guess there are a fair few parents out there that don't quite understand apps, smart phones and the like. But in the case of UK law, I'd also imagine that there are instances where apps are misleading people to think play is free, but it isn't. If this is the case then they could be falling foul if UK law - a bit like calling something a beef burger when it is actually 75% Winnie-the-Pooh.
Isn't part of the problem that most popular tablets/phones are single user only? Android only recently added this feature in 4.2 and iOS is (AFAIK) single user only.
Having a different login for the kids would solve the problem.
There's a lot of nasty software out there that is specifically targeted at kids and charges huge amounts for ingame items. My kids are at a young age and they simply do not understand the difference between real cash and virtual ingame cash, to them it's all the same. So if an app says 'do you want to buy this for 99,99 euros', they just tap 'yes'.
What I don't understand is why a parent would give an iPad/Nexus/whatever with a fully accessible master account to a child. On my iPad I just disabled in-app purchases and set password to 'every time' instead of 'once every 15 minutes'. And no app buying or removing either.
So if you're not a very good parent and neglect them and they get kidnapped, raped and killed that's totally the parent's fault. There's absolutely nobody else we could blame in this situation. These companies aren't there to play nice, they're there to rip you off for hundreds and thousands of dollars when you slip up and leave your kid with access to your credit card. They're like a hawk just waiting for the mother to look away so they can swoop in for the kill and you want to defend them. Sure, parents could do better but that is no reason to protect predatory companies looking to exploit innocent children and stick their parents with the bill.
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
What is the billing mechanism, anyways? Is it the wireless carrier? I'm an adult, and I wouldn't want that billing "feature" enabled on my phone, just in case I fat-fingered the wrong key.
I'm not repeating myself
I'm an X window user; I'm an ex-Windows user
I don't have kids, and I don't have an iPad either. However I do have friends who are, to be blunt, technically naive. It might surprise the Slashdot crowd, but one friend actually went on a work course where they were taught such things as the difference between files and folders! (To be fair the same friend is trying to get more computer literate - she has bought herself "Windows for Dummies" and is studiously working through it. I think she's actually thought of as something of a geek at where she works; she's a qualified midwife and works in a hospital unit for premature babies, so she's not in anyway 'stupid', just not computer literate).
Anyway, the point is that many would not understand the technology or technological trends in a way that we would on Slashdot. To many a game is a game, whether physical (a board game or card game or some such) or virtual (Solitaire anyone?) Games in the past do not allow you to 'buy extras' mid game, so this behaviour is unexpected. From past experience allowing your child (or mother) to play a game on a computer or iPad would be considered safe - the possibility of actual money being spent would not be considered and therefore not dealt with. To be honest, not being an iPad owner nor a computer game player, I would not be aware of this 'feature' in games - after all I've never seen it in Solitaire!
So let's not blame the parents. Let's instead blame those taking advantage of the possibilities of new technology and of the naivete of actual users. It is this that's behind the investigated by the OFT.
You never know what is enough unless you know what is more than enough. - Blake
I live in the UK, and I cant believe that the phone companies are permitted to REFUSE to set a credit limit.
Sent from my ASR33 using ASCII
There was a problem with ringtones a few years back: kids thought they were buying one ringtone for $2, they were actually agreeing to one a day for ever. The phone regulator was asked on national radio what he was doing about it, he said "Nothing. These people are criminals, and when we come after them, they run away!" (Notwithstanding the fact that the criminals have to wait 90 days before they get the money from established phone companies - who take 30% as a transaction fee).
There IS a problem: and it is primarily the fact that we cannot request a credit limit.
Sent from my ASR33 using ASCII
I have a feeling that the world would be a nicer place if only those who could stay awake for 24 hours a day, seven days a week would have children.
Maybe it's just me being a misanthrope again...
c++;
It's not the phone companies - it's the banks/credit card companies. With phone companies, it's trivial to buy a Pay As You Go mobile phone - I use one for my personal (non-work) phone as it works out a lot cheaper for me.
You're a temporary arrangement of matter sliding towards oblivion in a cold, uncaring universe
As much as I despise the practice of these predatory in-app systems, I have to chime in that iTunes does not require a credit card at all. You can create an account with just a $10 gift card. Apple has never had and will never get my creditcard information.
That group of bovine standing over there appears quite portentous. That's right it's an ominous cow herd.
/shrug
You can look on it as government interference if you want, but in the UK people like the OFT: we look on their work as consumer protection.
The key word is 'Fair'. If a trade practice is 'unfair', the OFT are pretty effective at stopping it. If it really is just a case of your kid spending your money, then no, it's not the government's problem. But how will the OFT know if it's fair if they don't investigate?
I don't have any children, so I've no axe to grind, but I still think it's a good idea that they at least investigate the fairness of in-app purchases.
The OFT is one of the reasons that in the UK they have a variety of mobile phone providers with coverage everywhere, that they can move between with no penalty, and who will unlock our phones on demand. I don't think this is true of the US.
Nowadays, every device has a built in app-store or similar functionality and a credit card is required to even make the device function (why does Apple require a credit card to download free apps or update apps that you've already paid for?!).
That's simply not true.
http://s.iosfans.com/?u=http://cdn.macorg.net/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/free-apple-account-002.png
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT2534
Plus, if you do have a credit card set up, then purchases require the password to be entered. You didn't give a password connected to your credit card to your kid did you?
On top of that, there are parental controls (under a different password) on the iOS devices, including one that turns off in-app purchase,
Further more, gift cards are available if you want to allocate a set amount for a child to spend.
So exactly how difficult is it for a responsible parent to stop their child spending? Actually it's the opposite way around... the parent has to take steps to enable the kid to make purchases.
For sure though there are a lot of parents that don't have the intelligence to not give a child a credit-card enabled phone. And low intelligence is not their fault. And I have no problem at all with governments clipping the wings of any companies peddling exploitative apps or premium phone lines.
This isn't about kids spending money. It's about deceitful advertisements that trick people in buying stuff.
The average person might see through these tricks. But a huge population is dumber than the average person.
Oops.
My national identity confusion (they/our) is because I'm British, but haven't lived in Britain since 2007.
Great OFT, but dreadful weather.
. . . should not be the government's problem.
If your business plan relies on kids who don't understanding that they're being ripped off. Then that's some degree of fraud or illegal marketing.
It seems that there's this mindset, that if you have long legal agreement, it okay to sell people things they regret buying.
Newsflash: it's not okay. If you do a transaction well aware that the other party is doing a bad deal and that other party doesn't know or understand it, it called fraud.
Fraud is hard to prove, but that doesn't make it legal!!!
It is still the parents problem for depending on others too much.
Trust Nobody. Everyone is a rapist pedo terrorist human trafficker. Even companies.
Trust people as much as you trust that hobo on the street with your childrens safety.
I am obviously exaggerating, but you get what I mean.
Putting too much trust in anything else is only going to bite you in the ass later on, be it a phone company or even banks.
These groups live off your failings. Literally.
It was the fault of the parent who gave the child access to the password for their device, which is equally against every single terms of service agreement in existence, pretty much.
There is no child fault here besides no experience with consequence to understand that this money was real.
It is like a parent giving a child grand theft auto and then complaining their child was violent because of it. (which itself is completely retarded unless the child was already borderline psychotic anyway, media only influences those with broken brains in the first place when they are at those ages)
Bingo. Since the late 80s firms have routinely been slapped down for predatory practices when it comes to kids. TV is the most obvious example - toy commercials have been forcibly unbundled from their parent programs and standards have been imposed to prevent the Chocobot Hour problem - but regulations have been put in place elsewhere for similar reasons. The US already has COPPA for dealing with the Internet, which prevents firms from collecting information on children under 13, for largely the same reasons.
Anyhow, not to go on an anti-corporate rant here, but this isn't anything new. Kids are stupid/naive and easily influenced, and less scrupulous businesses have long attempted to do an end-run around parents by targeting kids directly, which is why these regulations are in place. Parents should absolutely keep a close eye on what their kids are doing and nothing the government can do will replace that, but parents are ultimately competing against firms employing graduate level psychological methods. Kids are all but helpless here, so it's not a fair fight to say the least.
Parents should not have to fight against firms blatantly predating on their kids, which is what some of these kid-focused games are trying to do.
Well, in my country you can set up accounts for your kids, and no bank in their sane mind would lend a minor any money (that also means no overdraft) without a written consent by the parent. Because kids are by default not sui juris (and that even stretches in this case up to the 18th birthday) which means that you can't ever collect money you lend them. They can just flip you off and turn away, and there's exactly zero you could do.
Of course, if the parent agrees to become liable for their overdraft, it's fair game. But it is trivially easy to set up an account for your kid. Credit cards aren't that easy, but banks now offer "kids credit cards" around here since they caught on that kids need CCs for games. Basically it's a CC that only lets you spend what's on your account, and rejects whenever an amount would take it over the limit. Think of it as an almost maxed out CC.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
This is myopic, and I bet you are not a parent. In fact I bet you're probably still a kid, with that attitude.
The clue is in his name, "PolygamousRanchKid"
But yeah giving your kids access to unlimited credit is insane. It's partly a matter of discipline as if they weren't doing that they might be phoning premium rate phone lines for similar gimmicks although I guess they'd have to be on the line for hours to run up these sorts of sums.
Your ad here.
Usually, I'm the first to cry "no way" if government thinks it needs to butt in with the thinkofthechildren card. But they do have a point here. Game companies are tying to use the naivety and gullibility of kids to squeeze money out of them. And short of 24/7 monitoring, there is little parents can do. More and more games require you to enter a CC number "just in case", so you can play at all. And let's be honest, you can tell your kids 10 times that they must not spend real money, often it's easy to overlook whether you're spending in game or real money on your purchase. It's deliberately done so it's hard for the user to notice, and twice so for kids who don't really have a working concept of the value of money. For a 5 year old, 1, 10 and 100 bucks are just numbers, they don't really know how much is "much" and what is still "little". Not to mention that many little things add up, and kids have even less a concept for that.
What I would still prefer to a regulation would be some kind of "child friendly environment" ad sticker that gets promoted and that gets handed to games that don't try to rip off kids, as a guideline for parents which games are suitable for their children. Such games would, e.g. offer online purchases only for vouchers instead of CCs for kids under 14, would allow parents a separate login to monitor their kids' spending habits, would constantly show how much money has been spent this month already and would allow parents to set limits to how much their kids may spend per week or month. I could well see something like a "seal of approval" by some child protection group that such games could use to advertise their games, what government should do is either form such a group or endorse a reputable one and advertise that "seal" as a way for parents to discriminate between good and bad games.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
The UK Government will be examining whether free to download apps are putting unfair pressure on kids to pay up for additional content within the game through in-app purchases.
Let's help them with that so they can get on with the important job of searching the Pope's quarters for suspicious crucifixes and rosaries...
0. Kids are generally easier to con and less responsible than adults. That's why we don't let them drive, drink, vote or have credit cards.
1. Yes - they're disingenuously called "free-to-play" games and every app store is heaving with them. Technically you can enjoy the game without paying, but they're specifically designed to tempt you to open your wallet. Particularly insidious are the ones with both an imaginary in-game economy and the option of spending real money, where the two concepts can easily get blurred enough to fool a kid. A parent wouldn't necessarily pot this if they 'checked out' the game for a few minutes.
2. Evidence - the industry wouldn't be doing this if they weren't making more money from in-app purchases than by charging a fair, one-off price for the game.
3. Solution - the Govenment doesn't want to get any further into video game censorship than it already is, but we already have age-rating systems. Any game with in-app purchases should be marked as "Funded by in-app purchases and not suitable for under 16s" and make use of whatever parental controls exist on the platform. Games could be exempted if they could demonstrate that they had adequate mechanisms to allow parents to cap spending, and had payments disabled by default. (Giving a kid a limited budget to manage is not a bad thing, but they need training wheels!)
4. Next steps - don't bother: by the time you finish grinding out your report, customer pressure will have forced all the reputable app stores and age-rating schemes to fix this: Apple have already improved labelling of games with in-app purchases.
5. Conclusion - even the solutions in (3) and (4) won't solve this problem - there's too much money in it - but they might help responsible people avoid this trap. Sadly, we'll still see a lot of potentially good gameplay wrecked by greed for in-app purchases.
Now, let's have a quick look for stains in Mr Holmes' underpants.
In a survey of 100 programmers, 111111 thought that duck-typing was a good idea.
Your kid, spending your money . . . . . . should not be the government's problem.
Ah, parents these days . . . and their children . . . most of the time they're somebody else's problem.
Why should predatory business practices be allowed behavior by default and the burden of guarding against them be placed on the consumer? Should real-estate fraud be allowed and should the onus of guarding against it be placed on the consumer? It's kind of convenient to have a police force who sees to it that the occurrence of real-estate fraud is minimized, even hard core free market fanatics admit that much. So if we can do something to crack down on people who have turned exploiting the economic naivete of children into a business model then we should do it. Suckering kids and teens into buying toys and other junk is one thing but some of these in-app game purchases are bordering on downright fraud.
Can't speak for nowadays because I don't use iTunes any more, but I remember that going back when I registered it was not possible to create an account without a credit card or an equivalent debit service. This was one of the European iTunes stores.
At least until relatively recently Apple required the password to be entered even for free downloads and updates of existing apps.
Buying a kid a toy used to be a safe bet, the purchase of the item was the sum total of the toy's price.
When? In the 1950s? Almost every toy sold in last 50 years was designed to make the kid whine for the rest of the series. GI Joe, Lego, Pokemon, Barbie, Matchbox, etc.
Who logs in to gdm? Not I, said the duck.
Winne-the-Pooh? The UK beef burgers are more likely to be 75% horse. Eeyore would be closer.
You're a temporary arrangement of matter sliding towards oblivion in a cold, uncaring universe
It required one for me to sign up, but that was back at the first gen touch. I cannot speak to anything more recently.
You are entitled to your own opinions, not your own facts.
As far as I know, in-app purchases require you to put in your password. Parents really should know better than to trust their kids with full access to unlimited credit. That said, I do believe that the companies are acting in a predatory fashion.
However, kids are marketed to in a pretty ruthless fashion, so I think teaching kids about how to budget money and not impulse buy all the time is very useful. Get them a pre-paid card and give them £5 a week to spend - they learn something and get to play the games without being able to rack up huge bills.
You're a temporary arrangement of matter sliding towards oblivion in a cold, uncaring universe
So, the solution is to use a credit card to create the account and then block the card? Sigh.
The truth may be out there, but lies are inside your head
And the password would be cached for 15minutes or so, allowing kids to buy in app purchases after asking the parent to update/install software until the cache timed out. Just one minute can be enough time for some very expensive downloads.
The problem is that the same password is used for everything. After the kid asks you to enter it the 20th time to enable some free feature or change some setting the parent just hands it over.
They need to implement a separate password for purchases.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
The real problem is after hundreds of years of trying to make a civilized world/society where you don't have to keep watching for predators all the time, you still get assholes who ruin things for everyone.
Not saying we should turn the world into a safe theme park but these people know exactly what they are doing - preying on the weak. Some may say who cares about the weak, but us humans have got where we are not by being the strongest badass creature in the world. Or even the smartest. Yes we're smart but it's not what makes a country great. We've got where we are by working together and not backstabbing each other at every opportunity.
A country full of smart people backstabbing each other doesn't get very far. A lot of those nice places to live in are nice because they're not full of swindlers, thieves and backstabbers. And so making life harder for such people is not something I'd lose sleep over. Give them half a chance and they might "progress" to investment banking...
re: iTunes does not require a credit card at all. You can create an account with just a $10 gift card.
:>)
Oopsie! My cousins had been getting bonus money in order to be able to download music and populate their iPods. Once my aunt realized they could fill the iPod-touches (plural =?= iPods-touch ?) with the mongo-huge collection of CDs which they already owned, that faucet of bonus money turned off. I am in the doghouse.
.
Good point. My cousins are miffed at me because I pointed out to their parents that iTunes and the iPod also do not require you to pay for and download content which you already own digitally. It's possible to put a music CD into an Apple computer and have iTunes rip the CD into the appropriate FLAC/AAC/MP4 format needed for iTunes and the iPod.
I use android. I did not connect any credit card to the google account, so there is no bill to rack up - other than normal phone bills. Of course that means I can't purchase apps either, but there are enough free apps for me. For music, I buy the CD and rip it myself to ogg. Better than MP3, and the CD is a nice backup if the phone is lost an/or I switch providers.
The in-game purchase model is wrong. You should have to move a fixed amount of money into the game first, before being able to spend. That way, no surprises. And the rich can still spend freely, purchasing their way through some boring game. But they don't want that, they'll loose "sales" to the careless . . .
No, the solution is another provider who don't force a credit card. Such as android - no card needed!
Or you can go to the apple store and try to buy an iphone/ipad with cash. Claim that you don't have a credit card, ask them to set up the device for you. Maybe they can? If they tell you to get a card "no risk because you don't have to use it, tell the clerk to ready the device using his own card. No risk because there will be no use, right?
I am a happy bunny, but have had major agro from O2 and T-Mobile (who called in debt collectors for a BB I never had)
Sent from my ASR33 using ASCII
I agree that some of these games could be excessive if you purchased all the in-game items. I calculated that purchasing each "premium" item at least once could cost between $100 and $500 for Simpsons: Tapped Out. This is very similar to gambling. You can have sensible people that view it as some entertainment and will stop after a limit, or you have the people that don't set limits and lose a lot. With that comparison, kids are protected from gambling so there should be something in place for software companies to protect children. Software companies do need to make money of course, and this method is important because it allows the consumer to try a game before buying/paying for it. It also allows people that don't want to grind to be able to experience the end-game content. I do object to games like Simpsons: Tapped Out that make it next to impossible to ever get premium items without paying, but that's their choice. On the flip side, some responsible parenting would be good too. Teach children the value of money and of working for a reward (in-game or otherwise). Don't give your children access to phones or software that are attached to credit cards or billing accounts. Restrict them to game/gift cards for purchasing content. (perhaps that could be the new currency for allowances?)
--
Luck is just skill you didn't know you had.
The problem is that the same password is used for everything.
No it's not. The Apple ID is on thing, it's used for downloading.
Parental controls is a pin number.
And the passcode to access the device in the first place is a different one again.
If you're saying there should be a different password for free and non-free app downloads, that's straying into needlessly complicated territory. Not Apple's style.
We're talking about YOUR iOS device here and YOUR account. You should take an interest in what apps the kid is downloading, even if they are free.
If it's the kids own iOS device, he gets his own Apple ID, without unlimited credit card attached.
Either way, he doesn't get the parental controls PIN.
There's a setting for that. 15, 10, 5 and prompt every time. This isn't too far away from the content rating settings.
Beware of those who profit off the docile and persecute the unbelievers.
iOS Restrictions (parental controls) allows you to choose to have that 15 minutes, or require a password for every download.
It still does.
Who's device is it? If it's the kids, then they have their own account, with whatever financial arrangements you choose.
If it's your device, then you wouldn't want the kid adding and updating apps without permission.
No, I can't. People in the US, UK and a handful of other countries can, but for many, including in Apple's biggest market, it is not an option.
My kid has had a checking account with a Visa card attached since he was 5. You can definitely get them. Of course, the parents suggestion of "When it runs out of money, the kids have to wait until next week and maybe learn a bit about delayed gratification." means that he has already failed. My kid has never run out of money in his account because we taught him that spending every last penny is a dumb, self destructive thing to do. We openly discuss our finances with him and always have. He is fully aware that we pay our credit cards down to 0 every month and why we do it. He is fully aware of how expensive it is to max out your credit cards every month.
As far as I know, in-app purchases require you to put in your password.
....and as has been repeatedly pointed out there have often been loopholes in this, such as systems that cache the password for 15 minutes, or systems that 'cry wolf' by asking for passwords for (e.g.) free apps and updates, so parents get complacent. Plus, your average kid may be smart enough to shoulder-surf when you enter your password, but still dumb enough to be fooled into spending money without realising.
In a survey of 100 programmers, 111111 thought that duck-typing was a good idea.
You do know that its possible for both parents and businesses to share responsibility for things like this?
You seem eager to heap responsibility and blame on parents, but hey, businesses should be able to pursue the mighty buck wherever it leads, without consequences. Sounds fair.
Parents should watch what their kids are doing, and not give in to pestering - but that doesn't make it right for supposedly reputable businesses to lurk in the bushes poised to spring out and take advantage as soon as a parent makes a mistake.
In a survey of 100 programmers, 111111 thought that duck-typing was a good idea.
vthere should be a no pin mode for free stuff / updates.
Back when I had WOW cable they made to you go though all the buy screens for the free VOD stuff that had a price of $0.00. Directv does not use the do you want to buy X movie for X price on the free VOD stuff.
I can see a system where some get's used to clicking though buy screens with a price of $0 getting tipped up by a one the costs more then $0.
Why do you need the password for the free stuff?
Can't speak for nowadays because I don't use iTunes any more, but I remember that going back when I registered it was not possible to create an account without a credit card or an equivalent debit service. This was one of the European iTunes stores.
You could _always_ open with a credit card, and then immediately remove the credit card from the account. You could also open an account without a credit card if you knew how: You just had to click "Buy" on a free item, and then you could open an account with no credit card or even a gift card at all.
So that makes it OK to trick kids into buying stuff with their parents' money their parents can't afford? WTFIWWY?
We call them children for a reason. Make it so parents can't afford to leave them alone with a computer for 5 minutes and parents won't let them have access to computers or game systems or phones at all. I don't know if that's a good thing or not but it's not how I would want to run my household.
You can make immediate purchases through Google Android - for some 3D shooting games, the basic clothing like a Hawaii T-shirt, beach sunglasses and flip-flops is free, but the camouflage gear, armor, and infinite rounds costs real money.
Vintage computer adverts: http://www.vintageadbrowser.com/computers-and-software-ads
why does Apple require a credit card to download free apps or update apps that you've already paid for?
They don't. They certainly don't make it easy to proceed without a credit card but you _can_ set up an iTunes account and download and update free apps without a credit card. My apologies for not having a step-by-step available (it's been a while since I had to set up a CC-free account) but you can find the details with a little google-fu. But, it is possible.
Apple should make it _easier_, but it is possible.
Just never allow any form of payment on your device. No credit card, no phone billing, no store-bought 'credits', nothing, nada, zilch. This does mean you and those around you can not use a whole range of programs on that device but you'll soon find out you're not missing out on anything at all. Nothing. No bucket of smurfberries ever made anyone a better person. No virtual furniture ever made anyone a happier person. No VIP-badge ever turned someone from self-suggested failure into a social success.
This is especially important if you have children. Teach your children well. Feed them on your dreams, don't feed them to someone's business plan.
If this 'kills the industry', so be it. That industry made themselves ripe for slaughter anyway.
--frank[at]unternet.org
One other thing I recall the OFT investigating is/was people who took free government provided online services, repackaged them in app form and then sold them to unwitting people who didn't realize the services were meant to be free. Which seems like something that should indeed be handled, although I'm not sure if it really violates any law or how one might write a law to stop it.
Why does your kid need a IPad or a IPhone? Why not buy him a computer with an OS which does not have app stores.
Having a business model that relies on and hopes for parents to turn on the spigot that the child can tap is inherently deceitful.
See also: Credit card companies that hope you don't notice the fine print that they can jack up your rates, mathematically trapping you, and banks that tell you they're protecting your credit rating while in fact hoping you overcharge with your debit card so they can jack you for $35/overcharge.
Being technically legal in the fine print, while hoping you actually fall into troubles because that is their primary, not secondary, business model is deceitful.
(-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
I think its you that needs to grow up. The rest of use are sick of ... parents to[o] lazy to parent .......... teach you[r] children the consequences of [their actions], it's YOUR job.
Lazy? It does not sound as if you have ever been a parent. It is a 50-hours-a-day job on top of other things like maintaining the house, housework, the massive amount of paperwork connected with bills, school etc, and dealing with problems arising from grandparents - plus the small matter of neeeding to go to work for a living. Yet on top of all that you want parents to stand watching over their children's shoulders all their waking hours to make sure that they are not snagged in some way by some crook.
"teach you[r] children the consequences of [their actions]" is your advice. Well, it takes at least 16 years of intensive teaching to prepare a child for the world, in some cases more. The children who have been highlighted in this issue are less than 10, and are well away from learning to contol serious money - something that many adults never even grasp.
Why does your kid need a IPad or a IPhone? Why not buy him a computer with an OS which does not have app stores.
You did say BUY a computer but there's little sale outside these top prebundled OSs:
Ubuntu App store
MacOS X App store
Windows 8 App store
It won't be easy finding legal Windows 7 copy without online merchants so that you can live App-free on your new computer.
Unless you plan to build your own PC and put non-Ubuntu FOSS on it, other choices call for wading into uncanny territory or buying older unsold items and used stuff
That said, I don't promote the idea of purchasing a tablet or phones for kids. There's already a living room PC and a laptop sitting around at home and kids do NOT need more room to hide their acts.
This is the same problem 99% of security experts seem to not understand: If you require passwords for everything that dilutes the security for when it's really needed.
If the parents only had to type the password when they spend real money, they would realize that they need to keep it safe. Heck, the amount of times iOS bugged me about my password I wouldn't be surprised if some parents just said "screw it, the password's hunter2. Don't buy anything though". Just to stop their kids from bugging them every 5 minutes.
Kids under 13 can't have an Apple account. A few years ago it was 18.
Maybe now they've got some kind of parent managed account like you describe, but if so all this stuff is pretty recent.
There is something in what you say. In the 80s, they actually had devices for kids. You could by a kids' cassette player/recorder, for example, which was lower fidelity than a "real" one, but had bigger buttons, was more robust, and cost less.
Today, they do make kids' MP3 players. My kids have them, and they're a pretty good deal. However, they don't make touchscreen app devices for kids, and the existing options are woefully inadequate (e.g. in Jelly Bean 4.2, you can't buy an app for the device, only for a single user).
If it helps, consider this: The OFT is investigating because the market has failed. Making locked-down devices for kids is an obvious thing that would sell exceedingly well. The reason it hasn't happened is because predators make the store operators a lot of money.
sub f{($f)=@_;print"$f(q{$f});";}f(q{sub f{($f)=@_;print"$f(q{$f});";}f});
Oh-ho-ho-ho....
I've set up my special Christmas line just for you...
The reality is, it's insane for any company with a decent reputation to be getting involved with these scams. Even companies that aren't involved with scamming people might eventually be splattered with mud (or is it mud...) from this kind of sharp practice.
I mean the video game industry is already the go to area for every moral panic, and this is a case where they are being legitimately sleazy and evil...
Seriously, this is on the level of a Nigerian 419 scams... and about as ethical. Even if you are a slimeball who believes that the suckers deserve to be fleeced, you need a Lyle Langley type exit strategy at the least... (Yes, I realize the irony of this given Tapped Out.)
"MIT betrayed all of its basic principles."
Yeah, when read stuff like this, I always say, "If you don't like it, then move to the United States..."
"MIT betrayed all of its basic principles."
Expecting parents to be looking over the shoulder of their kids,
No, it isn't. That is your job as a parent. If you don't want your kids to spend money, don't give them the password.
It's about deceitful advertisements that trick people in buying stuff.
And what would those deceitful advertisements be?
the problem is this detaches the child from the fact of spending money. With real money, they have something physical. When you buy something they loose something physical. If they get something physical in return, the see it. If they don't get something physical in return, the feel it. This is a learning process. Child CC's are tool by the industry to suck you into the industry soon. It used to be they aimed at college as that was the first "fresh meat". Even if you got with a child CC, you better be making that child earn there money. Giving a child money each week wont teach them anything. So what if I spend it, I get more next week.
Memory is deceptive because it is colored by today's events. - Albert Einstein
Kids are quite used to getting nothing material in return for their money. And the "so what if I spend today, I get money again" mentality is quite adult. That's what working for a wage is, essentially.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
The problem I see is that free games used to be financed by advertisers who wanted their banners seen. But now we have free games with in-app purchases. An example might be a first person shooter game where if you want more than a bow and arrow, you have to buy a gun, and ammo (separately). Or a virtual reality game where you are naked until you buy some clothes. In a early game called, Jones in the Fast Lane, if you waited too long to buy clothes, your avatar ended up sporting a barrel with suspenders. Of course that was not for real money. But getting back to games with paid for advantages. You don't have to be killed every few minutes by foes with superior weapons very long before you want to buy a machine gun. I got involved in one such game thinking if I was skillful enough, I wouldn't have to spend real money for enhancements, but it was not so. My policy now it to delete a game as soon as it becomes obvious it is a trap leading to in-app purchases.
Only in the same sense that the Amazon deliveries can only be cancelled by burning down your own house so the package has nowhere to be delivered.
Google is your friend.
http://lmgtfy.com/?q=itunes+store+no+credit+card
Answer is to click the "None" button when asked for payment details.
-- Using the preview button since 2005
This is the same problem 99% of security experts seem to not understand: If you require passwords for everything that dilutes the security for when it's really needed. If the parents only had to type the password when they spend real money, they would realize that they need to keep it safe. Heck, the amount of times iOS bugged me about my password I wouldn't be surprised if some parents just said "screw it, the password's hunter2. Don't buy anything though". Just to stop their kids from bugging them every 5 minutes.
Nonsense. You do not have to enter your password unless you are installing software (free or paid). You let your kids install software of any kind? Crazy, I say. My kids can't install jack without me showing up to enter the password - if I approve. And they know not to ask to install everything in the world. The answer is no.
No, not crazy. I'd say you just like being authoritarian. If you don't trust your kids with a computer maybe you should just not let them have one. Almost every computer/game machine made so far has operated in a way that "trusts" kids to use them. What sort of harmful stuff can they get on the App store anyway which they couldn't get on the web?
Credit card info is of course another matter, one which I would put on a different level of security than "let my kids download doodle jump on their iPad".
No, not crazy. I'd say you just like being authoritarian. If you don't trust your kids with a computer maybe you should just not let them have one. Almost every computer/game machine made so far has operated in a way that "trusts" kids to use them. What sort of harmful stuff can they get on the App store anyway which they couldn't get on the web? Credit card info is of course another matter, one which I would put on a different level of security than "let my kids download doodle jump on their iPad".
It's not authoritarian to protect them, dipwad. Do your kids have administrative privileges on their PC's? If they do, they've got metric shitloads of malware installed.
In case you didn't know this, Apple's App store uses the "walled-garden" model. Basically they review all software and developers need to obey strict guideline to be approved. Between online porn, social networks and cyberbullying I don't really think malware on the App store is much of an issue.
PCs are of course different, but consider that before Windows XP there was hardly such thing as restricted accounts on PCs. Sure, malware was sometimes a problem (even without user interaction) but we grew up fine with the "reckless" amount of control we had on our PCs. If anything things have gotten much much safer between improved Windows security, firewalls and paranoid anti-virus software.
If you really want to have total control over what your kids do then I guess that's up to you. The technology of today makes it possible to completely monitor them, in the digital as well as the real world. Being overprotective is probably a natural kind of development.
In case you didn't know this, Apple's App store uses the "walled-garden" model. Basically they review all software and developers need to obey strict guideline to be approved. Between online porn, social networks and cyberbullying I don't really think malware on the App store is much of an issue.
PCs are of course different, but consider that before Windows XP there was hardly such thing as restricted accounts on PCs. Sure, malware was sometimes a problem (even without user interaction) but we grew up fine with the "reckless" amount of control we had on our PCs. If anything things have gotten much much safer between improved Windows security, firewalls and paranoid anti-virus software.
If you really want to have total control over what your kids do then I guess that's up to you. The technology of today makes it possible to completely monitor them, in the digital as well as the real world. Being overprotective is probably a natural kind of development.
I'm well aware of all that. The appearance of Administrative rights on personal computers is a direct result of all the malware out there. If you're allowing all users on your computers to be administrators, you're very naive. Just like anyone who allows their kids to have their iTunes passwords is naive. It's not as if you need the password to USE the device; only for installation of software. Of course that flies in the face of your rant about requiring "passwords for everything." You claimed that iOS bugged you for your password every five minutes. I guess you must have been installing software every five minutes. Or more likely, you are just spouting hyperbole to support your rant.
I'd say it's more to do with Windows' evolution towards a multi-user OS. On a more technical note stuff like file system access control has improved security against viruses and remote hacking.
I don't consider myself "administrator" to anyone else's PC. I have my own computers and accounts which I of course keep to myself. In a corporate environment you need a different policy of course.
About iOS: Adding and removing Apps is just about the only thing this "OS" lets you do. In that context I suppose you can say you need a password for everything. I don't play a lot of games on phones or tablets, but I did spend a while messing round with it when I first got an iPhone. I found that 90% of the stuff scarcely entertained for more than five minutes, but it was fun to download and try out new stuff all the time, just like online flash games. So yeah, I would very easily pass the "password every five minutes" mark. I can't imagine there'd be much fun left with an overprotective parent saying "no, two games a day is enough. You can't be installing everything in the world"
You'd be surprised. Kids today will watch the same movie dozens of times. And there are many apps out there with hours and hours of playability, such as Scrabble and all its clones, not to mention the games I write (couldn't resist).
I used to watch movies a dozen times back in the day cause VHS tapes were so fucking expensive. I would have thought that kids these days might have moved on as technology progressed.
Scrabble sure offers hours of "play"-ability. But as a kid I'd have found the 3D action and racing games more engaging. And I still do. Maybe your kids aren't having the fun they could have.
And yet the 3D action and racing games are only good for 5 minutes? My kids have plenty of games to play. I was talking about games I consider playing more than 5 minutes.
Most of the stuff on iOS is only good for five minutes. Occaisonly you'll find a gem worth playing much longer. That's kind of the beauty of it, exploring what's out there and finding new stuff. I can certainly spend hours on a game that's only marginally enjoyable, but why should I if there's so much else out there to discover?
Most of the stuff on iOS is only good for five minutes. Occaisonly you'll find a gem worth playing much longer. That's kind of the beauty of it, exploring what's out there and finding new stuff. I can certainly spend hours on a game that's only marginally enjoyable, but why should I if there's so much else out there to discover?
I would have to disagree with fervor. I download something new at most once every two weeks. You must be stricken with a bad case of ADD.
To each his own, but it does mean you miss out on an awful lot of stuff and aren't very knowledgeable of the market.
I can certainly appreciate games with depth, it's just that they tend not to be on iOS. I could certainly kill time with scrabble, it's just not that enaging or rewarding to me when I know there's better stuff out there, even on iOS. Life's too short for boring games.
To each his own, but it does mean you miss out on an awful lot of stuff and aren't very knowledgeable of the market. I can certainly appreciate games with depth, it's just that they tend not to be on iOS. I could certainly kill time with scrabble, it's just not that enaging or rewarding to me when I know there's better stuff out there, even on iOS. Life's too short for boring games.
You don't have to buy something every five minutes to be knowledgeable about the market. There are plenty of games with depth on iOS; if you can't find them, it's you who isn't very knowledgeable about the market.
Well, you can look at stuff like user ratings and reviews, but I prefer a hands-on approach. Often times you'll find something well worth playing that hasn't grabbed any media attention. If you only download something once a fortnight chances are you're not going to find these apps by your own.
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